Cedarea Dobrogei de Sud (Cadrilaterului)
– The Surrender of Southern Dobruja (Quadrilater)

Summary/Abstract: The tragic summer of 1940 brought, for Romania, not just the loss of Bessarabia and Northern Bucovina in favour of the Soviet Union and of roughly half of Transylvania to Hungary, but also the retrocession of Southern Dobruja to Bulgaria. The Romanian State had obtained this territory in 1913 appealing to geopolitical justifications. The hereby article briefly presents the main points related to the evolution of this region within interwar Romania, the plans of Romanian and Bulgarian decision-makers in the context of 1938-1940, the conditions surrounding its surrender in the summer of 1940 and the concrete aspects concerning this territorial cession. The sources include numerous Romanian, Bulgarian and Western contributions, newer and older, as well as several documents from Romanian national, diplomatic and military archives. An inseparable part of the drama of the Greater Romania, the cession of Quadrilater nevertheless highlights strong individual characteristics. Similarly, the reasons invoked for obtaining this region during the years of the Balkan Wars and its identity and evolution within Romania, were also distinctive.

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