Credit, Charity, and the Modernization of Romanians in Transylvania (Late Nineteenth Century to Early Twentieth Century)

Abstract At the end of the nineteenth century, the process of modernization penetrated deeply into Romanian society and also reached the rural world, which caused a series of changes. This article aims at researching the scope of the contribution that Romanian credit institutions had in the development of Romanian schools, churches, and cultural institutions at the time. For this purpose, the article used comparative research to review the balance sheets of Romanian credit institutions, as they were published in the media at that time, as well as documents from several archives throughout Romania.