- Italians of Romania
The Italian Romanians are people of Italian descent who reside, or have moved to Romania. They are an ethnic minority in
Romania , numbering 3,331 people according to the 2002 census. Italians are fairly dispersed throughout the country, even though there is a relatively higher number of them in the western parts of the country (particularlyTimiş County ), and in the Municipality of Bucharest.As an officially-recognised ethnic minority, Italians have one seat reserved in the Romanian Chamber of Deputies.
In recent years, the number of Italians living in Romania has increased substantially. As of November 2007, there are some 12,000 Italians in and around
Timişoara .fr icon Mirel Bran, [http://www.lemonde.fr/web/article/0,1-0@2-3214,36-983359@51-974215,0.html "La Roumanie, ses Italiens, ses Chinois..."] , "Le Monde ",November 28 ,2007 ] About 3,000 square kilometres of land (2% of the agricultural land of Romania) have been bought by Italians.History
The territory of today's Romania has been part of the Italians' (especially Genoese and Venetians) trade routes on the
Danube since at least the 13th century. They founded several ports on the Danube, including "Vicina" (nearIsaccea ), Sfântu Gheorghe, "San Giorgio" (Giurgiu ) andCalafat .ee also
References
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