The idea behind the design of the coat of arms of Romania dates from 1859, when the two Romanian countries, Wallachia and Moldavia, united under Prince Alexandru Ioan Cuza.

The coat of arms was rather an emblem, faithful to the Communist pattern: a landscape (depicting a rising sun, a tractor and an oil drill) surrounded by stocks of wheat tied together with a cloth in the colors of the national flag.

In April 2016, deputies of the Judiciary Committee endorsed a bill voted previously by the Senate[5] that returns the crown on the head of the eagle and mandates the public authorities to replace the existing emblems and seals to those provided by law until 31 December 2018 (to mark the centenary of the Union of Transylvania with Romania on 1 December 1918).

A symbol of its royal past and a token for the period during 1881 and 1947 when Romania was a monarchy, ruled by the Hohenzollern-Sigmaringen house through its Romanian branch, founded by Carol.

The aquila, being the symbol of Latinity and a heraldic bird of the first order, symbolises courage, determination, the soaring toward great heights, power, grandeur.

On the bird's chest there is a quartered escutcheon with the symbols of the historical Romanian provinces (Wallachia, Oltenia, Moldavia, Bessarabia, Transylvania, the Banat, Crisana, Maramureș) as well as two dolphins reminding of the country's Black Sea Coast (Dobruja).

In the second quarter, Moldavia's traditional coat of arms is shown, gules: an aurochs head sable with a mullet of or between its horns, a cinquefoil rose on the dexter and a waning crescent on the sinister, both argent.

The fourth quarter shows the coat of arms of Transylvania, Maramureș and Crișana: a shield parted by a narrow fesse, gules; in the chief, on azure, there is a black aquila with golden beak coming out of the fesse, accompanied by a golden sun on the dexter and a crescent argent on the sinister (symbolizing the Székelys); on the base, on or, there are seven crenellated towers, placed four and three (symbolizing the Saxons).