Sfarma-Piatra
Encyclopedia
Sfarmă-Piatră was an antisemitic daily, monthly and later weekly newspaper, published in Romania
during the late 1930s and early 1940s. One in a series of publications founded by Nichifor Crainic
(better known as the head of Gândirea
magazine), with support from Universul
editor-in-chief Stelian Popescu
, it attempted regroup competing fascist
and pro-fascist movements around Crainic's views of "ethnocracy
". The editorial staff comprised a group of far right
intellectuals; alongside the editor-in-chief Alexandru Gregorian, they included Ovidiu Papadima
, Vintilă Horia
, Dan Botta, Dragoş Protopopescu
, Toma Vlădescu, and Pan M. Vizirescu. It notably hosted contributions by writers Ioan Alexandru Brătescu-Voineşti and Radu Gyr
.
Noted for its contemptuous style of journalism and its recourse to violent language, Sfarmă-Piatră launched press campaigns against various figures who advocated left-wing or centrist
positions, as well as against prominent members of the Jewish-Romanian community
. Among the targets of its attacks were Foreign Minister Nicolae Titulescu
(an advocate of international cooperation
and the League of Nations
), mainstream politicians such as Constantin Argetoianu
and Constantin Stere
, and the well-known writers Tudor Arghezi
, Mihail Sebastian
, Eugen Lovinescu
and Mihail Sadoveanu
. The publication was involved in a lengthy conflict with democratic newspapers such as Adevărul
and Dimineaţa, as well as with two rival voices on the far right—the National Christian Party
(PNC) of Octavian Goga
and A. C. Cuza
, and Mihail Manoilescu
's Buna Vestire.
Initially adverse King
Carol II
and attempting a rapprochement with the fascist Iron Guard
, it came to support Carol's National Renaissance Front
after 1938, and, during World War II
, switched its position, offering backing to the Guard's National Legionary
regime and finally to that of Conducător
Ion Antonescu
.
Ion G. Duca
by the Iron Guard's Nicadori death squad
. Together with his collaborator Protopopescu, with Cuvântul
journalist Nae Ionescu
, and other far right supporters in the press, Crainic was arrested on charges of having morally instigated the killing. They were tried over the following months, but were eventually acquitted. During the affair, Crainic and the others made public statements dissociating themselves from the Iron Guard and its leader Corneliu Zelea Codreanu
, which contrasted with their support for the movement before and after that date. By then, Calendaruls editor was also ending his brief association with the PNC. This signaled the beginning of a rivalry among the radical right-wing groups, which would also reflect on Crainic's stance toward Alexandru Vaida-Voevod
(whose fascist party, the Romanian Front
, was to merge with the PNC soon after).
Crainic attempted to revive Calendarul, but his attempts were frustrated by successive executives down to 1938. Sfarmă-Piatră saw print on November 14, 1935, after Crainic received funding from Stelian Popescu. In its first issue, it proclaimed its commitment to nationalism
, and launched an appeal to "obliterate the rookeries that the naive take for temples and the con artists claim are eternal", stating that its goal was to fight "the freckled dragons".
According to literary historian Z. Ornea, the journal was noted for making use of "the violent, sneering, vulgar and unsubstantial lampoon". Noting the heavy use of demeaning epithets, literary critic Ruxandra Cesereanu
describes the journal and its partners on the far right as engaged in "besmirching writers and public figures", while political analyst Michael Shafir notes it was "viciously antisemitic".
Sfarmă-Piatră constantly popularized the claim that Romania was subject to a Jewish invasion, and featured many articles in which Jews who took Romanian names were referred to under their original ones, in what was an attempt to have them branded and marginalized. It also maintained a climate of hatred against Jews in high position, claiming that King Carol's camarilla
was a sign of Jewish domination over the country, and, in particular, issuing attacks against Carol's mistress, Elena Lupescu, who was of part-Jewish origin. From the moment of its creation, Sfarmă-Piatră published regular pieces against the rival journals Adevărul
and Dimineaţa, and attempted to maintain close links with other ultra-nationalist journals (Porunca Vremii, Vremea, Curentul).
From early on, the periodical made a point of attacking politicians of the establishment, and in particular members of the National Peasants' Party
(PNŢ): alongside Argetoianu, Titulescu and Stere, its journalists wrote against Vaida-Voevod and Victor Iamandi
. In particular, Sfarmă-Piatră attacked several politicians and intellectuals (Sadoveanu, Argetoianu, Vaida-Voevod) for their association with Freemasonry
. Through Crainic's articles, Sfarmă-Piatră also issued occasional praise for Titulescu, commending him for standing up to Hungary
's revisionist
designs in respect to Transylvania
, and depicted him standing in front of the Chamber of Deputies
as if dressed "in the fiery cape of Romanian consciousness." Similar praise for the Foreign Minister was contributed to the newspaper by Dragoş Protopopescu.
and to expose the dangers posed by modernism
and the avant-garde
, as well as the negative impact the older left-wing cultural trend known as Poporanism
. In 1936, an essayist named Septimiu Bucur contributed a piece in which he claimed that Romania lacked a school of literary criticism after the late 19th century demise of Junimea
. In particular, he argued against the Popranists Constantin Dobrogeanu-Gherea
(a Jewish immigrant whom he described as "alienated" from Romanian realities) and Garabet Ibrăileanu
(whose outlook he rejected for being akin to regionalism
). Bucur then focused on Eugen Lovinescu
, who, as editor of Sburătorul
, had abandoned his conservative
position to support an explicitly urban form of modernism, marked by the imprint of Impressionism
. He accused the modernist doyen of having introduced "a plant with poisoned juices" to Romania, and accused him of being partly responsible for "the recent invasion of kike foreigners".
A year later, Ovidiu Papadima
wrote an article specifically targeting Lovinescu. Announcing that "the era of unforgiving judgments is approaching", Papadima accused Lovinescu of having engineered "our spiritual decay" through "the invasion of modernism", which, he claimed, replicated the supposed intrusion of "foreign capital" in the economic field, and brought along "the rapacious claws of the Judaic
spirit." Ridiculing Lovinescu as "a desk sociologist" with "the temperament of a subdued ruminant", and alleging that his education was supposed to make him a natural adversary of "modernist dares", Papadima claimed that the Sburătorul leader was being manipulated by Jews, who fed his ambition of leading a cultural movement. Among the Jewish writer on whom he focused his allegations were Benjamin Fondane
, Camil Baltazar
, Ilarie Voronca
and Felix Aderca
. Another article mockingly referred to the critic as Oegen Lovinescu, and to his colleague Pompiliu Constantinescu
as Fonfăilă Constantinescu (from fonf, "person who speaks through the nose"). The campaign against Lovinescu, a common feature of the far right press, also saw Sfarmă-Piatră printing articles and essays in which he was denounced as "histrionic" and "the falsifier of Romanian culture".
Criticism of Sadoveanu became regular in the radical right-wing press in 1936, when the novelist decided to accept leadership of the twin newspapers Adevărul and Dimineaţa. Sadoveanu, a traditionalist with links to the Poporanist trend, celebrated for his historical novel
s, antagonized the publications by thus explicitly stating his commitment to democracy. Among many others, the journalist Alexandru Gregorian denounced Sadoveanu for "betrayal", in a Sfarmă-Piatră article titled M. Sadoveanu. Împărat ("M. Sadoveanu. Emperor"). Gregorian described his target as a victim of Jewish manipulation, exercised by the Jewish entrepreneur Breuer, and, emphasizing Sadoveanu's prominent status within Romanian Freemasonry
, alleged that he was worshiping both the Great Architect of the Universe
and Ucigă-l toaca (the latter being a popular Romanian-language
name for the devil, translating as "Let him be killed by the semantron
"). Comparing the two newspapers to a "ghetto
", he sarcastically depicted Mihail Sadoveanu as "the aurochs
of Moldavia
" (see Coat of arms of Moldavia), "standing circumcised
in the Breuers' office [at Adevăruls headquarters] on Sărindar Street." In particular, Alexandru Gregorian focused on Sadoveanu's obesity
, and concluded that he was "a cadaver". Crainic himself voiced the accusation of "treason", and his article for the journal urged young people to view Sadoveanu as the equal of Ieremia Golia, a 16th century Moldavian boyar
who changed his allegiances between Moldavian rulers, and who was one of the central characters in Sadoveanu's own fiction works.
texts. Papadima thus contributed an article attacking the prose of Mircea Eliade
, a young modernist author who would later rally with the far right. He focused on Eliade's Domnişoara Christina, which contained a dream-like sequence in which an adult seems to have a sexual encounter with a 10 year old girl, describing the writing as evidence of "pathology" and concluding that it was "inverted tripe." Another one of Papadima's articles depicted Eliade as "deliciously ridiculous at times", and accused of him descarding the position of "an honest worker" in order to claim leadership of "a phenomenon". In part, Papadima's claims were responsible for the early 1937 official decision to have Eliade stripped of his teaching position at the University of Bucharest
.
Like Gândirea
and other publications from the same ideological field, Sfarmă-Piatră issued strong criticism of Tudor Arghezi
, whose work bridged the gap between modernism and traditionalism. The controversy centered on Arghezi's volume Flori de mucigai ("Mildew Flowers"): after publishing an article in which he declared himself dissatisfied with the newly-found experimental
focus in Arghezi's literature, Horia returned with a piece denouncing the older writer for his "willing adhesion to pornography" and "treason" of the traditionalist guidelines. Describing Arghezi's style as "bloated and muddy", he stressed: "[when it comes to Arghezi,] no insult is too much, no curse word is at fault."
In April 1938, Papadima signed a congratulatory article addressed to the justice system, and provoked by a tribunal's decision to have the avant-garde writer Geo Bogza
imprisoned for a number of frankly erotic poems. On the occasion, he appealed to the authorities to arrest and try other writers whom, he claimed, were also guilty of this offense: Aderca, H. Bonciu
, and Max Blecher
. The text referred to the former two under their Jewish names (respectively, Froim Aderca and Haimovici Bonciu), which neither was using in their literary career.
from the hand of its aging leader. He described is conflict with Goga as one of the latter's maneuvers to ensure unquestioned rule over the newly-founded PNC (which had resulted from a 1935 fusion between the League and Goga's National Agrarian Party
).
Ornea describes this attitude as being Crainic's attempt to counter his relative isolation, and create himself a "political footing" from which to campaign in favor of his new views on "the ethnocratic
state". It was through Sfarmă-Piatră that Crainic introduced this concept to the Romanian public, claiming that it stood for "the first and only serious basis from which one may begin to discuss and accomplish the unification of [Romania's] nationalist movement". Writing for the newspaper in 1937, the editor complained that Cuza and his group were attempting to have antisemitism turned into a state policy only through democratic means, to which he opposed a totalitarian
method: "And then how can Cuzism be democratic, if it is antisemitic? The 'eliminations' of kikes through democracy? But what reasonable political thinker could conceive of such an aberration, other than Mr. A. C. Cuza?" The same year, after his program was attacked by corporatist
ideologue Mihail Manoilescu
in his magazine Buna Vestire, which functioned as a platform for the Iron Guard, Crainic contributed a Sfarmă-Piatră editorial which stated his deep disappointment. Although, at the same time, he spoke out against the potential perception of this goal as "the chromatic imitation" of the established Nazi German
and Italian fascist
regimes, the newspaper regularly published ample praises of Adolf Hitler
and Benito Mussolini
. In one article of this series, Crainic himself referred to Mussolini as "one of the greatest educators of mankind".
Nichifor Crainic subsequently attempted to unify the far right around himself, but his efforts were to prove largely fruitless. Early on, he addressed the Iron Guard, and in particular its youngest members. Ornea notes that this was effort hampered in mid-1936, when, as a Romanian Orthodox
theologian, Crainic authored a message deploring the assassination of Mihai Stelescu
, a Guard dissident and leader of the Crusade of Romanianism
, whose killing was most likely carried out on Codreanu's orders. However, during the same year, Sfarmă-Piatră hosted an essay by Dan Botta which, according to historian of religion Andrei Oişteanu
, was an illustration of the Iron Guard's own doctrine of self-sacrifice and political violence. Alluding to the folk legend about Meşterul Manole
, who gave his wife's life in return for completion of the Argeş Monastery
, Botta wrote: "Death implies a sacrifice. The deceased ktitor
s on whose bones a country was founded are the heroic dead. [...] How beautiful does this meaning of death-foundation in the Argeş Monastery ballad! How all-encompassing its teaching! [...] Let us learn to die!"
Preferring to praise Mussolini more than Hitler, and standing for a fascist fraternity of Latin peoples
, Crainic was also circumspect when it came to Codreanu's stated admiration for Nazism
. Believing that such an attitude best suited "Nordic" peoples, Crainic stated: "the Romanian would err profoundly if he were to deny the virtues of our Latinism." At the time, Toma Vlădescu parted with Sfarmă-Piatră and, as contributor to Buna Vestire, wrote pieces attacking his former mentor. One of them proclaimed Crainic "a cadaver" which produced "stench", recommending "drowning [him] in a little bit of salubrious ink." By then, Sfarmă-Piatrăs allies at Vremea also took distance from Crainic and rallied with Codreanu, accusing the former of displaying "amok
" and "megalomania
".
Just before the 1937 election
, when the Iron Guard, the PNC and other far right parties competed against each other, Crainic opposed the factionalism and called for a unified bloc against the left. As the elections provided a uniquely indecisive result and King Carol II nominated Goga's party (the fourth-running) to form the new cabinet, Crainic switched his backing to the PNC, whose racial discrimination
measures against Jews it welcomed. Sfarmă-Piatră continued to oscillate for the following two months, as the PNC and its paramilitary
wing, the Lăncieri
, came into open conflict with Codreanu's movement. In January 1938, Crainic's column celebrated the Iron Guard, referring to its Legionaries as the real victor in the previous suffrage (where they had come in third), praising them for their youth and supposedly universal social appeal, and claiming that they stood for his ideal to unify the nationalist camp. His piece included the verdict: "It is a phenomenon that nothing will be able to stop any longer."
Less than a month later, as King Carol decided to end his partnership with the PNC and to depose Premier Goga, in what Ornea characterized as an "opportunistic" move, Sfarmă-Piatră claimed that the cabinet had proven itself "noisy, superficial and utterly unprepared". Crainic's argument again had at its core his own views on ethnocracy, and he was in effect deploring Goga's failure to adopt the program as his own. Soon after, when Carol instituted his own authoritarian
regime around the new Premier Miron Cristea
, in a series of moves that was to lead to the establishment of an anti-Iron Guard monopoly-party named National Renaissance Front
, Crainic expressed the hope that ethnocracy was to be the authorities' ideal. According to Ornea, this statement, published by Sfarmă-Piatră, showed that its author "understood nothing from the course of political life."
more than with the Latins (see Origin of the Romanians, Protochronism
). The signs of this change were present in Botta's earlier texts about indifference to dying, since they referred to the ancient cult of Zalmoxis
. Other than Botta, the Dacianist category included Simion Dimancea, who declared, in a 1938 issue of the paper: "Will the Latin style predominate, or will the Dacian one? Both. However, the Dacian one will shine more majestically: it is at home."
Upon Crainic's return, the magazine was struggling, being faced with both financial difficulties and the censorship
enforced by Carol's new regime. Between that date and October 1938, it published a series of special issues dedicated to various reactionary
figures on the public stage (writer Ioan Alexandru Brătescu-Voineşti, physician and antisemitic agitator Nicolae Paulescu
), as well as to various episodes in the history of Romania (the rule of Wallachian Prince Constantin Brâncoveanu
and events of the World War I
Battle of Romania
). Z. Ornea, who describes this series as "rather insipid", credits them with having contributed to a commercial failure, which in turn made Sfarmă-Piatră appear as a monthly magazine up until October 1938. Among the main features of that period were two feuilleton
s: one was a Romanian-language
translation of Hitler's Mein Kampf
, the other was Germanofobia (Romanian for "Germanophobia
"), a political study authored by Brătescu-Voineşti.
In January 1939, after the government decapitated the Iron Guard and had Codreanu killed, and as the latter embarked on a widespread campaign of political violence, Crainic threw his support behind the authorities. At the time, he began condemning the weapon of political assassination, again in use under the Guard's new leader Horia Sima
, and, in an article for Sfarmă-Piatră, claimed to have always done so. He also argued that his previous writings all stood as evidence that he had deplored the Guard's course of action, and stated that the "new generation" had disappointed him early on. Ornea, who rejects the notion that any such evidence can be found, proposes that Crainic was merely attempting to rescue his magazine from being branded a pro-Iron Guard venue. Although Crainic offered praise to the National Renaissance Front and the 1938 Constitution
, which had introduced fascist-inspired corporatism, the periodical was shut down on March 5, 1939.
Again a newspaper, Sfarmă-Piatră reemerged on December 22 of the same year, when it continued to support Carol and his dictatorship. A long series of eulogies for the monarch followed, some of them being signed by poet Radu Gyr
, a former Iron Guard activist who had just returned from a concentration camp in Miercurea Ciuc. One of Gyr's articles for the paper condemned the Iron Guard as "hooligans", and proposed a new guideline for the far right: "The king summons incandescent nationalism [...] The king summons the youth. These are the sacred hooligan ideas of yesterday, presently turned into a light-bearing standard."
, Northern Bukovina and Northern Transylvania
(see Soviet occupation of Bessarabia and Northern Bukovina, Second Vienna Award
), and the Iron Guard again reemerged, sharing power with Conducător
Ion Antonescu
to generate a "National Legionary State
". Sfarmă-Piatră again switched its allegiance, proclaiming Antonescu to be a leader dressed "in the armor of predestination", and depicting him one of the great European leaders, alongside Hitler, Mussolini, Portuguese
Estado Novo founder António de Oliveira Salazar
and the Caudillo
of Nationalist Spain, Francisco Franco
. Soon after, it saluted the Iron Guard as "the first organic form of the modern Romanian state." Led by Gregorian, the publication was a weekly and again a daily, and carried the subtitle Săptamânal de luptă şi doctrină românească ("Weekly of Romanian combat and doctrine", later changed to Ziar de informaţie şi luptă românească, "Newspaper of Romanian information and combat").
The magazine continued to be published after the January 1941 Legionary Rebellion
, which ended the partnership between Sima and Antonescu and brought the latter to an uncontested position of power. It subsequently became a venue for disseminating the official guidelines, repressive in general and antisemitic in particular (see Romania during World War II
, Holocaust in Romania). It thus began spreading the theory of Judeo-Bolshevism
, particularly after Romania joined in the German-led attack on the Soviet Union
. It also offered ample praise to the new wave of antisemitic measures enforced by the Antonescu executive. In July 1941, a month after the Iaşi pogrom
, it published an article signed by V. Beneş, which described in detail the "Antijudaic and antimasonic policy" of the Mihai Antonescu
executive, rendering an interview the Premier had granted to the press in the Kingdom of Italy
. Leizer Finchelstein, the Jewish employee of a newsstand in Iaşi
and a survivor of the pogrom, recalled that authorities had explicitly asked him to distribute and display Sfarmă-Piatră and Porunca Vremii in the months before the violence erupted.
The publication was disestablished later in the war, and, following the start of Soviet presence in Romania
, Crainic was tried for his responsibility in instigating racial violence, serving years in prison under the communist regime
, before being partly rehabilitated
and assigned to the staff of Glasul Patriei (a magazine publishing propaganda
for the Romanian diaspora
, and overseen by Romania's secret police, the Securitate
). A similar road was taken by Radu Gyr, who joined Crainic at Glasul Patriei after having himself spent time in communist jails.
A decade after the Romanian Revolution of 1989
, the emergence of neo-fascism
and the creation of small Iron Guard-inspired groups brought the creation of an online newspaper
of the same name. According to Michael Shafir, its circulation as of 2003 was "probably minuscule".
Romania
Romania is a country located at the crossroads of Central and Southeastern Europe, on the Lower Danube, within and outside the Carpathian arch, bordering on the Black Sea...
during the late 1930s and early 1940s. One in a series of publications founded by Nichifor Crainic
Nichifor Crainic
Nichifor Crainic was a Romanian writer, editor, philosopher, poet and theologian famed for his traditionalist and antisemitic activities...
(better known as the head of Gândirea
Gândirea
Gândirea , known during its early years as Gândirea Literară - Artistică - Socială , was a Romanian literary, political and art magazine.- Overview :Founded by Cezar Petrescu and D. I...
magazine), with support from Universul
Universul
Universul was a mass-circulation newspaper in Romania. It existed from 1884 to 1953, and was run by Stelian Popescu from 1914 to 1943 ....
editor-in-chief Stelian Popescu
Stelian Popescu
Stelian Popescu was a nationalist Romanian journalist.From 1914 to 1943, Popescu was director of Universul....
, it attempted regroup competing fascist
Fascism
Fascism is a radical authoritarian nationalist political ideology. Fascists seek to rejuvenate their nation based on commitment to the national community as an organic entity, in which individuals are bound together in national identity by suprapersonal connections of ancestry, culture, and blood...
and pro-fascist movements around Crainic's views of "ethnocracy
Ethnocracy
Ethnocracy is a form of government where representatives of a particular ethnic group hold a number of government posts disproportionately large to the percentage of the total population that the particular ethnic group represents and use them to advance the position of their particular ethnic...
". The editorial staff comprised a group of far right
Far right
Far-right, extreme right, hard right, radical right, and ultra-right are terms used to discuss the qualitative or quantitative position a group or person occupies within right-wing politics. Far-right politics may involve anti-immigration and anti-integration stances towards groups that are...
intellectuals; alongside the editor-in-chief Alexandru Gregorian, they included Ovidiu Papadima
Ovidiu Papadima
Ovidiu Papadima was a Romanian literary critic, folklorist, and essayist....
, Vintilă Horia
Vintila Horia
Vintilă Horia was a Romanian writer.-Biography:Born in Segarcea, he graduated from the Saint Sava National College, then studied Law, and then Letters, including terms at universities in Italy and Austria...
, Dan Botta, Dragoş Protopopescu
Dragos Protopopescu
Dragoş Protopopescu was a Romanian writer, poet, critic and philosopher. He was professor at the University of Cernăuţi....
, Toma Vlădescu, and Pan M. Vizirescu. It notably hosted contributions by writers Ioan Alexandru Brătescu-Voineşti and Radu Gyr
Radu Gyr
Radu Gyr was a Romanian poet, essayist, playwright and journalist....
.
Noted for its contemptuous style of journalism and its recourse to violent language, Sfarmă-Piatră launched press campaigns against various figures who advocated left-wing or centrist
Centrism
In politics, centrism is the ideal or the practice of promoting policies that lie different from the standard political left and political right. Most commonly, this is visualized as part of the one-dimensional political spectrum of left-right politics, with centrism landing in the middle between...
positions, as well as against prominent members of the Jewish-Romanian community
History of the Jews in Romania
The history of Jews in Romania concerns the Jews of Romania and of Romanian origins, from their first mention on what is nowadays Romanian territory....
. Among the targets of its attacks were Foreign Minister Nicolae Titulescu
Nicolae Titulescu
Nicolae Titulescu was a well-known Romanian diplomat, at various times government minister, finance and foreign minister, and for two terms President of the General Assembly of the League of Nations . He was a member of the Freemasonry.-Early years:...
(an advocate of international cooperation
Internationalism (politics)
Internationalism is a political movement which advocates a greater economic and political cooperation among nations for the theoretical benefit of all...
and the League of Nations
League of Nations
The League of Nations was an intergovernmental organization founded as a result of the Paris Peace Conference that ended the First World War. It was the first permanent international organization whose principal mission was to maintain world peace...
), mainstream politicians such as Constantin Argetoianu
Constantin Argetoianu
Constantin Argetoianu was a Romanian politician, one of the best-known personalities of interwar Greater Romania, who served as the Prime Minister between September 28 and November 23, 1939. His memoirs, Memorii. Pentru cei de mâine. Amintiri din vremea celor de ieri Constantin Argetoianu...
and Constantin Stere
Constantin Stere
Constantin G. Stere or Constantin Sterea was a Romanian writer, jurist, politician, ideologue of the Poporanist trend, and, in March 1906, co-founder Constantin G. Stere or Constantin Sterea (Romanian; , Konstantin Yegorovich Stere or Константин Георгиевич Стере, Konstantin Georgiyevich Stere;...
, and the well-known writers Tudor Arghezi
Tudor Arghezi
Tudor Arghezi was a Romanian writer, best known for his contribution to poetry and children's literature. Born Ion N. Theodorescu in Bucharest , he explained that his pen name was related to Argesis, the Latin name for the Argeş River.-Early life:Along with Mihai Eminescu, Mateiu Caragiale, and...
, Mihail Sebastian
Mihail Sebastian
-Life:Sebastian was born to a Jewish family in Brăila. After finishing his secondary studies, Sebastian went on to study law in Bucharest, but was soon attracted to the literary life and the exciting ideas of the new generation of Romanian intellectuals, as epitomized by the literary group...
, Eugen Lovinescu
Eugen Lovinescu
Eugen Lovinescu was a Romanian modernist literary historian, literary critic, academic, and novelist, who in 1919 established the Sburătorul literary club. He was the father of Monica Lovinescu, and the uncle of Horia Lovinescu, Vasile Lovinescu, and Anton Holban...
and Mihail Sadoveanu
Mihail Sadoveanu
Mihail Sadoveanu was a Romanian novelist, short story writer, journalist and political figure, who twice served as acting republican head of state under the communist regime . One of the most prolific Romanian-language writers, he is remembered mostly for his historical and adventure novels, as...
. The publication was involved in a lengthy conflict with democratic newspapers such as Adevărul
Adevarul
Adevărul is a Romanian daily newspaper, based in Bucharest. Founded in 1871 and reestablished in 1888, it was the main left-wing press venue to be published during the Romanian Kingdom's existence, adopting an independent pro-democratic position, advocating land reform and universal suffrage...
and Dimineaţa, as well as with two rival voices on the far right—the National Christian Party
National Christian Party
The National Christian Party was a Romanian political party, the product of a union between Octavian Goga's National Agrarian Party and A. C. Cuza's National-Christian Defense League; a prominent member of the party was the philosopher Nichifor Crainic...
(PNC) of Octavian Goga
Octavian Goga
Octavian Goga was a Romanian politician, poet, playwright, journalist, and translator.-Life:Born in Răşinari, nearby Sibiu, he was an active member in the Romanian nationalistic movement in Transylvania and of its leading group, the Romanian National Party in Austria-Hungary. Before World War I,...
and A. C. Cuza
A. C. Cuza
A. C. Cuza was a Romanian far right politician and theorist.-Early life:Born in Iaşi, after attending secondary school in his native city and in Dresden, Cuza studied law at the University of Paris, the Universität unter den Linden, and the Université Libre de Bruxelles...
, and Mihail Manoilescu
Mihail Manoilescu
Mihail Manoilescu was a Romanian journalist, engineer, economist, politician and memoirist, who served as Foreign Minister of Romania during the summer of 1940...
's Buna Vestire.
Initially adverse King
King of Romania
King of the Romanians , rather than King of Romania , was the official title of the ruler of the Kingdom of Romania from 1881 until 1947, when Romania was proclaimed a republic....
Carol II
Carol II of Romania
Carol II reigned as King of Romania from 8 June 1930 until 6 September 1940. Eldest son of Ferdinand, King of Romania, and his wife, Queen Marie, a daughter of Prince Alfred, Duke of Edinburgh, the second eldest son of Queen Victoria...
and attempting a rapprochement with the fascist Iron Guard
Iron Guard
The Iron Guard is the name most commonly given to a far-right movement and political party in Romania in the period from 1927 into the early part of World War II. The Iron Guard was ultra-nationalist, fascist, anti-communist, and promoted the Orthodox Christian faith...
, it came to support Carol's National Renaissance Front
National Renaissance Front
The National Renaissance Front was a fascist Romanian political party created by King Carol II in 1938 as the single monopoly party of government following his decision to ban all other political parties and suspend the 1923 Constitution, and the passing of the 1938 Constitution of Romania...
after 1938, and, during World War II
World War II
World War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...
, switched its position, offering backing to the Guard's National Legionary
National Legionary State
The National Legionary State was the Romanian government from September 6, 1940 to January 23, 1941. It was a single-party regime dictatorship dominated by the overtly fascist Iron Guard in uneasy conjunction with the head of government and Conducător Ion Antonescu, the leader of the Romanian...
regime and finally to that of Conducător
Conducator
Conducător was the title used officially in two instances by Romanian politicians, and earlier by Carol II.-History:...
Ion Antonescu
Ion Antonescu
Ion Victor Antonescu was a Romanian soldier, authoritarian politician and convicted war criminal. The Prime Minister and Conducător during most of World War II, he presided over two successive wartime dictatorships...
.
Beginnings
The paper was a successor to Nichifor Crainic's daily Calendarul, which had been closed down by the authorities in December 1933, just after the assassination of PremierPrime Minister of Romania
The Prime Minister of Romania is the head of the Government of Romania. Initially, the office was styled President of the Council of Ministers , when the term "Government" included more than the Cabinet, and the Cabinet was called The Council of Ministers...
Ion G. Duca
Ion G. Duca
Ion Gheorghe Duca was prime minister of Romania from November 14 to December 30, 1933, when he was assassinated for his efforts to suppress the fascist Iron Guard movement.-Life and political career:...
by the Iron Guard's Nicadori death squad
Iron Guard death squads
During the 1930s, three notable death squads emerged from Romania's Iron Guard: the Nicadori, the Decemviri, and the Răzbunători. Motivated by a combination of fascist political ideology and religious-nationalist mysticism, they carried out several high-level political assassinations in the...
. Together with his collaborator Protopopescu, with Cuvântul
Cuvântul
Cuvântul is a newspaper from Rezina, the Republic of Moldova, founded in 1995 by Tudor Iaşcenco.- External links :*...
journalist Nae Ionescu
Nae Ionescu
Nae Ionescu was a Romanian philosopher, logician, mathematician, professor, and journalist. Near the end of his career, he became known for his antisemitism and devotion to far right politics, in the years leading up to World War II.-Life:...
, and other far right supporters in the press, Crainic was arrested on charges of having morally instigated the killing. They were tried over the following months, but were eventually acquitted. During the affair, Crainic and the others made public statements dissociating themselves from the Iron Guard and its leader Corneliu Zelea Codreanu
Corneliu Zelea Codreanu
Corneliu Zelea Codreanu was a Romanian politician of the far right, the founder and charismatic leader of the Iron Guard or The Legion of the Archangel Michael , an ultra-nationalist and violently antisemitic organization active throughout most of the interwar period...
, which contrasted with their support for the movement before and after that date. By then, Calendaruls editor was also ending his brief association with the PNC. This signaled the beginning of a rivalry among the radical right-wing groups, which would also reflect on Crainic's stance toward Alexandru Vaida-Voevod
Alexandru Vaida-Voevod
Alexandru Vaida-Voevod or Vaida-Voievod was a Romanian politician who was a supporter and promoter of the union of Transylvania with the Romanian Old Kingdom; he later served three terms as a Prime Minister of Greater Romania.-Transylvanian politics:He was born to a Greek-Catholic family in the...
(whose fascist party, the Romanian Front
Romanian Front
The Romanian Front was a Fascist party created in 1935 - being led by Alexandru Vaida-Voevod as a splinter group from the National Peasants' Party.-History:...
, was to merge with the PNC soon after).
Crainic attempted to revive Calendarul, but his attempts were frustrated by successive executives down to 1938. Sfarmă-Piatră saw print on November 14, 1935, after Crainic received funding from Stelian Popescu. In its first issue, it proclaimed its commitment to nationalism
Nationalism
Nationalism is a political ideology that involves a strong identification of a group of individuals with a political entity defined in national terms, i.e. a nation. In the 'modernist' image of the nation, it is nationalism that creates national identity. There are various definitions for what...
, and launched an appeal to "obliterate the rookeries that the naive take for temples and the con artists claim are eternal", stating that its goal was to fight "the freckled dragons".
According to literary historian Z. Ornea, the journal was noted for making use of "the violent, sneering, vulgar and unsubstantial lampoon". Noting the heavy use of demeaning epithets, literary critic Ruxandra Cesereanu
Ruxandra Cesereanu
Ruxandra-Mihaela Cesereanu or Ruxandra-Mihaela Braga is a Romanian poet, essayist, short story writer, novelist and literary critic...
describes the journal and its partners on the far right as engaged in "besmirching writers and public figures", while political analyst Michael Shafir notes it was "viciously antisemitic".
Sfarmă-Piatră constantly popularized the claim that Romania was subject to a Jewish invasion, and featured many articles in which Jews who took Romanian names were referred to under their original ones, in what was an attempt to have them branded and marginalized. It also maintained a climate of hatred against Jews in high position, claiming that King Carol's camarilla
Camarilla
Camarilla may refer to:*Camarilla, an unofficial group of courtiers or favorites surrounding and influencing a king or ruler, specifically the two such groups prominent in German history....
was a sign of Jewish domination over the country, and, in particular, issuing attacks against Carol's mistress, Elena Lupescu, who was of part-Jewish origin. From the moment of its creation, Sfarmă-Piatră published regular pieces against the rival journals Adevărul
Adevarul
Adevărul is a Romanian daily newspaper, based in Bucharest. Founded in 1871 and reestablished in 1888, it was the main left-wing press venue to be published during the Romanian Kingdom's existence, adopting an independent pro-democratic position, advocating land reform and universal suffrage...
and Dimineaţa, and attempted to maintain close links with other ultra-nationalist journals (Porunca Vremii, Vremea, Curentul).
From early on, the periodical made a point of attacking politicians of the establishment, and in particular members of the National Peasants' Party
National Peasants' Party
The National Peasants' Party was a Romanian political party, formed in 1926 through the fusion of the Romanian National Party from Transylvania and the Peasants' Party . It was in power between 1928 and 1933, with brief interruptions...
(PNŢ): alongside Argetoianu, Titulescu and Stere, its journalists wrote against Vaida-Voevod and Victor Iamandi
Victor Iamandi
Victor Iamandi was a Romanian politician and activist. He served as the Romanian Minister of Justice. He was killed by the Iron Guard during the Jilava Massacre due to the measures he took against the Guard during his ministerial service.-External links:*...
. In particular, Sfarmă-Piatră attacked several politicians and intellectuals (Sadoveanu, Argetoianu, Vaida-Voevod) for their association with Freemasonry
Freemasonry
Freemasonry is a fraternal organisation that arose from obscure origins in the late 16th to early 17th century. Freemasonry now exists in various forms all over the world, with a membership estimated at around six million, including approximately 150,000 under the jurisdictions of the Grand Lodge...
. Through Crainic's articles, Sfarmă-Piatră also issued occasional praise for Titulescu, commending him for standing up to Hungary
Hungary
Hungary , officially the Republic of Hungary , is a landlocked country in Central Europe. It is situated in the Carpathian Basin and is bordered by Slovakia to the north, Ukraine and Romania to the east, Serbia and Croatia to the south, Slovenia to the southwest and Austria to the west. The...
's revisionist
Irredentism
Irredentism is any position advocating annexation of territories administered by another state on the grounds of common ethnicity or prior historical possession, actual or alleged. Some of these movements are also called pan-nationalist movements. It is a feature of identity politics and cultural...
designs in respect to Transylvania
Transylvania
Transylvania is a historical region in the central part of Romania. Bounded on the east and south by the Carpathian mountain range, historical Transylvania extended in the west to the Apuseni Mountains; however, the term sometimes encompasses not only Transylvania proper, but also the historical...
, and depicted him standing in front of the Chamber of Deputies
Chamber of Deputies of Romania
The Chamber of Deputies is the lower house in Romania's bicameral parliament. It has 315 seats, to which deputies are elected by direct popular vote on a proportional representation basis to serve four-year terms...
as if dressed "in the fiery cape of Romanian consciousness." Similar praise for the Foreign Minister was contributed to the newspaper by Dragoş Protopopescu.
Sfarmă-Piatră, modernism and traditionalism
A regular feature of Sfarmă-Piatră was constituted by its claims to save Romanian cultureCulture of Romania
Romania has a unique culture, which is the product of its geography and of its distinct historical evolution. Like Romanians themselves, it is defined as the meeting point of three regions: Central Europe, Eastern Europe, and the Balkans, but cannot be truly included in any of them...
and to expose the dangers posed by modernism
Modernism
Modernism, in its broadest definition, is modern thought, character, or practice. More specifically, the term describes the modernist movement, its set of cultural tendencies and array of associated cultural movements, originally arising from wide-scale and far-reaching changes to Western society...
and the avant-garde
Avant-garde
Avant-garde means "advance guard" or "vanguard". The adjective form is used in English to refer to people or works that are experimental or innovative, particularly with respect to art, culture, and politics....
, as well as the negative impact the older left-wing cultural trend known as Poporanism
Poporanism
The word “poporanism” is derived from “popor”, meaning “people” in the Romanian language. The ideology of Romanian Populism and poporanism are interchangeable. Founded by Constantin Stere in the early 1890s, populism is distinguished by its opposition to socialism, promotion of voting rights for...
. In 1936, an essayist named Septimiu Bucur contributed a piece in which he claimed that Romania lacked a school of literary criticism after the late 19th century demise of Junimea
Junimea
Junimea was a Romanian literary society founded in Iaşi in 1863, through the initiative of several foreign-educated personalities led by Titu Maiorescu, Petre P. Carp, Vasile Pogor, Theodor Rosetti and Iacob Negruzzi...
. In particular, he argued against the Popranists Constantin Dobrogeanu-Gherea
Constantin Dobrogeanu-Gherea
Constantin Dobrogeanu-Gherea was a Romanian Marxist theorist, politician, sociologist, literary critic, and journalist....
(a Jewish immigrant whom he described as "alienated" from Romanian realities) and Garabet Ibrăileanu
Garabet Ibraileanu
Garabet Ibrăileanu was a Romanian-Armenian literary critic and theorist, writer, translator, sociologist, Iaşi University professor , and, together with Paul Bujor and Constantin Stere, for long main editor of the Viaţa Românească literary magazine between 1906 and 1930...
(whose outlook he rejected for being akin to regionalism
Regionalism (politics)
Regionalism is a term used in international relations. Regionalism also constitutes one of the three constituents of the international commercial system...
). Bucur then focused on Eugen Lovinescu
Eugen Lovinescu
Eugen Lovinescu was a Romanian modernist literary historian, literary critic, academic, and novelist, who in 1919 established the Sburătorul literary club. He was the father of Monica Lovinescu, and the uncle of Horia Lovinescu, Vasile Lovinescu, and Anton Holban...
, who, as editor of Sburătorul
Sburatorul
Sburătorul was a Romanian modernist literary magazine and literary society, established in Bucharest in April 1919. Led by Eugen Lovinescu, the circle was instrumental in developing new trends and styles in Romanian literature, ranging from a new wave of Romanian Symbolism to an urban-themed...
, had abandoned his conservative
Conservatism
Conservatism is a political and social philosophy that promotes the maintenance of traditional institutions and supports, at the most, minimal and gradual change in society. Some conservatives seek to preserve things as they are, emphasizing stability and continuity, while others oppose modernism...
position to support an explicitly urban form of modernism, marked by the imprint of Impressionism
Impressionism
Impressionism was a 19th-century art movement that originated with a group of Paris-based artists whose independent exhibitions brought them to prominence during the 1870s and 1880s...
. He accused the modernist doyen of having introduced "a plant with poisoned juices" to Romania, and accused him of being partly responsible for "the recent invasion of kike foreigners".
A year later, Ovidiu Papadima
Ovidiu Papadima
Ovidiu Papadima was a Romanian literary critic, folklorist, and essayist....
wrote an article specifically targeting Lovinescu. Announcing that "the era of unforgiving judgments is approaching", Papadima accused Lovinescu of having engineered "our spiritual decay" through "the invasion of modernism", which, he claimed, replicated the supposed intrusion of "foreign capital" in the economic field, and brought along "the rapacious claws of the Judaic
Judaism
Judaism ) is the "religion, philosophy, and way of life" of the Jewish people...
spirit." Ridiculing Lovinescu as "a desk sociologist" with "the temperament of a subdued ruminant", and alleging that his education was supposed to make him a natural adversary of "modernist dares", Papadima claimed that the Sburătorul leader was being manipulated by Jews, who fed his ambition of leading a cultural movement. Among the Jewish writer on whom he focused his allegations were Benjamin Fondane
Benjamin Fondane
Benjamin Fondane or Benjamin Fundoianu was a Romanian and French poet, critic and existentialist philosopher, also noted for his work in film and theater. Known from his Romanian youth as a Symbolist poet and columnist, he alternated Neoromantic and Expressionist themes with echoes from Tudor...
, Camil Baltazar
Camil Baltazar
Camil Baltazar was a Romanian-Jewish poet.-Selected works:*Vecernii, 1923*Flaute de mătase, 1923...
, Ilarie Voronca
Ilarie Voronca
Ilarie Voronca was a Romanian-French avant-garde poet and essayist.Voronca was of Jewish ethnicity...
and Felix Aderca
Felix Aderca
Felix Aderca or F. Aderca Aderca, also known as Zelicu Froim Adercu or Froim Aderca; March 13, 1891 – December 12, 1962) was a Romanian novelist, playwright, poet, journalist and critic, noted as a representative of rebellious modernism in the context of Romanian literature...
. Another article mockingly referred to the critic as Oegen Lovinescu, and to his colleague Pompiliu Constantinescu
Pompiliu Constantinescu
Pompiliu Constantinescu was a Romanian literary critic.-Biography:He was born on 17 May 1901, "in a place where he saw the light of day for the first time, on Sabines Street no...
as Fonfăilă Constantinescu (from fonf, "person who speaks through the nose"). The campaign against Lovinescu, a common feature of the far right press, also saw Sfarmă-Piatră printing articles and essays in which he was denounced as "histrionic" and "the falsifier of Romanian culture".
Criticism of Sadoveanu became regular in the radical right-wing press in 1936, when the novelist decided to accept leadership of the twin newspapers Adevărul and Dimineaţa. Sadoveanu, a traditionalist with links to the Poporanist trend, celebrated for his historical novel
Historical novel
According to Encyclopædia Britannica, a historical novel is-Development:An early example of historical prose fiction is Luó Guànzhōng's 14th century Romance of the Three Kingdoms, which covers one of the most important periods of Chinese history and left a lasting impact on Chinese culture.The...
s, antagonized the publications by thus explicitly stating his commitment to democracy. Among many others, the journalist Alexandru Gregorian denounced Sadoveanu for "betrayal", in a Sfarmă-Piatră article titled M. Sadoveanu. Împărat ("M. Sadoveanu. Emperor"). Gregorian described his target as a victim of Jewish manipulation, exercised by the Jewish entrepreneur Breuer, and, emphasizing Sadoveanu's prominent status within Romanian Freemasonry
Freemasonry in Romania
The beginnings of Freemasonry in the Danubian Principalities of Moldavia and Wallachia date to the 18th century and the activities of the humanist scholar Anton Maria del Chiaro, secretary to voivodes Constantin Brâncoveanu and Constantine Mavrocordatos...
, alleged that he was worshiping both the Great Architect of the Universe
Great Architect of the Universe
The Great Architect of the Universe is a conception of God discussed by many Christian theologians and apologists. As a designation it is used within Freemasonry to neutrally represent whatever Supreme Being to which each member individually holds in adherence...
and Ucigă-l toaca (the latter being a popular Romanian-language
Romanian language
Romanian Romanian Romanian (or Daco-Romanian; obsolete spellings Rumanian, Roumanian; self-designation: română, limba română ("the Romanian language") or românește (lit. "in Romanian") is a Romance language spoken by around 24 to 28 million people, primarily in Romania and Moldova...
name for the devil, translating as "Let him be killed by the semantron
Semantron
The semantron or semanterion , also called a xylon is a percussion instrument used in monasteries to summon monks to prayer or at the start of a procession.-Origins and use:...
"). Comparing the two newspapers to a "ghetto
Ghetto
A ghetto is a section of a city predominantly occupied by a group who live there, especially because of social, economic, or legal issues.The term was originally used in Venice to describe the area where Jews were compelled to live. The term now refers to an overcrowded urban area often associated...
", he sarcastically depicted Mihail Sadoveanu as "the aurochs
Aurochs
The aurochs , the ancestor of domestic cattle, were a type of large wild cattle which inhabited Europe, Asia and North Africa, but is now extinct; it survived in Europe until 1627....
of Moldavia
Moldavia
Moldavia is a geographic and historical region and former principality in Eastern Europe, corresponding to the territory between the Eastern Carpathians and the Dniester river...
" (see Coat of arms of Moldavia), "standing circumcised
Circumcision
Male circumcision is the surgical removal of some or all of the foreskin from the penis. The word "circumcision" comes from Latin and ....
in the Breuers' office [at Adevăruls headquarters] on Sărindar Street." In particular, Alexandru Gregorian focused on Sadoveanu's obesity
Obesity
Obesity is a medical condition in which excess body fat has accumulated to the extent that it may have an adverse effect on health, leading to reduced life expectancy and/or increased health problems...
, and concluded that he was "a cadaver". Crainic himself voiced the accusation of "treason", and his article for the journal urged young people to view Sadoveanu as the equal of Ieremia Golia, a 16th century Moldavian boyar
Boyar
A boyar, or bolyar , was a member of the highest rank of the feudal Moscovian, Kievan Rus'ian, Bulgarian, Wallachian, and Moldavian aristocracies, second only to the ruling princes , from the 10th century through the 17th century....
who changed his allegiances between Moldavian rulers, and who was one of the central characters in Sadoveanu's own fiction works.
Condemning "pornography"
In 1936-1937, Papadima and Vintilă Horia used Sfarmă-Piatră to denounce those writers who, in their view, had authored pornographicPornography
Pornography or porn is the explicit portrayal of sexual subject matter for the purposes of sexual arousal and erotic satisfaction.Pornography may use any of a variety of media, ranging from books, magazines, postcards, photos, sculpture, drawing, painting, animation, sound recording, film, video,...
texts. Papadima thus contributed an article attacking the prose of Mircea Eliade
Mircea Eliade
Mircea Eliade was a Romanian historian of religion, fiction writer, philosopher, and professor at the University of Chicago. He was a leading interpreter of religious experience, who established paradigms in religious studies that persist to this day...
, a young modernist author who would later rally with the far right. He focused on Eliade's Domnişoara Christina, which contained a dream-like sequence in which an adult seems to have a sexual encounter with a 10 year old girl, describing the writing as evidence of "pathology" and concluding that it was "inverted tripe." Another one of Papadima's articles depicted Eliade as "deliciously ridiculous at times", and accused of him descarding the position of "an honest worker" in order to claim leadership of "a phenomenon". In part, Papadima's claims were responsible for the early 1937 official decision to have Eliade stripped of his teaching position at the University of Bucharest
University of Bucharest
The University of Bucharest , in Romania, is a university founded in 1864 by decree of Prince Alexander John Cuza to convert the former Saint Sava Academy into the current University of Bucharest.-Presentation:...
.
Like Gândirea
Gândirea
Gândirea , known during its early years as Gândirea Literară - Artistică - Socială , was a Romanian literary, political and art magazine.- Overview :Founded by Cezar Petrescu and D. I...
and other publications from the same ideological field, Sfarmă-Piatră issued strong criticism of Tudor Arghezi
Tudor Arghezi
Tudor Arghezi was a Romanian writer, best known for his contribution to poetry and children's literature. Born Ion N. Theodorescu in Bucharest , he explained that his pen name was related to Argesis, the Latin name for the Argeş River.-Early life:Along with Mihai Eminescu, Mateiu Caragiale, and...
, whose work bridged the gap between modernism and traditionalism. The controversy centered on Arghezi's volume Flori de mucigai ("Mildew Flowers"): after publishing an article in which he declared himself dissatisfied with the newly-found experimental
Experimental literature
Experimental literature refers to written works - often novels or magazines - that place great emphasis on innovations regarding technique and style.-Early history:...
focus in Arghezi's literature, Horia returned with a piece denouncing the older writer for his "willing adhesion to pornography" and "treason" of the traditionalist guidelines. Describing Arghezi's style as "bloated and muddy", he stressed: "[when it comes to Arghezi,] no insult is too much, no curse word is at fault."
In April 1938, Papadima signed a congratulatory article addressed to the justice system, and provoked by a tribunal's decision to have the avant-garde writer Geo Bogza
Geo Bogza
Geo Bogza was a Romanian avant-garde theorist, poet, and journalist, known for his left-wing and communist political convictions. As a young man in the interwar period, he was known as a rebel and was one of the most influential Romanian Surrealists...
imprisoned for a number of frankly erotic poems. On the occasion, he appealed to the authorities to arrest and try other writers whom, he claimed, were also guilty of this offense: Aderca, H. Bonciu
H. Bonciu
H. Bonciu, or Horia Bonciu , was a Romanian novelist, poet, journalist and translator, noted especially as an atypical figure on his country's avant-garde scene...
, and Max Blecher
Max Blecher
Max Blecher was a writer from Romania.His father was a well-to-do Jewish merchant and the owner of a porcelain shop. He attended primary and secondary school in Roman, Romania. After receiving his baccalaureat, Blecher left for Paris to study medicine...
. The text referred to the former two under their Jewish names (respectively, Froim Aderca and Haimovici Bonciu), which neither was using in their literary career.
Early rivalries within the far right
One of the campaigns launched by Sfarmă-Piatră involved attacks on the National Christian Party's policies. In an article of October 1936, Crainic claimed that, early in the 1930s, he had been offered leadership of Cuza's National-Christian Defense LeagueNational-Christian Defense League
The National-Christian Defense League was a virulently anti-Semitic political party of Romania formed by A. C. Cuza.-Origins:The group had its roots in the National Christian Union, formed in 1922 by Cuza and the famed physiologist Nicolae Paulescu. This group, which used the swastika as its...
from the hand of its aging leader. He described is conflict with Goga as one of the latter's maneuvers to ensure unquestioned rule over the newly-founded PNC (which had resulted from a 1935 fusion between the League and Goga's National Agrarian Party
National Agrarian Party (Romania)
The National Agrarian Party was a right-wing agrarian political party active in Romania during the early 1930s....
).
Ornea describes this attitude as being Crainic's attempt to counter his relative isolation, and create himself a "political footing" from which to campaign in favor of his new views on "the ethnocratic
Ethnocracy
Ethnocracy is a form of government where representatives of a particular ethnic group hold a number of government posts disproportionately large to the percentage of the total population that the particular ethnic group represents and use them to advance the position of their particular ethnic...
state". It was through Sfarmă-Piatră that Crainic introduced this concept to the Romanian public, claiming that it stood for "the first and only serious basis from which one may begin to discuss and accomplish the unification of [Romania's] nationalist movement". Writing for the newspaper in 1937, the editor complained that Cuza and his group were attempting to have antisemitism turned into a state policy only through democratic means, to which he opposed a totalitarian
Totalitarianism
Totalitarianism is a political system where the state recognizes no limits to its authority and strives to regulate every aspect of public and private life wherever feasible...
method: "And then how can Cuzism be democratic, if it is antisemitic? The 'eliminations' of kikes through democracy? But what reasonable political thinker could conceive of such an aberration, other than Mr. A. C. Cuza?" The same year, after his program was attacked by corporatist
Corporatism
Corporatism, also known as corporativism, is a system of economic, political, or social organization that involves association of the people of society into corporate groups, such as agricultural, business, ethnic, labor, military, patronage, or scientific affiliations, on the basis of common...
ideologue Mihail Manoilescu
Mihail Manoilescu
Mihail Manoilescu was a Romanian journalist, engineer, economist, politician and memoirist, who served as Foreign Minister of Romania during the summer of 1940...
in his magazine Buna Vestire, which functioned as a platform for the Iron Guard, Crainic contributed a Sfarmă-Piatră editorial which stated his deep disappointment. Although, at the same time, he spoke out against the potential perception of this goal as "the chromatic imitation" of the established Nazi German
Nazi Germany
Nazi Germany , also known as the Third Reich , but officially called German Reich from 1933 to 1943 and Greater German Reich from 26 June 1943 onward, is the name commonly used to refer to the state of Germany from 1933 to 1945, when it was a totalitarian dictatorship ruled by...
and Italian fascist
Italian Fascism
Italian Fascism also known as Fascism with a capital "F" refers to the original fascist ideology in Italy. This ideology is associated with the National Fascist Party which under Benito Mussolini ruled the Kingdom of Italy from 1922 until 1943, the Republican Fascist Party which ruled the Italian...
regimes, the newspaper regularly published ample praises of Adolf Hitler
Adolf Hitler
Adolf Hitler was an Austrian-born German politician and the leader of the National Socialist German Workers Party , commonly referred to as the Nazi Party). He was Chancellor of Germany from 1933 to 1945, and head of state from 1934 to 1945...
and Benito Mussolini
Benito Mussolini
Benito Amilcare Andrea Mussolini was an Italian politician who led the National Fascist Party and is credited with being one of the key figures in the creation of Fascism....
. In one article of this series, Crainic himself referred to Mussolini as "one of the greatest educators of mankind".
Nichifor Crainic subsequently attempted to unify the far right around himself, but his efforts were to prove largely fruitless. Early on, he addressed the Iron Guard, and in particular its youngest members. Ornea notes that this was effort hampered in mid-1936, when, as a Romanian Orthodox
Romanian Orthodox Church
The Romanian Orthodox Church is an autocephalous Eastern Orthodox church. It is in full communion with other Eastern Orthodox churches, and is ranked seventh in order of precedence. The Primate of the church has the title of Patriarch...
theologian, Crainic authored a message deploring the assassination of Mihai Stelescu
Mihai Stelescu
-With the Iron Guard:Born in Galaţi, he joined, while still in high school, the Legion of the Archangel Michael , an ultra-nationalist, Fascist, and anti-Semitic political movement led by Corneliu Zelea Codreanu....
, a Guard dissident and leader of the Crusade of Romanianism
Crusade of Romanianism
The Crusade of Romanianism was a Romanian fascist movement that was active during the 1930s.Formed in 1935 as the White Eagles the Crusade was made up of the supporters of Mihai Stelescu who had left the Iron Guard in acrimonious circumstances the previous year...
, whose killing was most likely carried out on Codreanu's orders. However, during the same year, Sfarmă-Piatră hosted an essay by Dan Botta which, according to historian of religion Andrei Oişteanu
Andrei Oisteanu
Andrei Oişteanu is a Romanian historian of religions and mentalities, ethnologist, cultural anthropologist, literary critic and novelist. Specialized in the history of religions and mentalities, he is also noted for his investigation of rituals and magic and his work in Jewish studies and the...
, was an illustration of the Iron Guard's own doctrine of self-sacrifice and political violence. Alluding to the folk legend about Meşterul Manole
Mesterul Manole
In Romanian mythology, Meșterul Manole was the chief architect of the Curtea de Argeș Monastery in Wallachia...
, who gave his wife's life in return for completion of the Argeş Monastery
Curtea de Arges Cathedral
The Cathedral of Curtea de Argeș is a church in Curtea de Argeș, Romania, located in the grounds of a monastery. It is dedicated to Saint Nicholas....
, Botta wrote: "Death implies a sacrifice. The deceased ktitor
Ktitor
A ktetor or ktitor is someone who provides the funds for construction or reconstruction of an Orthodox church or monastery, for the addition of icons, frescos, and other works of art. A Catholic equivalent of the term is a donator. The female form is ktetorissa or ktitorissa ....
s on whose bones a country was founded are the heroic dead. [...] How beautiful does this meaning of death-foundation in the Argeş Monastery ballad! How all-encompassing its teaching! [...] Let us learn to die!"
Preferring to praise Mussolini more than Hitler, and standing for a fascist fraternity of Latin peoples
Latins
"Latins" refers to different groups of people and the meaning of the word changes for where and when it is used.The original Latins were an Italian tribe inhabiting central and south-central Italy. Through conquest by their most populous city-state, Rome, the original Latins culturally "Romanized"...
, Crainic was also circumspect when it came to Codreanu's stated admiration for Nazism
Nazism
Nazism, the common short form name of National Socialism was the ideology and practice of the Nazi Party and of Nazi Germany...
. Believing that such an attitude best suited "Nordic" peoples, Crainic stated: "the Romanian would err profoundly if he were to deny the virtues of our Latinism." At the time, Toma Vlădescu parted with Sfarmă-Piatră and, as contributor to Buna Vestire, wrote pieces attacking his former mentor. One of them proclaimed Crainic "a cadaver" which produced "stench", recommending "drowning [him] in a little bit of salubrious ink." By then, Sfarmă-Piatrăs allies at Vremea also took distance from Crainic and rallied with Codreanu, accusing the former of displaying "amok
Running amok
Running amok, sometimes referred to as simply amok is a term for a killing spree perpetrated by an individual out of rage or resentment over perceived mistreatment....
" and "megalomania
Megalomania
Megalomania is a psycho-pathological condition characterized by delusional fantasies of power, relevance, or omnipotence. 'Megalomania is characterized by an inflated sense of self-esteem and overestimation by persons of their powers and beliefs'...
".
Just before the 1937 election
Romanian general election, 1937
General elections were held in Romania on 20 and 22 December 1937. It was Romania's last election before King Carol II dissolved Parliament and instituted a royal dictatorship the following February. By the next elections under the 1923 Constitution, Romania had passed through two dictatorships and...
, when the Iron Guard, the PNC and other far right parties competed against each other, Crainic opposed the factionalism and called for a unified bloc against the left. As the elections provided a uniquely indecisive result and King Carol II nominated Goga's party (the fourth-running) to form the new cabinet, Crainic switched his backing to the PNC, whose racial discrimination
Racism
Racism is the belief that inherent different traits in human racial groups justify discrimination. In the modern English language, the term "racism" is used predominantly as a pejorative epithet. It is applied especially to the practice or advocacy of racial discrimination of a pernicious nature...
measures against Jews it welcomed. Sfarmă-Piatră continued to oscillate for the following two months, as the PNC and its paramilitary
Paramilitary
A paramilitary is a force whose function and organization are similar to those of a professional military, but which is not considered part of a state's formal armed forces....
wing, the Lăncieri
Lancieri
The Lăncieri or 'Lance-bearers' were a Romanian fascist paramilitary movement who adopted a blue shirted uniform and contributed to the country's political street battles in the 1920s and 1930s....
, came into open conflict with Codreanu's movement. In January 1938, Crainic's column celebrated the Iron Guard, referring to its Legionaries as the real victor in the previous suffrage (where they had come in third), praising them for their youth and supposedly universal social appeal, and claiming that they stood for his ideal to unify the nationalist camp. His piece included the verdict: "It is a phenomenon that nothing will be able to stop any longer."
Less than a month later, as King Carol decided to end his partnership with the PNC and to depose Premier Goga, in what Ornea characterized as an "opportunistic" move, Sfarmă-Piatră claimed that the cabinet had proven itself "noisy, superficial and utterly unprepared". Crainic's argument again had at its core his own views on ethnocracy, and he was in effect deploring Goga's failure to adopt the program as his own. Soon after, when Carol instituted his own authoritarian
Authoritarianism
Authoritarianism is a form of social organization characterized by submission to authority. It is usually opposed to individualism and democracy...
regime around the new Premier Miron Cristea
Miron Cristea
Miron Cristea, was an Austro-Hungarian-born Romanian cleric and politician....
, in a series of moves that was to lead to the establishment of an anti-Iron Guard monopoly-party named National Renaissance Front
National Renaissance Front
The National Renaissance Front was a fascist Romanian political party created by King Carol II in 1938 as the single monopoly party of government following his decision to ban all other political parties and suspend the 1923 Constitution, and the passing of the 1938 Constitution of Romania...
, Crainic expressed the hope that ethnocracy was to be the authorities' ideal. According to Ornea, this statement, published by Sfarmă-Piatră, showed that its author "understood nothing from the course of political life."
1938 decline and support for King Carol
In February-June 1938, Crainic was absent from among Sfarmă-Piatrăs staff, dedicating himself entirely to his work as editor of Porunca Vremii. In his absence, Sfarmă-Piatră became a tribune for young and radical essayists who identified with the DaciansDacians
The Dacians were an Indo-European people, very close or part of the Thracians. Dacians were the ancient inhabitants of Dacia...
more than with the Latins (see Origin of the Romanians, Protochronism
Protochronism
Protochronism is a Romanian term describing the tendency to ascribe, largely relying on questionable data and subjective interpretations, an idealised past to the country as a whole...
). The signs of this change were present in Botta's earlier texts about indifference to dying, since they referred to the ancient cult of Zalmoxis
Zalmoxis
Zalmoxis , is a divinity of the Getae, mentioned by Herodotus in his Histories IV, 93-96...
. Other than Botta, the Dacianist category included Simion Dimancea, who declared, in a 1938 issue of the paper: "Will the Latin style predominate, or will the Dacian one? Both. However, the Dacian one will shine more majestically: it is at home."
Upon Crainic's return, the magazine was struggling, being faced with both financial difficulties and the censorship
Censorship
thumb|[[Book burning]] following the [[1973 Chilean coup d'état|1973 coup]] that installed the [[Military government of Chile |Pinochet regime]] in Chile...
enforced by Carol's new regime. Between that date and October 1938, it published a series of special issues dedicated to various reactionary
Reactionary
The term reactionary refers to viewpoints that seek to return to a previous state in a society. The term is meant to describe one end of a political spectrum whose opposite pole is "radical". While it has not been generally considered a term of praise it has been adopted as a self-description by...
figures on the public stage (writer Ioan Alexandru Brătescu-Voineşti, physician and antisemitic agitator Nicolae Paulescu
Nicolae Paulescu
Nicolae Paulescu was a Romanian physiologist, professor of medicine, the discoverer of insulin . The "pancreine" was a crude extract of bovine pancreas in salted water, after which some impurites were removed with hydrochloric acid and sodium hydroxide.-Early life and activities:Born in Bucharest,...
), as well as to various episodes in the history of Romania (the rule of Wallachian Prince Constantin Brâncoveanu
Constantin Brâncoveanu
Constantin Brâncoveanu was Prince of Wallachia between 1688 and 1714.-Ascension:A descendant of the Craioveşti boyar family and related to Matei Basarab, Brâncoveanu was born at the estate of Brâncoveni and raised in the house of his uncle, stolnic Constantin Cantacuzino...
and events of the World War I
World War I
World War I , which was predominantly called the World War or the Great War from its occurrence until 1939, and the First World War or World War I thereafter, was a major war centred in Europe that began on 28 July 1914 and lasted until 11 November 1918...
Battle of Romania
Romanian Campaign (World War I)
The Romanian Campaign was part of the Balkan theatre of World War I, with Romania and Russia allied against the armies of the Central Powers. Fighting took place from August 1916 to December 1917, across most of present-day Romania, including Transylvania, which was part of the Austro-Hungarian...
). Z. Ornea, who describes this series as "rather insipid", credits them with having contributed to a commercial failure, which in turn made Sfarmă-Piatră appear as a monthly magazine up until October 1938. Among the main features of that period were two feuilleton
Feuilleton
Feuilleton was originally a kind of supplement attached to the political portion of French newspapers, consisting chiefly of non-political news and gossip, literature and art criticism, a chronicle of the latest fashions, and epigrams, charades and other literary trifles...
s: one was a Romanian-language
Romanian language
Romanian Romanian Romanian (or Daco-Romanian; obsolete spellings Rumanian, Roumanian; self-designation: română, limba română ("the Romanian language") or românește (lit. "in Romanian") is a Romance language spoken by around 24 to 28 million people, primarily in Romania and Moldova...
translation of Hitler's Mein Kampf
Mein Kampf
Mein Kampf is a book written by Nazi leader Adolf Hitler. It combines elements of autobiography with an exposition of Hitler's political ideology. Volume 1 of Mein Kampf was published in 1925 and Volume 2 in 1926...
, the other was Germanofobia (Romanian for "Germanophobia
Anti-German sentiment
Anti-German sentiment is defined as an opposition to or fear of Germany, its inhabitants, and the German language. Its opposite is Germanophilia.-Russia:...
"), a political study authored by Brătescu-Voineşti.
In January 1939, after the government decapitated the Iron Guard and had Codreanu killed, and as the latter embarked on a widespread campaign of political violence, Crainic threw his support behind the authorities. At the time, he began condemning the weapon of political assassination, again in use under the Guard's new leader Horia Sima
Horia Sima
Horia Sima was a Romanian fascist politician. After 1938, he was the second and last leader of the fascist and antisemitic para-military movement known as the Iron Guard.-In Romania:...
, and, in an article for Sfarmă-Piatră, claimed to have always done so. He also argued that his previous writings all stood as evidence that he had deplored the Guard's course of action, and stated that the "new generation" had disappointed him early on. Ornea, who rejects the notion that any such evidence can be found, proposes that Crainic was merely attempting to rescue his magazine from being branded a pro-Iron Guard venue. Although Crainic offered praise to the National Renaissance Front and the 1938 Constitution
1938 Constitution of Romania
The 1938 Constitution of Romania was the fundamental law that established the authoritarian monarchic regime of King Carol II. It was drafted by a university professor, Istrate Micescu, based on suggestions given by the king, and made public on February 20, 1938. Four days later, voters were...
, which had introduced fascist-inspired corporatism, the periodical was shut down on March 5, 1939.
Again a newspaper, Sfarmă-Piatră reemerged on December 22 of the same year, when it continued to support Carol and his dictatorship. A long series of eulogies for the monarch followed, some of them being signed by poet Radu Gyr
Radu Gyr
Radu Gyr was a Romanian poet, essayist, playwright and journalist....
, a former Iron Guard activist who had just returned from a concentration camp in Miercurea Ciuc. One of Gyr's articles for the paper condemned the Iron Guard as "hooligans", and proposed a new guideline for the far right: "The king summons incandescent nationalism [...] The king summons the youth. These are the sacred hooligan ideas of yesterday, presently turned into a light-bearing standard."
World War II, end and legacy
In late 1940, after Carol's regime succumbed to the loss of BessarabiaBessarabia
Bessarabia is a historical term for the geographic region in Eastern Europe bounded by the Dniester River on the east and the Prut River on the west....
, Northern Bukovina and Northern Transylvania
Northern Transylvania
Northern Transylvania is a region of Transylvania, situated within the territory of Romania. The population is largely composed of both ethnic Romanians and Hungarians, and the region has been part of Romania since 1918 . During World War II, as a consequence of the territorial agreement known as...
(see Soviet occupation of Bessarabia and Northern Bukovina, Second Vienna Award
Second Vienna Award
The Second Vienna Award was the second of two Vienna Awards arbitrated by the Nazi Germany and Fascist Italy. Rendered on August 30, 1940, it re-assigned the territory of Northern Transylvania from Romania to Hungary.-Prelude and historical background :After the World War I, the multi-ethnic...
), and the Iron Guard again reemerged, sharing power with Conducător
Conducator
Conducător was the title used officially in two instances by Romanian politicians, and earlier by Carol II.-History:...
Ion Antonescu
Ion Antonescu
Ion Victor Antonescu was a Romanian soldier, authoritarian politician and convicted war criminal. The Prime Minister and Conducător during most of World War II, he presided over two successive wartime dictatorships...
to generate a "National Legionary State
National Legionary State
The National Legionary State was the Romanian government from September 6, 1940 to January 23, 1941. It was a single-party regime dictatorship dominated by the overtly fascist Iron Guard in uneasy conjunction with the head of government and Conducător Ion Antonescu, the leader of the Romanian...
". Sfarmă-Piatră again switched its allegiance, proclaiming Antonescu to be a leader dressed "in the armor of predestination", and depicting him one of the great European leaders, alongside Hitler, Mussolini, Portuguese
Portugal
Portugal , officially the Portuguese Republic is a country situated in southwestern Europe on the Iberian Peninsula. Portugal is the westernmost country of Europe, and is bordered by the Atlantic Ocean to the West and South and by Spain to the North and East. The Atlantic archipelagos of the...
Estado Novo founder António de Oliveira Salazar
António de Oliveira Salazar
António de Oliveira Salazar, GColIH, GCTE, GCSE served as the Prime Minister of Portugal from 1932 to 1968. He also served as acting President of the Republic briefly in 1951. He founded and led the Estado Novo , the authoritarian, right-wing government that presided over and controlled Portugal...
and the Caudillo
Caudillo
Caudillo is a Spanish word for "leader" and usually describes a political-military leader at the head of an authoritarian power. The term translates into English as leader or chief, or more pejoratively as warlord, dictator or strongman. Caudillo was the term used to refer to the charismatic...
of Nationalist Spain, Francisco Franco
Francisco Franco
Francisco Franco y Bahamonde was a Spanish general, dictator and head of state of Spain from October 1936 , and de facto regent of the nominally restored Kingdom of Spain from 1947 until his death in November, 1975...
. Soon after, it saluted the Iron Guard as "the first organic form of the modern Romanian state." Led by Gregorian, the publication was a weekly and again a daily, and carried the subtitle Săptamânal de luptă şi doctrină românească ("Weekly of Romanian combat and doctrine", later changed to Ziar de informaţie şi luptă românească, "Newspaper of Romanian information and combat").
The magazine continued to be published after the January 1941 Legionary Rebellion
Legionnaires' Rebellion and Bucharest Pogrom
The Legionnaires' rebellion and the Bucharest pogrom occurred in Bucharest, Romania, between 21 and 23 January 1941.As the privileges of the Iron Guard were being cut off by Conducător Ion Antonescu, members of the Iron Guard, also known as the Legionnaires, revolted...
, which ended the partnership between Sima and Antonescu and brought the latter to an uncontested position of power. It subsequently became a venue for disseminating the official guidelines, repressive in general and antisemitic in particular (see Romania during World War II
Romania during World War II
Following the outbreak of World War II on 1 September 1939, the Kingdom of Romania officially adopted a position of neutrality. However, the rapidly changing situation in Europe during 1940, as well as domestic political upheaval, undermined this stance. Fascist political forces such as the Iron...
, Holocaust in Romania). It thus began spreading the theory of Judeo-Bolshevism
Jewish Bolshevism
Jewish Bolshevism, Judeo-Bolshevism, and known as Żydokomuna in Poland, is an antisemitic stereotype based on the claim that Jews have been the driving force behind or are disproportionately involved in the modern Communist movement, or sometimes more specifically Russian Bolshevism.The expression...
, particularly after Romania joined in the German-led attack on the Soviet Union
Operation Barbarossa
Operation Barbarossa was the code name for Germany's invasion of the Soviet Union during World War II that began on 22 June 1941. Over 4.5 million troops of the Axis powers invaded the USSR along a front., the largest invasion in the history of warfare...
. It also offered ample praise to the new wave of antisemitic measures enforced by the Antonescu executive. In July 1941, a month after the Iaşi pogrom
Iasi pogrom
The Iaşi pogrom or Jassy pogrom of June 27, 1941 was one of the most violent pogroms in Jewish history, launched by governmental forces in the Romanian city of Iaşi against its Jewish population, resulting in the murder of at least 13,266 Jews, according to Romanian authorities.-Background:]During...
, it published an article signed by V. Beneş, which described in detail the "Antijudaic and antimasonic policy" of the Mihai Antonescu
Mihai Antonescu
Mihai Antonescu was a Romanian politician who served as Deputy Prime Minister and Foreign Minister during World War II.-Early career:...
executive, rendering an interview the Premier had granted to the press in the Kingdom of Italy
Kingdom of Italy (1861–1946)
The Kingdom of Italy was a state forged in 1861 by the unification of Italy under the influence of the Kingdom of Sardinia, which was its legal predecessor state...
. Leizer Finchelstein, the Jewish employee of a newsstand in Iaşi
Iasi
Iași is the second most populous city and a municipality in Romania. Located in the historical Moldavia region, Iași has traditionally been one of the leading centres of Romanian social, cultural, academic and artistic life...
and a survivor of the pogrom, recalled that authorities had explicitly asked him to distribute and display Sfarmă-Piatră and Porunca Vremii in the months before the violence erupted.
The publication was disestablished later in the war, and, following the start of Soviet presence in Romania
Soviet occupation of Romania
The Soviet occupation of Romania refers to the period from 1944 to August 1958, during which the Soviet Union maintained a significant military presence in Romania...
, Crainic was tried for his responsibility in instigating racial violence, serving years in prison under the communist regime
Communist Romania
Communist Romania was the period in Romanian history when that country was a Soviet-aligned communist state in the Eastern Bloc, with the dominant role of Romanian Communist Party enshrined in its successive constitutions...
, before being partly rehabilitated
Rehabilitation (Soviet)
Rehabilitation in the context of the former Soviet Union, and the Post-Soviet states, was the restoration of a person who was criminally prosecuted without due basis, to the state of acquittal...
and assigned to the staff of Glasul Patriei (a magazine publishing propaganda
Propaganda
Propaganda is a form of communication that is aimed at influencing the attitude of a community toward some cause or position so as to benefit oneself or one's group....
for the Romanian diaspora
Romanian diaspora
The Romanian diaspora is the ethnically Romanian population outside Romania and Moldova. The concept does not usually include the ethnic Romanians who live as natives in the states surrounding Romania, chiefly those Romanians who live in Ukraine and Serbia. The diaspora does include the people of...
, and overseen by Romania's secret police, the Securitate
Securitate
The Securitate was the secret police agency of Communist Romania. Previously, the Romanian secret police was called Siguranţa Statului. Founded on August 30, 1948, with help from the Soviet NKVD, the Securitate was abolished in December 1989, shortly after President Nicolae Ceaușescu was...
). A similar road was taken by Radu Gyr, who joined Crainic at Glasul Patriei after having himself spent time in communist jails.
A decade after the Romanian Revolution of 1989
Romanian Revolution of 1989
The Romanian Revolution of 1989 was a series of riots and clashes in December 1989. These were part of the Revolutions of 1989 that occurred in several Warsaw Pact countries...
, the emergence of neo-fascism
Neo-Fascism
Neo-fascism is a post–World War II ideology that includes significant elements of fascism. The term neo-fascist may apply to groups that express a specific admiration for Benito Mussolini and Italian Fascism or any other fascist leader/state...
and the creation of small Iron Guard-inspired groups brought the creation of an online newspaper
Online newspaper
An online newspaper, also known as a web newspaper, is a newspaper that exists on the World Wide Web or Internet, either separately or as an online version of a printed periodical....
of the same name. According to Michael Shafir, its circulation as of 2003 was "probably minuscule".