Dimitrie Cantemir
Prince of Moldavia
Dimitrie or Demetrius Cantemir (Romanian pronunciation: [diˈmitri.e kanteˈmir] ; Russian: Дмитрий Кантемир, romanized: Dmitry Kantemir; 26 October 1673 – 21 August 1723), also known by other spellings, was a Moldavian prince, statesman, and man of letters. He twice served as voivode of Moldavia (March–April 1693 and 1710–1711). During his second term, he allied his state with Russia in a war against Moldavia's Ottoman overlords; Russia's defeat forced Cantemir's family into exile and the replacement of the native voivodes by Greek phanariots. Cantemir was also a prolific writer, variously a: philosopher, historian, composer, musicologist, linguist, ethnographer and geographer. His son, Antioch, Russia's ambassador to Great Britain and France and a friend of Montesquieu and Voltaire, would become known as "the father of Russian poetry".
Name
Dimitrie is the Romanian form of the name Latinized as Demetrius and, less often, anglicized as Demeter. The Russian form of his name was Dmitri Konstantinovich Kantemir (Дми́трий Константи́нович Кантеми́р). He is also known as Dimitri Kantemiroğlu in Turkish contexts, Dymitr Kantemir in Polish, and Dēmētrios Kantimērēs (Δημήτριος Καντιμήρης) in Greek. His surname Cantemir (Kantemir) is of Turkic/Tatar origin, "kan" meaning "blood" and "temir" meaning "iron".
Life
Dimitrie was born in Silişteni, Moldavia (now Vaslui County, Romania) on 26 October 1673 to Constantin Cantemir and Ana Bantăș.
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Vocabulary and entity names are the principal evidence signals here, because they determine the precision of every later search. The source revision retrieved here is dated Apr 26, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q159933. VIAF identifies the subject as 61561051. The Library of Congress control number is n50082842. 5 of 5 selected statements include explicit references; 2 carry qualifiers and 2 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1673, 1723, 1693 and 1710.
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This entry incorporates text from “Dimitrie Cantemir” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.