His descălecat, or "dismounting", on the banks of the Moldova River has traditionally been regarded as the symbol of the foundation of the Principality of Moldavia in Romanian historiography.

The early 16th-century Moldo-Russian Chronicle,[2] which contains the most detailed description of the foundation of Moldavia, described Dragoș as one of the "Romans" who had received estates in Maramureș from "King Vladislav of Hungary".

[2] Modern historians' attempts to determine Dragoș's family connections and to describe his early life have not produced a broad consensus.

[5][6] In that charter, Charles I of Hungary instructed the Eger Chapter to determine the boundaries of the domain of Bedeu (now Bedevlya in Ukraine) that he had donated to the brothers Drag and Dragoș.

[5][7] Drag and Dragoș were mentioned as the king's "servants", showing that they were directly subjected to the sovereign, like all noblemen in the Kingdom of Hungary.

[8][11] In his diploma, King Louis ordered John, the Vlach voivode of Maramureș, to reinstate Dragoș of Giulești and his family in the possession of their estates.

[4] He says that parallel toponyms – for instance, Bedeu in Maramureș and Bădeuți in Moldavia – show that Vlach groups from the region of Câmpulung settled in the basin of the Siret River.

[13] The Ragusan historian, Jacob Luccari, who completed his chronicle in 1601, wrote that Dragoș had been "the baron of Khust, a town in Transylvania" before moving to Moldavia.

[5] The Moldavian chronicles preserved several variants of the legend of Dragoș's hunting for an aurochs or bison, ending with his "dismounting" by the Moldova River, which gave rise to the development of Moldavia.

[24] Many historians (including Ștefan S. Gorovei, Dennis Deletant, Neagu Djuvara, and Constantine Rezachevici) propose an early date, 1347 or even 1345.

[25][26][27][28] They say that a successful Hungarian campaign under the command of Andrew Lackfi, Count of the Székelys, against the Tatars across the Carpathians in 1345 gave rise to the development of a defensive march, ruled by Dragoș.

[25][26] According to Deletant, the establishment of that border province was connected to the foundation of the Roman Catholic Diocese of Cumania, which was sanctioned, upon the request of Louis I of Hungary, by Pope Clement VI on 27 March 1347.

[30] Finally, there are many historians (including Victor Spinei, István Vásáry, Tudor Sălăgean) who say, in accordance with the majority of the Moldavian chronicles, that 1359 was the year of the foundation of Moldavia.

[32] Nevertheless, the fact that he was the head of a frontier zone of the Kingdom of Hungary shows that he and his retainers had an important role in the military actions east of the Carpathians.

[46] Drag's descendants (members of the Drágffy family) held vast estates in the northeastern parts regions of the Kingdom of Hungary in the late 14th century.