Nicolae Filimon

Born in Bucharest as the son of an Eastern Orthodox parish priest of the Enei Church, Filimon was a cantor and an autodidact.

The same year, he became a minor public official at the Faith Department in Prince Barbu Dimitrie Ştirbei's Chancellery.

During the following year, he travelled to the German Confederation, and published his account as Excursiuni în Germania meridională ("Voyages to Southern Germany"), which also included the Romanticist novellas Mănăstirea domenicanilor după colina Fiesole (later known as Mateo Cipriani) and O baroneasă de poronceală.

His experience and relative success as a journalist and critic would serve as the basis of chapters in his novels, which actually form in-depth analyses of cultural trends; he would collaborate on journals edited by Cezar Bolliac and Ion Ionescu de la Brad.

It became an instant success, but Filimon could not enjoy it for long after: although he continued to write for various journals, he was stricken down with tuberculosis, and died soon after.