Elias Schwarzfeld or Schwartzfeld (Hebrew: אליאס (אליהו) שוורצפלד; March 7, 1855 – 1915) was a Moldavian, later Romanian Jewish historian, essayist, novelist and newspaperman, also known as a political activist and philanthropist.
While pursuing his literary and scientific activities, he also worked as an assistant to Maurice de Hirsch, managing his various philanthropic projects and, after 1891, the Jewish Colonization Association.
[3] In 1885 he published, on behalf of coreligionists in the small towns and villages, two pamphlets discussing cases of antisemitic persecution and Jewish reactions: “Radu Porumbaru şi isprăvile lui la Fabrica de Hârtie din Bacău” (“Radu Porumbaru and his Doings at the Bacău Paper Mill”) and ‘”Adevărul asupra revoltei de la Brusturoasa’” (“The Truth about the Revolt in Brusturoasa”).
[3] Schwarzfeld's activities having rendered him objectionable to the National Liberal government of Ion Brătianu, he was expelled October 17, 1885, only forty-eight hours being given to him to arrange his personal affairs.
[1] From Paris, Schwarzfeld continued his literary activity in behalf of his Romanian coreligionists, and he was co-editor of Egalitatea ("Equality"), the Bucharest-based Jewish periodical founded in Bucharest by his brother.
[3] In addition, he published Romanian versions of Isidore Loeb's article “Juifs” (“Jews”), Arsène Darmesteter's pamphlet on the Talmud, and the two lectures by Ernest Renan on Judaism.
[1] In 2002, Editura Hasefer republished some of Schwarzfeld's scholarly contributions in an anthology edited by historian Lya Benjamin: Evreii în texte istoriografice.
It notably includes his posthumously published reply to Romanian ethnic nationalist historian Nicolae Iorga's Istoria evreilor în ţările noastre (The History of the Jews in Our Countries), 1913.