Transylvanian School

The Transylvanian School's major centres were in the cities of Blaj (Balázsfalva), Oradea (Nagyvárad), Lugoj (Lugos) and Beiuș (Belényes).

The latter also used the expression direcția latinistă (Latin Direction), and in a similar manner the Italian Romance scholar, Mario Ruffini, wrote of la scuola latinista rumena.

[6] Within a span of fifty years, the majority national group in the Principality of Transylvania, the Romanians, succeeded in documenting their Latin origins, rewriting their history, language, and grammar, and building the pedagogical foundation needed to educate and gain political rights for its members within the Habsburg Empire.

In this memorandum, they demanded similar rights for the Transylvanian Romanians as those enjoyed by the (largely) Hungarian nobility, the enfranchised Saxon patrician class,[9] and the free military Székelys[10] under the Union of the Three Nations.

Their ideas and writings influenced latter Romanian scholars, some of whom activated in neighbouring Wallachia and Moldavia: Aaron Florian, Alexandru Papiu Ilarian, August Treboniu Laurian.

While considered founders and civilizing force in the cultural domain by Titu Maiorescu (himself related to Petru Maior) and the members of Junimea, the Transylvanian School and later "latinists" scholars were criticised for their reliance on German and Latin loanwords.

[20] Contemporary thinkers, such as Mihail Kogălniceanu and Bogdan Petriceicu Hasdeu, as well as later academicians criticised the abusive "purification" of the language proposed at various extents by the School and some of the later scholars influenced by it.