Moldovan or Moldavian (
Latin alphabet
The Latin alphabet, also known as the Roman alphabet, is the collection of letters originally used by the Ancient Rome, ancient Romans to write the Latin language. Largely unaltered except several letters splitting—i.e. from , and from � ...
: ,
Moldovan Cyrillic alphabet
The Moldovan Cyrillic alphabet is a Cyrillic alphabet designed for the Romanian language spoken in the Soviet Union ( Moldovan) and was in official use from 1924 to 1932 and 1938 to 1989 (and still in use today in the breakaway Moldovan region ...
: ) is one of the two local names for the
Romanian language
Romanian (obsolete spelling: Roumanian; , or , ) is the official and main language of Romania and Moldova. Romanian is part of the Eastern Romance languages, Eastern Romance sub-branch of Romance languages, a linguistic group that evolved fr ...
in
Moldova
Moldova, officially the Republic of Moldova, is a Landlocked country, landlocked country in Eastern Europe, with an area of and population of 2.42 million. Moldova is bordered by Romania to the west and Ukraine to the north, east, and south. ...
. ''Moldovan'' was declared the official language of Moldova in Article 13 of the
constitution
A constitution is the aggregate of fundamental principles or established precedents that constitute the legal basis of a polity, organization or other type of entity, and commonly determines how that entity is to be governed.
When these pri ...
adopted in 1994,
while the 1991
Declaration of Independence of Moldova used the name ''Romanian''. In 2003, the
Moldovan parliament
The parliament of the Republic of Moldova () is the supreme representative body of the Republic of Moldova, the only state legislative authority, being a unicameral structure composed of 101 elected MPs on lists, for a period or legislature of ...
adopted a law defining ''Moldovan'' and ''Romanian'' as
glottonyms for the same language.
In 2013, the
Constitutional Court of Moldova
The Constitutional Court of the Republic of Moldova () represents the sole body of constitutional jurisdiction in the Moldova, Republic of Moldova, autonomous and independent from the executive, the legislature and the judiciary.
The task of the ...
interpreted that Article 13 of the constitution is superseded by the Declaration of Independence,
thus giving official status to the name ''Romanian''.
On 16 March 2023, the
Moldovan Parliament
The parliament of the Republic of Moldova () is the supreme representative body of the Republic of Moldova, the only state legislative authority, being a unicameral structure composed of 101 elected MPs on lists, for a period or legislature of ...
approved a law on referring to the
national language
'' ''
A national language is a language (or language variant, e.g. dialect) that has some connection— de facto or de jure—with a nation. The term is applied quite differently in various contexts. One or more languages spoken as first languag ...
as ''Romanian'' in all legislative texts and the
constitution
A constitution is the aggregate of fundamental principles or established precedents that constitute the legal basis of a polity, organization or other type of entity, and commonly determines how that entity is to be governed.
When these pri ...
. On 22 March, the
president of Moldova
The president of the Republic of Moldova () is the head of state of Moldova. The current president is Maia Sandu, who assumed office on 24 December 2020.
Duties and functions
The president "represents the State" and is "…the guarantor of n ...
,
Maia Sandu
Maia Sandu (; born 24 May 1972) is a Moldovan politician who is serving as the sixth president of Moldova since 2020. She is the founder and former leader of the Party of Action and Solidarity and was Prime Minister of Moldova, prime minister o ...
, promulgated the law.
The
breakaway region of
Transnistria
Transnistria, officially known as the Pridnestrovian Moldavian Republic and locally as Pridnestrovie, is a Landlocked country, landlocked Transnistria conflict#International recognition of Transnistria, breakaway state internationally recogn ...
continues to recognize "Moldavian" as one of its official languages, alongside
Russian and
Ukrainian.
Ukraine
Ukraine is a country in Eastern Europe. It is the List of European countries by area, second-largest country in Europe after Russia, which Russia–Ukraine border, borders it to the east and northeast. Ukraine also borders Belarus to the nor ...
also continued until recently to make a distinction between ''Moldovan'' and ''Romanian'', with one village declaring its language to be ''Romanian'' and another declaring it to be ''Moldovan'', though Ukrainian officials have announced an intention to remove the legal status of ''Moldovan''.
On 16 November 2023, the
Ministry of Education and Science of the Ukrainian government stated that it has initiated steps to abolish the Moldovan language and to replace it with Romanian. On 13 January 2024, Ukrainian newspaper ''Dumska'' reported that the Ukrainian Ministry of Education and Science had announced all 16 schools in Odesa Oblast teaching "Moldovan" had dropped the term in favor of Romanian.
The language of the Moldovans had for centuries been interchangeably identified by both terms, but during the time of the
Soviet Union
The Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR), commonly known as the Soviet Union, was a List of former transcontinental countries#Since 1700, transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 until Dissolution of the Soviet ...
, ''Moldovan'', or as it was called at the time, ''Moldavian'', was the only term officially recognized. Its resolution declared Moldavian a
Romance language
The Romance languages, also known as the Latin or Neo-Latin languages, are the languages that are Language family, directly descended from Vulgar Latin. They are the only extant subgroup of the Italic languages, Italic branch of the Indo-E ...
distinct from Romanian.
While a majority of Moldovans with higher education,
as well as a majority of inhabitants of the capital city of
Chișinău
Chișinău ( , , ; formerly known as Kishinev) is the Capital city, capital and List of cities and towns in Moldova, largest city of Moldova. The city is Moldova's main industrial and commercial centre, and is located in the middle of the coun ...
,
call their language ''Romanian'', most rural residents indicated ''Moldovan'' as their native language in the
2004 census.
In schools in Moldova, the term "Romanian language" has been used since independence.
The
variety of Romanian spoken in Moldova is the
Moldavian subdialect, which is spread approximately within the territory of the former
Principality of Moldavia
Moldavia (, or ; in Romanian Cyrillic: or ) is a historical region and former principality in Eastern Europe, corresponding to the territory between the Eastern Carpathians and the Dniester River. An initially independent and later auto ...
(now split between
Romania
Romania is a country located at the crossroads of Central Europe, Central, Eastern Europe, Eastern and Southeast Europe. It borders Ukraine to the north and east, Hungary to the west, Serbia to the southwest, Bulgaria to the south, Moldova to ...
, Moldova and
Ukraine
Ukraine is a country in Eastern Europe. It is the List of European countries by area, second-largest country in Europe after Russia, which Russia–Ukraine border, borders it to the east and northeast. Ukraine also borders Belarus to the nor ...
). Moldavian is considered one of the five major spoken varieties of Romanian. However, all five are written identically, and Moldova and Romania share the same
literary language
Literary language is the Register (sociolinguistics), register of a language used when writing in a formal, academic writing, academic, or particularly polite tone; when speaking or writing in such a tone, it can also be known as formal language. ...
.
The standard alphabet used in Moldova is equivalent to the
Romanian alphabet
The Romanian alphabet is a variant of the Latin alphabet used for writing the Romanian language. It consists of 31 letters, five of which (Ă, Â, Î, Ș, and Ț) have been modified from their Latin originals for the phonetic requirements of t ...
, which uses the
Latin script
The Latin script, also known as the Roman script, is a writing system based on the letters of the classical Latin alphabet, derived from a form of the Greek alphabet which was in use in the ancient Greek city of Cumae in Magna Graecia. The Gree ...
. Until 1918, varieties of the
Romanian Cyrillic alphabet
The Romanian Cyrillic alphabet is the Cyrillic alphabet that was used to write the Romanian language and Church Slavonic until the 1830s, when it began to be gradually replaced by a Latin-based Romanian alphabet.Cyrillic remained in occasion ...
were used. The
Moldovan Cyrillic alphabet
The Moldovan Cyrillic alphabet is a Cyrillic alphabet designed for the Romanian language spoken in the Soviet Union ( Moldovan) and was in official use from 1924 to 1932 and 1938 to 1989 (and still in use today in the breakaway Moldovan region ...
(derived from the
Russian alphabet
The Russian alphabet (, or , more traditionally) is the script used to write the Russian language.
The modern Russian alphabet consists of 33 letters: twenty consonants (, , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ), ten vowels (, , , , , , , , , ) ...
and standardised in the Soviet Union) was used in 1924–1932 and 1938–1989 and remains in use in Transnistria.
History and politics
Birth

The history of the Moldovan language refers to the historical evolution of the
glottonym ''Moldavian''/''Moldovan'' in Moldova and beyond. It is closely tied to the region's political status, as during long periods of rule by
Russia
Russia, or the Russian Federation, is a country spanning Eastern Europe and North Asia. It is the list of countries and dependencies by area, largest country in the world, and extends across Time in Russia, eleven time zones, sharing Borders ...
and the
Soviet Union
The Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR), commonly known as the Soviet Union, was a List of former transcontinental countries#Since 1700, transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 until Dissolution of the Soviet ...
, officials emphasized the language's name as part of separating the Moldovans from those people who began to identify as Romanian in a different nation-building process. Cyrillic script was in use. From a linguistic perspective, ''Moldovan'' is an alternative name for the varieties of the
Romanian language
Romanian (obsolete spelling: Roumanian; , or , ) is the official and main language of Romania and Moldova. Romanian is part of the Eastern Romance languages, Eastern Romance sub-branch of Romance languages, a linguistic group that evolved fr ...
spoken in the
Republic of Moldova
Moldova, officially the Republic of Moldova, is a landlocked country in Eastern Europe, with an area of and population of 2.42 million. Moldova is bordered by Romania to the west and Ukraine to the north, east, and south. The unrecognised ...
(see
History of the Romanian language
The history of the Romanian language started in Roman provinces north of the Jireček Line in Classical antiquity. There are three main hypotheses around its exact territory: the autochthony thesis (it developed in left-Danube Dacia only), the dis ...
).
Before 1918, during the period between the wars, and after the
union of Bessarabia with Romania
The union of Bessarabia with Romania was proclaimed on by Sfatul Țării, the legislative body of the Moldavian Democratic Republic. This state had the same borders of the region of Bessarabia, which was annexed by the Russian Empire following t ...
, scholars did not have consensus that Moldovans and the Romanians formed a single ethnic group. The Moldovan peasants had grown up in a different political entity and missed the years of creating a pan-Romanian national political consciousness. They identified as Moldovans speaking the language "Moldovan". This caused reactions from pan-Romanian nationalists. The concept of the distinction of Moldovan from Romanian was explicitly stated only in the early 20th century. It accompanied the raising of national awareness among Moldovans, with the Soviets emphasizing distinctions between Moldavians and Romanians.
''Moldavian'' has also been recorded by the 1960s' ''Romanian Linguistic Atlas'' as the answer to the question "What
anguagedo you speak?" in parts of
Western Moldavia
Western Moldavia (, ''Moldova de Apus'', or , also known as Moldavia, is the core historic and geographical part of the former Principality of Moldavia situated in eastern and north-eastern Romania. Until its union with Wallachia in 1878, the P ...
(
Galați
Galați ( , , ; also known by other #Etymology and names, alternative names) is the capital city of Galați County in the historical region of Western Moldavia, in eastern Romania. Galați is a port town on the river Danube. and the sixth-larges ...
and
Iași
Iași ( , , ; also known by other #Etymology and names, alternative names), also referred to mostly historically as Jassy ( , ), is the Cities in Romania, third largest city in Romania and the seat of Iași County. Located in the historical ...
counties).
Major developments since the fall of the Soviet Union include resuming use of a Latin script rather than Cyrillic letters in 1989, and several changes in the statutory name of the official language used in Moldova. At one point of particular confusion about identity in the 1990s, all references to geography in the name of the language were dropped, and it was officially known simply as ' — 'the state language'.
Moldovan was assigned the code
mo
in
ISO 639-1
ISO 639-1:2002, ''Codes for the representation of names of languages—Part 1: Alpha-2 code'', is the first part of the ISO 639 series of international standards for language codes. Part 1 covers the registration of "set 1" two-letter codes. The ...
and code
mol
in
ISO 639-2
ISO 639-2:1998, ''Codes for the representation of names of languages — Part 2: Alpha-3 code'', is the second part of the ISO 639 International standard, standard, which lists Language code, codes for the representation of the names of languages ...
and
ISO 639-3
ISO 639-3:2007, ''Codes for the representation of names of languages – Part 3: Alpha-3 code for comprehensive coverage of languages'', is an international standard for language codes in the ISO 639 series. It defines three-letter codes for ...
. Since November 2008, these have been deprecated, leaving
ro
and
ron
(639-2/T) and
rum
(639-2/B), the language identifiers to be used for the variant of the Romanian language also known as Moldavian and Moldovan in English, the ISO 639-2 Registration Authority said in explaining the decision.
In 1989, the contemporary Romanian version of the
Latin alphabet
The Latin alphabet, also known as the Roman alphabet, is the collection of letters originally used by the Ancient Rome, ancient Romans to write the Latin language. Largely unaltered except several letters splitting—i.e. from , and from � ...
was adopted as the
official script
An official is someone who holds an office (function or mandate, regardless of whether it carries an actual working space with it) in an organization or government and participates in the exercise of authority (either their own or that of the ...
of the
Moldavian SSR
The Moldavian Soviet Socialist Republic or Moldavian SSR (, mo-Cyrl, Република Советикэ Сочиалистэ Молдовеняскэ), also known as the Moldovan Soviet Socialist Republic, Moldovan SSR, Soviet Moldavia, Sovie ...
.
[ Legea cu privire la funcționarea limbilor vorbite pe teritoriul RSS Moldovenești nr. 3465-XI din 01.09.89 Vestile nr. 9/217, 1989 (Law regarding the usage of languages spoken on the territory of the Republic of Moldova): "Moldavian SSR supports the desire of the Moldovans that live across the borders of the Republic, and considering the really existing linguistical Moldo-Romanian identity – of the Romanians that live on the territory of the USSR, of doing their studies and satisfying their cultural needs in their mother tongue."]
Independent Moldova
The Declaration of Independence of
Moldova
Moldova, officially the Republic of Moldova, is a Landlocked country, landlocked country in Eastern Europe, with an area of and population of 2.42 million. Moldova is bordered by Romania to the west and Ukraine to the north, east, and south. ...
(27 August 1991) named the official language as "Romanian". The 1994 constitution, passed under a Communist government, declared "Moldovan" as the state language.
When in 1993 the
Romanian Academy
The Romanian Academy ( ) is a cultural forum founded in Bucharest, Romania, in 1866. It covers the scientific, artistic and literary domains. The academy has 181 active members who are elected for life.
According to its bylaws, the academy's ma ...
changed the official orthography of the Romanian language, the Institute of Linguistics at the
Academy of Sciences of Moldova did not initially make these changes, which however have since been adopted.
In 1996, the Moldovan president
Mircea Snegur
Mircea Snegur (; 17 January 1940 – 13 September 2023) was a Moldovan agronomist and politician who served as the first President of Moldova from 1990 to 1997. Prior to that, he served as the Chairman of the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet of ...
attempted to change the official
name of the language back to ''Romanian''; the Moldovan Parliament, dominated by the Democratic Agrarian Party and various far left forces, dismissed the proposal as promoting "Romanian expansionism".
In 2003, a
Moldovan–Romanian dictionary ( (2003)) by
Vasile Stati
Vasile Stati (born 20 September 1939) is a Moldovan politician and historian.
Biography
He studied history and philology at the Moldovan language Department of the Moldova State University, State University of Chișinău.
He is the author of ...
was published aiming to prove that there existed two distinct languages. Reacting to this, linguists of the
Romanian Academy
The Romanian Academy ( ) is a cultural forum founded in Bucharest, Romania, in 1866. It covers the scientific, artistic and literary domains. The academy has 181 active members who are elected for life.
According to its bylaws, the academy's ma ...
in Romania declared that all the Moldovan words are also Romanian words, although some of its contents are disputed as being Russian
loanword
A loanword (also a loan word, loan-word) is a word at least partly assimilated from one language (the donor language) into another language (the recipient or target language), through the process of borrowing. Borrowing is a metaphorical term t ...
s. In Moldova, the head of the
Academy of Sciences' Institute of Linguistics, Ion Bărbuță, described the dictionary as "an absurdity, serving political purposes". Stati, however, accused both of promoting "Romanian colonialism". At that point, a group of Romanian linguists adopted a resolution stating that promotion of the notion of a distinct Moldovan language is an anti-scientific campaign.
In 2003, the
Parliament of the Republic of Moldova
In modern politics and history, a parliament is a legislative body of government. Generally, a modern parliament has three functions: representing the electorate, making laws, and overseeing the government via hearings and inquiries. ...
adopted a law defining ''Moldovan'' and ''Romanian'' as designations for the same language (
glottonyms).
In the
2004 census, 16.5% (558,508) of the 3,383,332 people living in Moldova declared Romanian as their native language, whereas 60% declared Moldovan. Most of the latter responses were from rural populations. While the majority of the population in the capital city of
Chișinău
Chișinău ( , , ; formerly known as Kishinev) is the Capital city, capital and List of cities and towns in Moldova, largest city of Moldova. The city is Moldova's main industrial and commercial centre, and is located in the middle of the coun ...
gave their language as "Romanian", in the countryside more than six-sevenths of the Romanian/Moldovan speakers indicated "Moldovan" as their native language, reflecting historic conservatism.
Currently, 2,184,065 people or 80.2% of those covered by the 2014 census on the right bank of the Dniester or Moldova (proper, without the Transnistrian separatist region) identified Moldovan or Romanian as their native language, of which 1,544,726 (55.1%) declared Moldovan and 639.339 (22.8%) declared it Romanian. According to the 2014 census, 2,720,377 answered to the question on "language usually used for communication". 2,138,964 people or 78.63% of the inhabitants of Moldova (proper, without the Transnistrian separatist region) have Moldovan/Romanian as first language, of which 1,486,570 (53%) declared it Moldovan and 652,394 (23.3%) declared it Romanian.
In the Republic of Moldova, “more than half of the self-proclaimed Moldovans (53.5%) said that they saw no difference” between the Romanian and Moldovan languages according to a survey conducted by Pal Kolsto and Hans Olav Melberg in 1998. Opinion polling from the Chernivtsi oblast indicated that a significant majority of the self-identified Moldovans thought that there was no difference between the Moldovan language and the Romanian language in that part of Ukraine. According to Alla Skvortsova, an ethnic Russian researcher from the Republic of Moldova, "Our survey found that while 94.4 percent of the Romanians living in Moldova consider Moldovan and Romanian to be the same language, only half of the Moldovans (53.2 percent) share this view".
In schools in Moldova, the term ''Romanian language'' has been used since independence.
In December 2007,
Moldovan president Vladimir Voronin
Vladimir Voronin (; born Vladimir Bujeniță, 25 May 1941) is a Moldovan politician. He was the third President of Moldova#Republic of Moldova (1991–present), President of Moldova from 2001 until 2009 and has been the leader of the Party of ...
asked for the term to be changed to ''Moldovan language'', but due to public pressure against that choice, the term was not changed.
In December 2013, the
Constitutional Court of Moldova
The Constitutional Court of the Republic of Moldova () represents the sole body of constitutional jurisdiction in the Moldova, Republic of Moldova, autonomous and independent from the executive, the legislature and the judiciary.
The task of the ...
ruled that the Declaration of Independence takes precedence over the Constitution and that the state language should be called Romanian.
By March 2017, the presidential website under
Igor Dodon
Igor Dodon (; born 18 February 1975) is a Moldovan politician who served as the 5th president of Moldova from 2016 to 2020. He currently serves as the leader of the Party of Socialists of the Republic of Moldova since 2024. He served as Ministry ...
had changed the Romanian language option to ''Moldovan'', which was described to be "in accordance with the constitution" by said president. The change was reverted on 24 December 2020, the day Maia Sandu assumed office.
In June 2021, during a meeting between the
Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Romania Bogdan Aurescu and the
Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Ukraine Dmytro Kuleba, the former asked Ukraine to recognize the nonexistence of the Moldovan language to improve the situation of the
Romanians in Ukraine. Kuleba responded to this saying that they were trying to do the paperwork for this as soon as possible.
On 30 November 2022, during another meeting between Aurescu and Kuleba, Aurescu reiterated this request. This happened again during a phone call between the two ministers on 12 April 2023, after Moldova had legally changed its official language to Romanian.
Discontinuation in Moldova and Ukraine
On 2 March 2023, the Moldovan parliament voted to replace the phrases "Moldovan language", "state language" and "official language" in Moldovan legislation with the phrase "Romanian language". The change was presented not as a constitutional change, but only a technical one, as it would implement the 2013 decision of the Constitutional Court of Moldova. This change was supported by the ruling
Party of Action and Solidarity
The Party of Action and Solidarity (, PAS) is a liberal political party in Moldova. The PAS was founded by Maia Sandu, the former Minister of Education and the incumbent president of Moldova. A pro-European party, it is an observer of the Eu ...
and was strongly opposed by the
Bloc of Communists and Socialists
The Bloc of Communists and Socialists (, BCS) is an electoral alliance between the Party of Communists of the Republic of Moldova (PCRM) and the Party of Socialists of the Republic of Moldova (PSRM). It was formed as the Electoral Bloc of Communi ...
. The
Academy of Sciences of Moldova also supported this decision. The bill was approved on its second and final reading on 16 March. This attracted criticism from Russia.
Maria Zakharova, the spokeswoman for the
Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Russian Federation, claimed that "the Romanian language should be renamed to Moldovan, and not the opposite". Romanian foreign minister Aurescu replied to this by saying, "This so-called Moldovan language does not exist, it is an artificial construct, which was created by the Soviet Union and has later been used by Russia for disinformation purposes". To this, Zakharova replied back by saying, "Sr. Bogdan Aurescu never existed either, but in the end he was created. Now it is possible to call him an artificial construct." The president of Moldova, Maia Sandu, promulgated the law on 22 March.
It was published on the ' ("Official Bulletin of the Republic of Moldova"), a state publication where all promulgated laws are published, on 24 March, thus entering into force. On 30 March, the changes appeared on the Constitution of Moldova.
On 13 April, Romanian Foreign Minister
Bogdan Aurescu requested the Ukrainian Foreign Minister
Dmytro Kuleba to relinquish the recognition of the Moldovan language in Ukraine. However, as of June 2023, Ukraine still continues to make Moldovan-language schoolbooks.
On 18 August,
Prime Minister of Romania
The prime minister of Romania (), officially the prime minister of the Government of Romania (), is the head of the Government of Romania, Government of Romania. Initially, the office was styled ''President of the Council of Ministers'' (), when ...
Marcel Ciolacu and
Prime Minister of Ukraine
The prime minister of Ukraine (, , ) is the head of government of Ukraine. The prime minister presides over the government of Ukraine, Cabinet of Ministers of Ukraine, which is the highest body of the executive branch of the government of Ukrain ...
Denys Shmyhal had a meeting in Bucharest. Among the things that were discussed was the issue of the Romanian minority in Ukraine. Ciolacu said that Romania sought for the Romanians in Ukraine to have exactly the same rights as the
Ukrainians in Romania and also for the removal of the Moldovan language from Ukrainian legislation.
Starting from 1 September 2023, the high school in the village of
Borysivka () in
Odesa Oblast
Odesa Oblast (), also referred to as Odeshchyna (Одещина), is an administrative divisions of Ukraine, oblast (province) of southwestern Ukraine, located along the northern coast of the Black Sea. Its administrative centre is the city of Ode ...
, where Ukrainian Romanians study, replaced the term "Moldovan language" with "Romanian language" in its curriculum.
On 10 October, during a meeting between Ciolacu and
President of Ukraine
The president of Ukraine (, ) is the head of state of Ukraine. The president represents the nation in international relations, administers the foreign political activity of the state, conducts negotiations and concludes international treaties. ...
Volodymyr Zelenskyy
Volodymyr Oleksandrovych Zelenskyy (born 25 January 1978) is a Ukrainian politician and former entertainer who has served as the sixth and current president of Ukraine since 2019. He took office five years after the start of the Russo-Ukraini ...
, Ciolacu once again requested that the Ukrainian authorities stop recognizing the existence of the Moldovan language. On the same day, during a meeting with Romanian journalists, Zelenskyy was asked if Ukraine would stop recognising the Moldovan language. He responded by saying that he did not see this as a global problem and that it was not an urgent issue for a country at war but that the Ukrainian government would meet in a week or two and that a solution to the issue "I'm sure everyone will be happy" with would be found.
On 18 October, Ukrainian authorities promised to "resolve the issue of artificial separation between the Romanian and "Moldovan" languages by implementing appropriate practical measures with due consideration of all legal aspects." Former Moldovan president
Igor Dodon
Igor Dodon (; born 18 February 1975) is a Moldovan politician who served as the 5th president of Moldova from 2016 to 2020. He currently serves as the leader of the Party of Socialists of the Republic of Moldova since 2024. He served as Ministry ...
, as well as the
Revival Party, have criticised this decision. According to an expert on Ukrainian affairs interviewed by the Romanian newspaper ''
Libertatea'', "Marcel Ciolacu's visit to Ukraine marked the end of a diplomatic effort by the Republic of Moldova and Romania in the face of Kyiv but, at the same time, it marks only the beginning of a difficult, lasting process within the Ukrainian state." Thus, the Moldovan language would not have been derecognised by Ukraine on 18 October, this was only in process.
On 16 November, the Ministry of Education and Science of the Ukrainian government stated that it has initiated steps to abolish the Moldovan language and to replace it with Romanian. The Ukrainian Ministry of Education stated:
On 13 January 2024, Ukrainian newspaper ''Dumska'' reported that the Ukrainian Ministry of Education and Science had announced all 16 schools in Odesa Oblast teaching "Moldovan" had dropped the term in favor of Romanian.
However, Anatol Popescu, president of the Bessarabia National–Cultural Association, reported that in the Romanian school of (), the term had been replaced with "language of the national minority" instead, protesting against this and against other issues that had been reported regarding the school's intended renaming and reorganization into a high school.
On 24 December, the Ukrainian Government approved a bill that would propose replacing "Moldovan" with Romanian on Ukraine's new proposed international list in the
European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages
The European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages (ECRML) is a European treaty (CETS 148) adopted in 1992 under the auspices of the Council of Europe to protect and promote historical regional and minority languages in Europe. However, t ...
, which would exclude it from the protected languages in Ukraine. The bill would also exclude the
Belarusian and Russian languages. The bill requires examination and approval by the
Verkhovna Rada
The Verkhovna Rada ( ; VR), officially the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine, is the unicameralism, unicameral parliament of Ukraine. It consists of 450 Deputy (legislator), deputies presided over by a speaker. The Verkhovna Rada meets in the Verkhovn ...
to enter into force.
Controversy

The matter of whether or not Moldovan is a separate language continues to be contested politically within and beyond the Republic of Moldova. The 1989 Language Law of the
Moldavian SSR
The Moldavian Soviet Socialist Republic or Moldavian SSR (, mo-Cyrl, Република Советикэ Сочиалистэ Молдовеняскэ), also known as the Moldovan Soviet Socialist Republic, Moldovan SSR, Soviet Moldavia, Sovie ...
, which is still in effect in Moldova, according to the Constitution, asserts a "linguistic Moldo-Romanian identity".
Article 13 of the Moldovan Constitution used to name it "the national language of the country" (the original uses the phrase , which literally means 'the language of the state') until 2023. In March 2023 the Parliament of Moldova has approved a law on referring to the national language as Romanian in all legislative texts and the constitution following the 2013 decision of the Constitutional Court of Moldova that gives primacy to the text of the 1991 Declaration of Independence of Moldova that calls the national language Romanian.
The law was approved by the parliament on 16 March, and the President of Moldova promulgated the law on 22 March.
Moldavian is one of
Transnistria
Transnistria, officially known as the Pridnestrovian Moldavian Republic and locally as Pridnestrovie, is a Landlocked country, landlocked Transnistria conflict#International recognition of Transnistria, breakaway state internationally recogn ...
's official languages, alongside
Ukrainian and
Russian.
Standard Moldovan is widely considered to be identical to standard Romanian. Writing about "essential differences",
Vasile Stati
Vasile Stati (born 20 September 1939) is a Moldovan politician and historian.
Biography
He studied history and philology at the Moldovan language Department of the Moldova State University, State University of Chișinău.
He is the author of ...
is obliged to concentrate almost exclusively on lexical rather than grammatical differences. Whatever language distinctions may once have existed, these have been decreasing rather than increasing. King wrote in 2000 that "in the main, Moldovan in its standard form was more Romanian by the 1980s than at any point in its history".
In 2002, the Moldovan
Minister of Justice
A justice ministry, ministry of justice, or department of justice, is a ministry or other government agency in charge of the administration of justice. The ministry or department is often headed by a minister of justice (minister for justice in a ...
Ion Morei said that Romanian and Moldovan were the same language and that the Constitution of Moldova should be amended to reflect this—not by substituting ''Romanian'' for the word ''Moldovan'', but by adding that "Romanian and Moldovan are the same language". The education minister
Valentin Beniuc said: "I have stated more than once that the notion of a Moldovan language and a Romanian language reflects the same linguistic phenomenon in essence." The president of Moldova
Vladimir Voronin
Vladimir Voronin (; born Vladimir Bujeniță, 25 May 1941) is a Moldovan politician. He was the third President of Moldova#Republic of Moldova (1991–present), President of Moldova from 2001 until 2009 and has been the leader of the Party of ...
acknowledged that the two languages are identical, but said that Moldovans should have the right to call their language "Moldovan".
In the
2004 census, of the citizens living in Moldova, 60% identified Moldovan as their native language; 16.5% chose Romanian. While 37% of all
urban Romanian/Moldovan speakers identified Romanian as their native language, in the countryside 86% of the Romanian/Moldovan speakers indicated Moldovan, a historic holdover.
Independent studies found a Moldovan linguistic identity asserted in particular by the rural population and post-Soviet political class. In a survey conducted in four villages near the border with Romania, when asked about their native language the interviewees identified the following: Moldovan 53%, Romanian 44%, and Russian 3%.
In November 2007, when reporting on EU Council deliberations regarding an agreement between the European Community and Moldova, the Romanian reporter Jean Marin Marinescu included a recommendation to avoid formal references to the "Moldovan language". The Romanian press speculated that the
EU banned the usage of the phrase "Moldovan language". However, the European Commissioner for External Relations and European Neighbourhood Policy,
Benita Ferrero-Waldner, denied these allegations. She said that the Moldovan language is referred to in the 1998 Cooperation Agreement between the
EU and
Moldova
Moldova, officially the Republic of Moldova, is a Landlocked country, landlocked country in Eastern Europe, with an area of and population of 2.42 million. Moldova is bordered by Romania to the west and Ukraine to the north, east, and south. ...
, and hence it is considered a part of the
acquis
The Community acquis or ''acquis communautaire'' (; ), sometimes called the EU acquis, and often shortened to acquis, is the accumulated legislation, legal acts and court decisions that constitute the body of European Union law that came into ...
, binding on all
member states
A member state is a state that is a member of an international organization or of a federation or confederation.
Since the World Trade Organization (WTO) and the International Monetary Fund (IMF) include some members that are not sovereign states ...
.
Orthography

The language was generally written in a
Romanian Cyrillic alphabet
The Romanian Cyrillic alphabet is the Cyrillic alphabet that was used to write the Romanian language and Church Slavonic until the 1830s, when it began to be gradually replaced by a Latin-based Romanian alphabet.Cyrillic remained in occasion ...
(based on the
Old Church Slavonic
Old Church Slavonic or Old Slavonic ( ) is the first Slavic languages, Slavic literary language and the oldest extant written Slavonic language attested in literary sources. It belongs to the South Slavic languages, South Slavic subgroup of the ...
alphabet) before the 19th century. Both Cyrillic and, rarely, Latin, were used until after
World War I
World War I or the First World War (28 July 1914 – 11 November 1918), also known as the Great War, was a World war, global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies of World War I, Allies (or Entente) and the Central Powers. Fighting to ...
; after Bessarabia was included in Romania in 1918, the Cyrillic alphabet was officially forbidden in the region. In the
interwar period
In the history of the 20th century, the interwar period, also known as the interbellum (), lasted from 11 November 1918 to 1 September 1939 (20 years, 9 months, 21 days) – from the end of World War I (WWI) to the beginning of World War II ( ...
, Soviet authorities in the
Moldavian Autonomous Soviet Socialist Republic
The Moldavian Autonomous Soviet Socialist Republic, shortened to Moldavian ASSR, was an Autonomous Soviet Socialist Republics, autonomous republic of the Ukrainian SSR between 12 October 1924 and 2 August 1940, encompassing the modern territory ...
alternately used Latin or Cyrillic for writing the language, mirroring the political goals of the moment. Between 1940 and 1989, i.e., during Soviet rule, the new
Moldovan Cyrillic alphabet
The Moldovan Cyrillic alphabet is a Cyrillic alphabet designed for the Romanian language spoken in the Soviet Union ( Moldovan) and was in official use from 1924 to 1932 and 1938 to 1989 (and still in use today in the breakaway Moldovan region ...
replaced Latin as the official alphabet in Moldova (then
Moldavian SSR
The Moldavian Soviet Socialist Republic or Moldavian SSR (, mo-Cyrl, Република Советикэ Сочиалистэ Молдовеняскэ), also known as the Moldovan Soviet Socialist Republic, Moldovan SSR, Soviet Moldavia, Sovie ...
). In 1989, the Latin script was once again adopted in Moldova by Law 3462 of 31 August 1989, which provided rules for transliterating Cyrillic to Latin, along with the orthographic rules used in
Romania
Romania is a country located at the crossroads of Central Europe, Central, Eastern Europe, Eastern and Southeast Europe. It borders Ukraine to the north and east, Hungary to the west, Serbia to the southwest, Bulgaria to the south, Moldova to ...
at the time. Transnistria, however, uses the Cyrillic alphabet.
Though not immediately adopting these, the Academy of Sciences of Moldova acknowledged both the Romanian Academy's decision of 1993 and the orthographic reform of 2005. In 2000, the Moldovan Academy recommended adopting the spelling rules used in Romania, and in 2010 launched a schedule for the transition to the new rules that was completed in 2011 (regarding its publications). However, these changes were not implemented by Moldova's Ministry of Education, so the old orthographic conventions were maintained in the education sector such as in school textbooks.
On 17 October 2016,
Minister of Education
An education minister (sometimes minister of education) is a position in the governments of some countries responsible for dealing with educational matters. Where known, the government department, ministry, or agency that develops policy and deli ...
Corina Fusu signed Order No. 872 on the application of the revised spelling rules as adopted by the Moldovan Academy of Sciences, coming into force on the day of signing.
Since then the spelling used by institutions subordinated to the Ministry of Education is in line with the spelling norms used in Romania since 1993. This order, however, has no application to other government institutions, nor has Law 3462 been amended to reflect these changes; thus, those institutions continue to use the old spelling.
See also
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Eastern Romance substratum
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Legacy of the Roman Empire
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Moldova–Romania relations
*
Thraco-Roman
The term Thraco-Roman describes the Romanization (cultural), Romanized culture of Thracians under the rule of the Roman Empire.
The Odrysian kingdom of Thrace became a Roman client kingdom c. 20 BC, while the Greek city-states on the Black Sea coa ...
* The
Balkan language area
References
Citations
Bibliography
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Further reading
* – About the identity of the contemporary Moldovans in the context of debates about their language.
External links
Chase Faucheux, "Language classification and manipulation in Romania and Moldova" thesis, 2006, Louisiana State University
Eleonora Rusnac, "Translation of Russian loans and irregularities of the spoken language in the Republic of Moldova" Association of Professional Translators of Moldova
"Moldova", ''Ethnologue'' report
Academy of Sciences of Moldova
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{{Authority control
Romanian language
Languages of Transnistria
Languages of Ukraine
Moldovenism