Ink, Not Blood

sung by Alexandru Ioan Cuza

Alexandru Ioan Cuza

Cuza Vodă · Alexander John Cuza

When & where

Ruled 1859-1866 over Moldavia and Wallachia — two small principalities squeezed between the Ottoman, Russian and Austrian empires, in today's Romania.

Known for

The double election that made Romania: in January 1859 both principalities separately elected the same man, exploiting a loophole in the great powers' treaty — it never said one person couldn't win both thrones.

The coolest thing they did

In just seven years he built a modern state almost from scratch: he took back a quarter of the country's farmland from monasteries that funneled its income abroad, gave land to over 400,000 peasant families, made primary school free and compulsory, and founded the universities of Iasi and Bucharest.

Fun fact

When conspirators burst into his bedroom at 4 a.m. in February 1866 to depose him, the story goes he signed his abdication on the bent back of one of the officers — then calmly left for exile without a fight.

The human behind the legend

A charismatic soldier who kept insisting he was only keeping the throne warm for a foreign prince — then reformed so much, so fast, that political enemies on all sides allied to throw him out. His wife Elena raised his two sons by his mistress as her own. The peasants he freed never forgot him: when his body came home in 1873, thirty thousand of them came to weep at his coffin.

References in this song

♦"Ink, not blood" — Cuza's whole career was bloodless: he won two thrones through elections, rebuilt the country through laws, and even his overthrow ended with a signature instead of a battle.
♦"Read their treaty -- read it again" — the great powers' 1858 Paris Convention set up Moldavia and Wallachia with two separate elected princes, but never forbade one man from being elected in both. In January 1859 both principalities, about three weeks apart, elected the same Alexandru Ioan Cuza — and the union was a done deal.
♦"One stroke..." — the reform avalanche of 1863-1864: the state reclaimed the roughly one quarter of the country's farmland held by monasteries that funneled their income abroad; forced peasant labor (the corvee) was abolished and over 400,000 peasant families received land; primary school became free and compulsory. In 1862 the united principalities had officially taken the name Romania, with one government in Bucharest.
♦"The pact the people called the 'monstrous'" — the 'monstrous coalition': an alliance of liberals and conservatives, bitter enemies otherwise, who agreed on exactly one goal — removing Cuza.
♦"A soldier bent his back to make my final writing desk" — around 4 a.m. on 11 February 1866, conspirators stormed his bedroom; Cuza signed his abdication on the bent back of one of the officers, then calmly left for exile without a fight.
♦"Vienna. Florence. Heidelberg." — his exile route; he died in Heidelberg in 1873, aged 53. When his body came home, some thirty thousand of the peasants his land reform had freed came to weep at his coffin.

Lyrics

The old world ran on iron, on the cannon and the whip --
I conquered with a ballot box; the pen was all I gripped.
January, eighteen fifty-nine: two lands both wrote my name --
Two elections, three weeks apart... and both thrones mine to claim.

Load the inkwell, dip the pen,
Read their treaty -- read it again:
They armed themselves with armies; I armed myself with law --
And centuries come crashing down with every stroke I draw.

Ink, not blood! One name, two thrones!
Ink, not blood! I broke the old world's bones!
They said that change takes cannon fire -- I signed, and it was done:
I am Cuza -- my war was over before it had begun!

One stroke: a quarter of my country's soil comes home from monks abroad.
One stroke: four hundred thousand families own the fields they've plowed.
One stroke: the school bell rings for every child -- and rings for free.
One stroke: two lands take one new name -- Romania -- signed by me.

But ink cuts both ways, and my enemies could write:
The rivals who agreed on nothing found one common cause,
And signed the pact the people called the 'monstrous' overnight --
Two armies of the pen. One target. Me, of course.

Ink, not blood! One name, two thrones!
Ink, not blood! I broke the old world's bones!
They said that change takes cannon fire -- I signed, and it was done:
I am Cuza -- my war was over before it had begun!

Four in the morning, February, eighteen sixty-six:
They stormed into my bedroom, and a soldier bent his back
To make my final writing desk. I did not shout or fight --
I had signed a thousand pages that had set my people free,
So I wrote one final signature: the one that set them free of me.

Ink, not blood! One name, two thrones!
Ink, not blood! I broke the old world's bones!
They made me sign my thrones away -- but here is what they forgot:
A prince can be unsigned. Four hundred thousand deeds cannot.

Vienna. Florence. Heidelberg. I died at fifty-three,
An exile with a steady hand and nothing left to sign.
Then thirty thousand peasants wept the day they brought me home --
Ink, not blood.
Ink, not blood.
That is how you build a country that outlives you.