Dacology ( ro, Dacologie) is a branch of

Thracology Thracology ( bg, Тракология, Trakologiya; ro, Tracologie) is the scientific study of Ancient Thrace and Thracian antiquities and is a regional and thematic branch of the larger disciplines of ancient history and archaeology. A practition ...

which focuses on the scientific study of

Dacia Dacia (, ; ) was the land inhabited by the Dacians, its core in Transylvania, stretching to the Danube in the south, the Black Sea in the east, and the Tisza in the west. The Carpathian Mountains were located in the middle of Dacia. It thus r ...

and Dacian antiquities and is a regional and thematic branch of the larger disciplines of

ancient history Ancient history is a time period from the beginning of writing and recorded human history to as far as late antiquity. The span of recorded history is roughly 5,000 years, beginning with the Sumerian cuneiform script. Ancient history cove ...

and

archaeology Archaeology or archeology is the scientific study of human activity through the recovery and analysis of material culture. The archaeological record consists of artifacts, architecture, biofacts or ecofacts, sites, and cultural landscap ...

. A practitioner of the discipline is a Dacologist. Dacology investigates the range of ancient Dacian culture (

language Language is a structured system of communication. The structure of a language is its grammar and the free components are its vocabulary. Languages are the primary means by which humans communicate, and may be conveyed through a variety of met ...

literature Literature is any collection of written work, but it is also used more narrowly for writings specifically considered to be an art form, especially prose fiction, drama, and poetry. In recent centuries, the definition has expanded to include ...

history History (derived ) is the systematic study and the documentation of the human activity. The time period of event before the History of writing#Inventions of writing, invention of writing systems is considered prehistory. "History" is an umbr ...

religion Religion is usually defined as a social- cultural system of designated behaviors and practices, morals, beliefs, worldviews, texts, sanctified places, prophecies, ethics, or organizations, that generally relates humanity to supernatural, ...

art Art is a diverse range of human activity, and resulting product, that involves creative or imaginative talent expressive of technical proficiency, beauty, emotional power, or conceptual ideas. There is no generally agreed definition of wha ...

economics Economics () is the social science that studies the Production (economics), production, distribution (economics), distribution, and Consumption (economics), consumption of goods and services. Economics focuses on the behaviour and intera ...

, and

ethics Ethics or moral philosophy is a branch of philosophy that "involves systematizing, defending, and recommending concepts of right and wrong behavior".''Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy'' The field of ethics, along with aesthetics, concerns m ...

) from c. 1000 BC up to the end of

Roman Roman or Romans most often refers to: *Rome, the capital city of Italy *Ancient Rome, Roman civilization from 8th century BC to 5th century AD *Roman people, the people of ancient Rome *''Epistle to the Romans'', shortened to ''Romans'', a letter ...

rule in the 4th-7th centuries. It is directly subordinated to

, since Dacians are considered a branch of the

Thracian The Thracians (; grc, Θρᾷκες ''Thrāikes''; la, Thraci) were an Indo-European speaking people who inhabited large parts of Eastern and Southeastern Europe in ancient history.. "The Thracians were an Indo-European people who occupied t ...

s by most mainstream research and historical sources. Other theories sustain that the Daco-Thracian relation is not as strong as originally thought and as such Dacology has the potential to evolve as an independent discipline from Thracology.

History

One of the first mentions of the term Dacology was made by the historian Radu Vulpe at the 2nd ''International Congress of Thracology'' in September 1976 in connection with the Romanian historians Bogdan Petriceicu Hasdeu and

Ion I. Russu An ion () is an atom or molecule with a net electrical charge. The charge of an electron is considered to be negative by convention and this charge is equal and opposite to the charge of a proton, which is considered to be positive by conven ...

. The ''Romanian Thracology Institute I.G Bibicescu'', part of Romanian Academy, was founded in

Bucharest Bucharest ( , ; ro, București ) is the capital and largest city of Romania, as well as its cultural, industrial, and financial centre. It is located in the southeast of the country, on the banks of the Dâmbovița River, less than north of ...

in the same year.Archäologien Europas: Geschichte, Methoden und Theorien By Peter F. Biehl, Alexander Gramsch, Arkadiusz Marciniak One of his first directors was the thracologist Dumitru Berciu (1907–1998). The related term Thraco-Dacology also exists, alluding to

Thraco-Dacian The linguistic classification of the ancient Thracian language has long been a matter of contention and uncertainty, and there are widely varying hypotheses regarding its position among other Paleo-Balkan languages. It is not contested, however, t ...

, and one of the first uses is also from around 1980, in the Romanian government archive. The term ''Dacologist'' has been negatively affected by the association with protochronism. Some researchers prefer to call themselves Thracologists instead of Dacologists. This choice of title is made in the context of their research being focused on the Dacians and without necessarily promoting a strong connection between the Thracians and Dacians.

Dacologists

Researchers who have been noted in the field of Dacology include: * Bogdan Petriceicu Hasdeu *

* Radu Vulpe * Andrei Vartic

International Congress of Dacology

There have been 11 editions of the ''International Congress of Dacology'' organized so far. However, they have been organized by the controversial Dacianist group around

Napoleon Săvescu Dacianism is a Romanian term describing the tendency to ascribe, largely relying on questionable data and subjective interpretation, an idealized past to the country as a whole. While particularly prevalent during the regime of Nicolae Ceaușescu ...

, thus making the term Dacology synonymous with Protochronism in this ambiance.

References

Bibliography

* * * * *

External links

Nationalism and the Representation of Society in Romanian Archaeology

La plecarea lui Andrei Vartic
{{Dacia topics Historiography of Dacia Archaeology of Romania Dacian archaeology