The term "Moldavian" can also be used to refer to the inhabitants of the territory of the historical Principality of Moldavia, currently divided among Romania (47.5%), Moldova (30.5%) and Ukraine (22%).

[24][25] Also, the Slavic neighbours called Moldovans "Vlachs" or "Volokhs", a term also used to refer to all native Romance speakers from Eastern Europe and the Balkan peninsula.

[29] Historian van Meurs however indicates that some Russian official documents and scholarly studies in the 19th century actually continued to use both "Romanians" and "Moldavians" when referring to the local population, noting that the Russian policy which restricted the use of the Romanian language in Bessarabia was rather part of the general tendency of Russification and of promotion of a tsarist nationality policy as such.

[30] Likewise, historian Charles King notes that the Moldovan peasant's view of his own national identity was not the product of Russian assimilationist policies but had instead remained virtually frozen since 1812.

[31] The Romanian researcher Irina Livezeanu further notes that the Russification policies did not greatly affect the identity of the Moldavians, as their overwhelming majority were illiterate peasants.

However, for the inhabitants of Bessarabia living under the Russian rule, the term gained an ethnic connotation by the beginning of the 20th century: in May 1917, at a congress of Bessarabian teachers, a dispute arose over the identification of the native population; a group protested against being called "Romanians", affirming they were "Moldovans",[36] while another group, led by poet Alexei Mateevici, supported the view that the Moldovans are also Romanians.

The circumstances surrounding the vote were themselves complex, since, at the request of the Sfatul Țării, Romanian troops were present in Bessarabia, as it was facing external threats and anarchy within.

[38][39] By the time of the union, the peasants of Bessarabia, who constituted the majority of Romanian speakers in the region, clung to a Moldavian identity and did not undergo the same nation-building as the ones in Romania.

Several researchers who visited the area around World War I, including the Romanian historian Ion Nistor and French geographer Emmanuel de Martonne testified that most Bessarabian peasants called themselves Moldavians.

[42][43][44] In 1940, during World War II, Romania agreed to an ultimatum and returned the region to the Soviet Union, which organized it into the Moldavian SSR.

The Soviets began a campaign to return the Moldovan identity overt that of the rest of Romanian speakers, taking advantage of the incomplete integration of Bessarabia into the interwar Romania (see also Moldovenism).

Amongst these prominent figures, there are the following ones: The resolution of the "Association of Historians from the Republic of Moldova" (AIRM) from October 28, 2009 in favor of teaching the history of Romanians in Moldovan schools reads "The people of the Moldovan SSR were subjected to the Communist ideology, with the aim of replacing the Romanian identity of the native population, with one newly created".

[76] A group of international observers considered the census was generally conducted in a professional manner, although they reported several cases when enumerators encouraged respondents to declare themselves Moldovans rather than Romanians.

They are concentrated mostly in Moscow, but also in some rural areas in Kuban, southern Siberia, and the Russian Far East, where they migrated or were deported generations ago.

The largest share (47.5%) of the territory of the historical Principality of Moldavia together with all its formal capitals (Târgul Moldovei, Suceava, and Iaşi) and the famous painted churches are located in Romania.

Both bodies are in full communion, the dispute between them being purely territorial and revolves around the legitimate succession of the interwar Metropolitan See of Bessarabia.