Decree of Turda

The Decree of Turda (tordai dekrétum; Decretul de la Turda) was a 14th century decree by King Louis I of Hungary that granted special privileges to the Transylvanian noblemen to take measures against malefactors belonging to any nation, especially the Romanians.

Background
In the 14th century, the Kingdom of Hungary had a political and economic consolidation, thus Transylvania prospered as never before. The campaign against the Golden Horde in 1345 led by Andrew Lackfi, Count of the Székelys had finally expelled the Tatars and ended the devastations of the Mongols.

According to Hungarian historians, the main source of problems was the relationship between nobles and villains, which was not resolved and was further complicated as claimed by legal and social aspects of the settlement of Romanians in the Hungarian counties. Due to the different ways of life, the constantly increasing population of Romanians in Transylvania led to repeated conflicts with the Hungarians. King Louis I of Hungary visited Transylvania in 1366 to deal with the disorder.

According to Romanian historian Ioan-Aurel Pop the main cause was the suspicion of disloyalty of Romanian population towards the Hungarian Crown. After their lands were settled with colonists, seized, or passed to Hungarian nobles some of the knezes and voivodes rebelled. This might have caused the resistance and later departure of Radu Negru and Bogdan I, and the founding of Wallachia and Moldavia as separate entities from the Kingdom of Hungary. Faced with rebellion and pressed by the nobility, the King had to act promptly and with strictness.

History
King Louis I of Hungary stayed in Transylvania from April to August in 1366. On 28 June 1366, while residing in Torda (present-day Turda), the monarch issued a decree at the request of the Transylvanian noblemen. The latter had informed the King that they "have been suffering, day by day, many troubles because of the evil arts of many malefactors, especially Romanians, ...because of their way of being and their disorderly behaviour". The royal decree granted special privileges to the Transylvanian noblemen "in order to exterminate or remove, from this country, malefactors belonging to any nation, in particular Romanians". For this purpose, the decree determines the rules of the legal procedure. On 28 June 1366, while residing in the Transylvanian town of Torda (present-day Turda), Louis enacted a decree to reinforce law and order, regulating some areas of social and public life, administration, criminal law and judicial practice.

The conditions imposed by the decree for maintaining or acceding nobility (in particular, affiliation to the Roman Catholic Church and possession of a royal certificate of donation for the owned land) were to select and limit the noble class over a period of centuries, which in turn accelerated the decline of the Estate of Romanians (Universitas Valachorum).

The decree takes action against malefactors: propter presumptuosam astuciam diversorum malefactorum, specialiter Olachorum in ipsa terra nostra existencium (…) ad exterminandum seu delendum in ipsa terra malefactores quarumlibet nacionum, signanter Olachorum - because of the evil arts of many malefactors, especially Romanians, who live in that our country (…) to expel or to exterminate in this country malefactors belonging to any nation, especially Romanians.

Historians have not reached a consensual view of the exact circumstances of the issuing of the decree and its main purpose.

According to Romanian historian Ioan-Aurel Pop, this was the first time in Transylvania that discriminatory law enforcement along ethnic lines was legally codified.

István Petrovics writes that the mobile way of life of the increasing Romanian population caused their conflicts with the sedentary Hungarians. According to Ioan-Aurel Pop, the Decree comes after the breakaway of Moldavia from Hungarian influence which raised concern with the king and nobles alike that other Romanian nobles might follow Bogdan's example. He also states that the decree shows the Romanians' "muted resistance" against the monarch and the noblemen who had attempted to deprive them of their property, especially their inherited estates.

According to Benedek Jancsó, documents from the 14th-15th centuries attest several social problems, the relationship between the semi-nomadic shepherding Romanian settlers and the permanently settled and farming Transylvanian Hungarians and Saxons was the same as between the farming Hungarians in the Great Hungarian Plains and the wandering Cumans with their flocks. This explains the strict measures taken by King Louis the Great in 1366 that the "proliferating malefactors must be exterminated".