Orăștie
city in Hunedoara County, Romania
Orăștie (Romanian pronunciation: [orəʃˈti.e]; German: Broos, Hungarian: Szászváros, Latin: Saxopolis, Transylvanian Saxon: Brooss) is a small town and municipality in Hunedoara County, south-western Transylvania, central Romania.
History
7th–9th century – On the site of an old swamp was a human settlement, now the location of the old town center, whose remains can be traced into the 10th century when the first fortification was built with raised earth and wood stockades.
11th–12th century – The first Christian religious edifice was raised: The Orăștie Rotunda. It is a circular chapel, with an age estimated at 1000 years. Perhaps it was used only by aristocratic families that dominated the Orăștie area and surroundings in the 11th century. Nearby there is a similar construction from the same period – The Geoagiu Rotunda.
1105 – In the wake of the First Crusade Anselm von Braz ”liber de liberis genitus", châtelain of Logne, Walloon ministerial count settled here. The historian Karl Kurt Klein implies – though without proof – that he moved with his sons and descendants into the region where Orăștie City is located today.
1200 – According to Transylvanian chronicles, this is the year in which construction of the city walls began. Subsequently, this was abandoned because of unfavorable conditions.
This brief starts where responsible research should: with the source description of “Orăștie” as city in Hunedoara County, Romania. Everything that follows is an evidence route, not borrowed authority.
Why this record matters
The subject matters to the places & architecture register because the source frames it as city in Hunedoara County, Romania. Its deeper value depends on whether names, dates, institutions and citations support that framing.
Maps, plans, fabric surveys and administrative records can establish how the site’s name, extent and function changed over time. The source revision retrieved here is dated Sep 27, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q262472. VIAF identifies the subject as 129090974. Authority coordinates are 45.840, 23.199. 4 of 4 selected statements include explicit references; 0 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1000, 1105 and 1200.
Architectural summaries often privilege surviving fabric and can understate demolished phases, contested use or displaced communities. The source lead contains qualifying language; that uncertainty should survive quotation, summary and reuse. Authority statements aid reconciliation but still require their own references, qualifiers and ranks to be checked.
How to read it
Treat names, boundaries and functions as historically changeable. Maps, plans, inventories and administrative records can clarify what the place meant at different dates.
- Historic place names
- Jurisdictional context
- Routes into maps and plans
Contemporary maps, plans, listed-building records, estate papers and the responsible local or national archive.
Three-step research path
- Establish the record: confirm the title “Orăștie”, its source revision and the description used here.
- Expand the search: follow Orăștie primary sources, Orăștie archive and Orăștie research across catalogues and specialist indexes.
- Test the account: compare the strongest cited source with the responsible institution’s current record and note any disagreement.
Questions for further research
- Which source most directly establishes the central claim about “Orăștie”?
- What physical evidence or contemporary plan supports the description?
- Which authority defined the place, boundary or structure at the relevant date?
Search terms from this dossier
This entry incorporates text from “Orăștie” 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.