Corneliu Zelea Codreanu

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Căpitanul
Corneliu Zelea Codreanu
Corneliu Zelea Codreanu
Captain of the Iron Guard
In office
24 June 1927 – May 1938
Succeeded byHoria Sima (as "Commander")
Member of the Assembly of Deputies
In office
August 1932 – November 1933
Personal details
Born
Corneliu Zelinski

(1899-09-13)13 September 1899
Extrajudicial execution
Resting placeJilava, Ilfov County, Romania (1938–1940)
Green House, Bucharest, Romania (1940–?)
Unknown (present)
Political partyNational-Christian Defense League (1923–1927)
Iron Guard (1927–1938)
Spouse
​
(m. 1925⁠–⁠1938)​
Alma materAlexandru Ioan Cuza University
Grenoble Alpes University
OccupationPolitician
ProfessionLawyer
Known forFounder and Leader of the Legionary Movement
BooksFor My Legionaries
ReligionRomanian Orthodox
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Category

Corneliu Zelea Codreanu

ultranationalist and violently antisemitic organization active throughout most of the interwar period. Generally seen as the main variety of local fascism, and noted for its mystical and Romanian Orthodox-inspired revolutionary message, Iron Guard gained prominence on the Romanian political stage, coming into conflict with the political establishment and the democratic forces, and often resorting to terrorism
. The Legionnaires traditionally referred to Codreanu as Căpitanul ("The Captain"), and he held absolute authority over the organization until his death.

Codreanu, who began his career in the wake of

far right, rallying around him a growing segment of the country's intelligentsia and peasant population, and inciting pogroms in various parts of Greater Romania. Several times outlawed by successive Romanian cabinets, his Legion assumed different names and survived in the underground, during which time Codreanu formally delegated leadership to Gheorghe Cantacuzino-Grănicerul. Following Codreanu's instructions, the Legion carried out assassinations of politicians it viewed as corrupt, including Premier Ion G. Duca and his former associate Mihai Stelescu. Simultaneously, Corneliu Zelea Codreanu advocated Romania's adherence to a military and political alliance with Nazi Germany
.

During the

Gendarmerie. He was succeeded as leader by Horia Sima. In 1940, under the National Legionary State
proclaimed by the Iron Guard, his killing served as the basis for violent retribution.

Corneliu Zelea Codreanu's views influenced the modern far-right. Groups claiming him as a forerunner include

neofascist organizations in Italy
and other parts of Europe.

Biography

Early life

Corneliu Codreanu was born in

libel Codreanu.[4] Corneliu Zelea Codreanu's birth certificate, held in the Iași division of Romania's National Archives, indicates that he was registered as "Corneliu Codreanu", that his parents names were reported as Ion and Elisa Codreanu, and that "Zelea" was added to the name by verbal process on 17 March 1902.[8]

Too young for

Comintern was violently opposed to Romania's interwar borders (see Greater Romania).[10]

While the Bolshevik presence decreased overall following the repression of

anticommunism, in the belief that Jews were, among other things, the primordial agents of the Soviet Union (see Jewish Bolshevism).[8]

GCN and National-Christian Defense League

Codreanu studied law in Iași, where he began his political career. Like his father, he became close to A. C. Cuza. Codreanu's fear of Bolshevik insurrection led to his efforts to address industrial workers himself. At the time, Cuza was preaching that the Jewish population was a manifest threat to Romanians, claimed that Jews were threatening the purity of Romanian young women, and began campaigning in favour of racial segregation.[12]

Historian

demagogue agitator".[13] According to Cioroianu, Codreanu loved Romania with "fanaticism", which implied that he saw the country as "idyllicized [and] different from the real one of his times".[13] British scholar Christopher Catherwood also referred to Codreanu as "an obsessive anti-Semite and religious fanatic".[14] Historian Zeev Barbu proposed that "Cuza was Codreanu's mentor [...], but nothing that Codreanu learned from him was strikingly new. Cuza served mainly as a catalyst for his nationalism and antisemitism."[12] As he himself later acknowledged, the young activist was also deeply influenced by the physiologist and antisemitic ideologue Nicolae Paulescu, who was involved with Cuza's movement.[15]

In late 1919, Codreanu joined the short-lived Garda Conștiinței Naționale (GCN, "Guard of National Conscience"), a group formed by the electrician Constantin Pancu.[6] Pancu had an enormous influence on Codreanu.[16][how?]

Pancu's movement, whose original membership did not exceed 40,

People's Party (of which Cuza became an affiliate);[19] Averescu's ascension to power in 1920 engendered a new period of social troubles in the larger urban areas (see Labor movement in Romania).[18]

The GCN, in which Codreanu thought he could see the nucleus of nationalist trade unions, became active in crushing strike actions.[7] Their activities did not fail in attracting attention, especially after students who obeyed Codreanu, grouped in the Association of Christian Students, started demanding a Jewish quota for higher education – this gathered popularity for the GCN, and it led to a drastic increase in the frequency and intensity of assaults on all its opponents.[20] In response, Codreanu was expelled from the University of Iași. Although allowed to return when Cuza and others intervened for him (refusing to respect the decision of the University Senate), he was never presented with a diploma after his graduation.[21]

While studying in

emancipation of Jews (see History of the Jews in Romania).[22]

When protests organized by Codreanu were met with lack of interest from the new National Liberal government, he and Cuza founded (4 March 1923) a Christian nationalist organization called the National-Christian Defense League.[23] They were joined in 1925 by Ion Moța, translator of the antisemitic hoax known as The Protocols of the Elders of Zion and future ideologue of the Legion.[24] Codreanu was subsequently tasked with organizing the League at a national level, and became especially preoccupied with its youth ventures.[25]

With the granting of full rights of

conspiracies that had not been assigned a definite date. Before the jury ended deliberation, Ion Moța shot the traitor and was given a prison sentence himself.[28]

Manciu's killing

Codreanu clashed with Cuza over the League's structure: he demanded that it develop a

Archangel Michael. This was said to be in honour of an Orthodox icon that adorned the walls of the prison church,[30] or, more specifically, linked to Codreanu's reported claim of having been visited by the Archangel himself.[17] A more personal problem also divided Codreanu and Cuza, namely that Cuza's son had an affair with Codreanu's sister that left her pregnant.[31] The couple had broken up with the younger Cuza refused his girlfriend's demand that he marry her now that she was bearing his child. Though the scandal was hushed up, the fact that his sister was having an illegitimate child was deeply humiliating for Codreanu as he liked to present his family as model members of the Orthodox church and he sought unsuccessfully to have Cuza pressure his son to marry his sister.[31][additional citation(s) needed
]

Back in Iași, Codreanu created his own system of allegiance within the League, starting with the Frăția de Cruce ("Brotherhood of the Cross", named after a variant of blood brotherhood which requires sermon with a cross).[32] It gathered on 6 May 1924, in the countryside around Iași, starting work on the building of a student centre. This meeting was violently broken up by the authorities on orders from Romanian Police prefect Constantin Manciu.[33] Codreanu and several others were allegedly beaten and tormented for several days, until Cuza's intervention on their behalf proved effective.[34]

After an interval of retreating from any political activity, Codreanu took revenge on Manciu, assassinating him and severely wounding some other policemen on 24 October 1924,

Minister of Justice). Its most notable, if indirect, effect was the banning of the Communist Party. In October and November debates between members of Parliament became heated, and Cuza's group was singled out as morally responsible for the murder: Petre Andrei stated that "Mr. Cuza aimed and Codreanu fired",[38] to which Cuza replied by claiming his innocence, while theorizing that Manciu's brutality was a justifiable cause for violent retaliation.[36]

Although Codreanu was purposely tried as far away from Iași as

Turnu Severin, the authorities were unable to find a neutral jury.[39] On the day he was acquitted, members of the jury, who deliberated for five minutes in all, showed up wearing badges with League symbols and swastikas (the symbol in use by Cuza's League).[40] After a triumphal return and an ostentatious wedding to Elena Ilinoiu,[41] Codreanu clashed with Cuza for a second time and decided to defuse tensions by taking leave in France
.

Codreanu's wedding to Elena Ilinoiu in June 1925 in Focșani was the major social event in Romania that year; it was celebrated in lavish, pseudo-royal style and attended by thousands, attracting enormous media attention.

Grenoble
, Codreanu was the victim of an assassination attempt — Moța, just returned from prison, was given another short sentence after he led the reprisals.

Creation of the Legion of the Archangel Michael

Codreanu returned from Grenoble to take part in the 1926 elections, and ran as a candidate for the town of Focșani. He lost, and, although it had had a considerable success, the League disbanded in the same year.[44] Codreanu gathered former members of the League who had spent time in prison, and put into practice his dream of forming the Legion (November 1927, just days after the fall of a new Averescu cabinet, which had continued to support now-rival Cuza).[45] Codreanu claimed to have had a vision of the Archangel Michael who told him he had been chosen by God to be Romania's saviour.[37] From the beginning, a commitment to the values of the Eastern Orthodox Church was core to the message of the Legion, and Codreanu's alleged vision was a centrepiece of his message.[37]

Based on the Frăția de Cruce, Codreanu designed the Legion as a selective and autarkic group, paying allegiance to him and no other, and soon expanded it into a replicating network of political cells called "nests" (cuiburi).[46] Frăția endured as the Legion's most secretive and highest body, which requested from its members that they undergo a rite of passage, during which they swore allegiance to the "Captain", as Codreanu was now known.[17]

According to American historian Barbara Jelavich, the movement "at first supported no set ideology, but instead emphasized the moral regeneration of the individual", while expressing a commitment to the Romanian Orthodox Church.[47] The Legion introduced Orthodox rituals as part of its political rallies,[48] while Codreanu made his public appearances dressed in folk costume[49] — a traditionalist pose adopted at the time only by him and the National Peasant Party's Ion Mihalache.[50] Throughout its existence, the Legion maintained strong links with members of the Romanian Orthodox clergy,[51] and its members fused politics with an original interpretation of Romanian Orthodox messages — including claims that the Romanian kin was expecting its national salvation, in a religious sense.[52]

Such a mystical focus, Jelavich noted, was in tandem with a marked preoccupation for violence and self-sacrifice, "but only if the [acts of terror] were committed for the good of the cause and subsequently expiated."

Christ.[54] With time, the Legion developed a doctrine around a cult of the fallen, going so far as to imply that the dead continued to form an integral part of a perpetual national community.[55][56] As a consequence of its mysticism, the movement made a point of not adopting or advertising any particular platform,[57] and Codreanu explained early on: "The country is dying for lack of men and not for lack of political programs."[58] Elsewhere, he pointed out that the Legion was interested in the creation of a "new man" (omul nou).[59]

Despite its apparent lack of political messages, the movement was immediately noted for its antisemitism, for arguing that Romania was faced with a "

Jewish Question" and for proclaiming that a Jewish presence thrived on uncouthness and pornography.[60] The Legionary leader wrote: "The historical mission of our generation is the resolution of the kike problem. All of our battles of the past 15 years have had this purpose, all of our life's efforts from now on will have this purpose."[61] He accused the Jews in general of attempting to destroy what he claimed was a direct link between Romania and God, and the Legion campaigned in favour of the notion that there was no actual connection between the Old Testament Hebrews and the modern Jews.[62] In one instance, making a reference to the origin of the Romanians, Codreanu stated that Jews were corrupting the "Roman-Dacian structure of our people."[63] The Israeli historian Jean Ancel wrote that, from the mid-19th century onward, the Romanian intelligentsia had a "schizophrenic attitude towards the West and its values".[64] Romania been a strongly Francophile country starting in the 19th century, and most of the Romanian intelligentsia professed themselves believers in French ideas about the universal appeal of democracy, freedom, and human rights while at the same time holding antisemitic views about Romania's Jewish minority.[65] Ancel wrote that Codreanu was the first significant Romanian to reject not only the prevailing Francophilia of the intelligentsia, but also the entire framework of universal democratic values, which Codreanu claimed were "Jewish inventions" designed to destroy Romania.[66]

He began openly calling for the destruction of Jews,

which?] Romania was, with the exception of Poland, the most antisemitic country in Eastern Europe.[70]

Codreanu's message was among the most radical forms of Romanian antisemitism, and contrasted with the generally more moderate antisemitic views of Cuza's former associate, the prominent historian

Transnistria) and planning a Romanian-led transnational federation centred on the Carpathians and the Danube.[68]

In 1936, Codreanu published an essay entitled "The Resurrection of the Race", where he wrote

I will under underline this once again: we are not up against a few pathetic individuals who have landed here by chance and who now seek protection and shelter. We are up against a fully-fledged Jewish state, an entire army which has come here with its sights set on conquest. The movement of the Jewish population and its penetration into Romania are being carried out in accordance with precise plans. In all probability, the 'Great Jewish Council' is planning the creation of a new Palestine on a strip of land, starting out on the Baltic Sea, embraces a part of Poland and Czechoslovakia and half of Romania right across to the Black Sea...

The worse thing that Jews and politicians have done to us, the greatest danger that they have exposed our people to, is not the way they are seizing the riches and possessions of our country, destroying the Romanian middle class, the way they swamp our schools and liberal professions, or the pernicious influence they are having on our whole political life, although these already constitute mortal dangers for a people. The greatest danger they pose to the people is rather that they are undermining us racially, that they are destroying the racial, Romano-Dacian structure of our people and call into being a type of human being that is nothing, but a racial wreck."[72]

From early on, the movement registered significant gains among the

middle-class and educated youth.[73] However, according to various commentators, Codreanu won his most significant following in the rural environment, which in part reflected the fact that he and most other Legionary leaders were first-generation urban dwellers.[74] American historian of fascism Stanley G. Payne, who noted that the Legion benefited from the 400% increase in university enrolment ("proportionately more than anywhere else in Europe"), has described the Captain and his network of disciples as "a revolutionary alliance of students and poor peasants", which centred on the "new underemployed intelligentsia prone to radical nationalism".[75] Thus, a characteristic trait of the newly-founded movement was the young age of its leaders; later records show that the average age of the Legionary elite was 27.4.[76]

By then also an

modernization and materialism, he only vaguely indicated that his movement's economic goals implied a non-Marxian form of Collectivist anarchism,[75] and presided over his followers' initiatives to set up various cooperatives.[78]

First outlawing and parliamentary mandate

After more than two years of stagnation, Codreanu felt it necessary to amend the purpose of the movement: he and the leadership of the movement started touring rural regions, addressing the churchgoing illiterate population with the rhetoric of

Maramureș and Bessarabia.[81] In one notable incident of 1930, Legionnaires encouraged the peasant population of Borșa to attack the town's 4,000 Jews.[69]

The Legion also attempted to assassinate government officials and journalists, including

Minister of the Interior Ion Mihalache (January 1931); again arrested, Codreanu was acquitted in late February.[84]

Having been boosted by the

Chamber of Deputies on the lists of the "Corneliu Zelea Codreanu Grouping" (the provisional name for the Guard), together with other prominent members of his original movement — including Ion Zelea, his father, and Mihai Stelescu, a young activist who ultimately came into conflict with the Legion; it is likely that the new Vaida-Voevod cabinet gave tacit support to the Grouping in subsequent partial elections.[86] The Legion had won five seats in all, signalling its first important electoral gain.[87]

Codreanu quickly became noted for exposing corruption of ministers and other politicians on a case-by-case basis (although several of his political adversaries at the time described him as "bland and incompetent").[86]

Clash with Duca and truce with Tătărescu

Ion Antonescu and Codreanu at a skiing event in 1935

The authorities became increasingly concerned with the revolutionary potential of the Legion, and minor clashes in 1932 between the two introduced what became, from 1933, almost a decade of major political violence. The situation degenerated after Codreanu expressed his full support for

Nicadori death squad on 30 December 1933.[92] Another result was the very first crackdown on non-affiliated sympathizers of the Iron Guard, after Nae Ionescu and allies protested against its repression.[93]

Due to Duca's killing, Codreanu was forced into hiding, awaiting calm and delegating leadership to General Gheorghe Cantacuzino-Grănicerul, who later assumed partial guilt for the assassination.[94] Legionnaire Mihai Stelescu, who would become Codreanu's adversary as head of the splinter group Crusade of Romanianism, alleged that Codreanu had been given refuge by a cousin of Magda Lupescu, Carol's mistress, implying that the Guard was becoming corrupt.[95] Despite Codreanu's attacks on the elite, at his trial in 1934 a number of respected politicians like Gheorghe I. Brătianu, Alexandru Vaida-Voevod and Constantin Argetoianu testified for Codreanu as character witnesses.[96] Codreanu was again acquitted.

As Duca had alleged, the Iron Guard did have some links to the Nazi Party's foreign office under Alfred Rosenberg, but in 1933–34 the main local beneficiary of financial support from Rosenberg was Codreanu's rival Octavian Goga, who lacked Codreanu's mass following and thus was more biddable.[97] A further issue for the Nazis was concern over Codreanu's statements that Romania had too many minorities for its own good, which led to fears that Codreanu might persecute the volksdeutsch minority if he came to power.[97] Though limited, the connections between the NSDAP and the Iron Guard added to the Legion's appeal as the Iron Guard was associated in the public mind with the apparently dynamic and successful society of Nazi Germany.[97]

Some time after the start of

Death Squad, which immediately showed its goals with the killing of dissident Mihai Stelescu by a group called the Decemviri (led by Ion Caratănase),[99] neutralizing the Crusade of Romanianism's anti-Legion campaign, and silencing Stelescu's claims that Codreanu was politically corrupt, uncultured, a plagiarist, and hypocritical in his public display of asceticism.[100]

1937 was marked by the deaths and ostentatious funerals of Ion Moța (by then, the movement's vice president) and Vasile Marin, who had volunteered on Francisco Franco's side in the Spanish Civil War and had been killed in the battle at Majadahonda.[101] Codreanu also published his autobiographical and ideological essay Pentru legionari ("For the Legionnaires" or "For My Legionnaires").[102]

It was during this period that the Guard came to be financed by Nicolae Malaxa (otherwise known as a prominent collaborator of Carol),[103] and became interested in reforming itself to reach an even wider audience: Codreanu created a meritocratic inner structure of ranks, established a wide range of philanthropic ventures, again voiced themes which appealed to the industrial workers, and created Corpul Muncitoresc Legionar, a Legion branch which grouped members of the working class.[104] King Carol met difficulties in preserving his rule after being faced with a decline in the appeal of the more traditional parties, and, as Tătărescu's term approached its end, Carol made an offer to Codreanu, demanding leadership of the Legion in exchange for a Legionary cabinet; this offer was promptly refused.[105]

"Everything for the Country" Party

Corneliu Zelea Codreanu and Iron Guard members in 1937

After the consequent ban on paramilitary groups, the Legion was restyled into a political party, running in elections as Totul Pentru Țară ("Everything for the Country", acronym TPȚ). Shortly afterwards, Codreanu went on record stating his contempt for Romania's alliances in

Italian Foreign Minister Galeazzo Ciano, the latter of whom viewed Goga's cabinet as a transition to the Iron Guard's rule.[107]

In the

majority bonus, Codreanu's movement was, at the time, the third most popular party in Romania, the only one whose popularity grew in 1937–1938, and by far the most popular fascist group.[109]

The Legion was excluded from political coalitions by nominally fascist King Carol, who preferred newly-formed subservient movements and the revived National-Christian Defense League.

Jewish Question".[4]

The new government alliance, unified as the National Christian Party, gave itself a blue-shirted paramilitary corps that borrowed heavily from the Legion — the Lăncieri[111] — and initiated an official campaign of persecution of Jews, attempting to win back the interest the public had in the Iron Guard.[112] After much violence, Codreanu was approached by Goga and agreed to have his party withdraw from campaigning in the scheduled elections of 1938,[113] believing that, in any event, the regime had no viable solution and would wear itself out — while attempting to profit from the king's authoritarianism by showing his willingness to integrate any possible one-party system.[114]

Clash with King Carol and 1938 trials

Codreanu's designs were overturned by Carol, who deposed Goga, introducing his own dictatorship after his attempts to form a national government. The system relied instead on the new Constitution of 1938, the financial backing received from large business, and the winning over of several more or less traditional politicians, such as Nicolae Iorga and the Internal Affairs Minister Armand Călinescu (see National Renaissance Front). The ban on the Guard was again tightly enforced, with Călinescu ordering all public places known to have harboured Legion meetings to be closed down (including several restaurants in Bucharest).[115] Members of the movement were placed under close surveillance or arrested in cases where they did not abide by the new legislation, while civil servants risked arrest if they were caught spreading Iron Guard propaganda.[4]

The official and semi-official press began attacking Codreanu. He was thus virulently criticized by the magazine

slander, based on a letter Codreanu sent to Iorga on 26 March 1938, in which he had attacked him for collaborating with Carol, calling Iorga "morally dishonest".[4][116] Codreanu referred to the historian's charge that Legionary commerce was financing rebellion, and argued that this strategy had originated from Iorga's own arguments.[4] Nicolae Iorga replied by filing a complaint with the Military Tribunal[4][117] and by writing Codreanu a letter which advised him to "descend in [his] conscience to find remorse" for "the amount of blood spilled over him".[118]

Upon being informed of the indictment, Codreanu urged his followers not to take any action if he was going to be sentenced to less than six months in prison, stressing that he wanted to give an example of dignity; however, he also ordered a group of Legionnaires to defend him in case of an attack by the authorities.

concentration camps such as the one in Miercurea Ciuc).[4]

Codreanu was tried for slander and sentenced to six months in jail, before the authorities indicted him for treason, sedition, and for the crimes of politically organizing underage students, issuing orders inciting to violence, maintaining links with foreign organizations, and organizing fire practices.[4][119] Of the people to give evidence in his favour at the trial, the best-known was General Ion Antonescu, who would later become Conducător and Premier of Romania.[4]

The two trials were marked by irregularities, and Codreanu accused the judges and prosecutors of conducting it in a "

Bolshevik" manner, because he had not been allowed to speak in his own defence.[4] He sought the counsel of the prominent lawyers Istrate Micescu and Grigore Iunian, but was refused by both, and, as a consequence, his defence team comprised Legionary activists with little experience.[4] They were several times prevented by the authorities from preparing their pleas.[4] The conditions of his imprisonment were initially harsh: his cell was damp and cold, which caused him health problems.[4]

Prison sentence

Codreanu's funeral, November 1940

Codreanu was eventually sentenced to ten years of hard labour in the salt mines.[4][120] According to historian Ilarion Țiu, the trial and verdict were received with general apathy, and the only political faction believed to have organized a public rally in connection with it was the outlawed Romanian Communist Party, some of whose members gathered in front of the tribunal to express support for the conviction.[4] The Legionary Movement itself grew disorganized, and provincial bodies of the Legion came to exercise control over the centre, which had been weakened by the arrests.[4] As the political establishment's main branches welcomed the news of Codreanu's sentencing, the Iron Guard organized a retaliation attack targeting the National Peasant Party's Virgil Madgearu, who had become known for expressing his opposition to the movement's extremism (Madgearu managed to escape the violence unharmed).[4]

Codreanu was moved from Jilava to Doftana Prison, where, despite the sentence, he was not required to perform any form of physical work.[4] The conditions of his detention improved, and he was allowed to regularly communicate with his family and subordinates.[4] At the time, he rejected all possibility of an escape, and ordered the Legion to refrain from violent acts.[4] A provisional leadership team was also organized, consisting of Ion Antoniu, Ion Belgae, Radu Mironovici, Iordache Nicoară, and Horia Sima.[121] However, the provisional leadership, against Codreanu's wishes, announced that he was faring badly in prison and threatened further retaliation, to the point where the prison staff increased security as a means to prevent a potential break-in.[4]

In the autumn, following the successful Nazi German expansion into

Berghof, as a way to prevent the tentative approach between Romania and Nazi Germany. Confident that Hitler was not determined on supporting the Legion, and irritated by the incidents, Carol ordered the decapitation of the movement.[122]

Death

On 30 November, it was announced that Codreanu, the Nicadori and the Decemviri had been shot after trying to flee custody the previous night.

Tâncăbești (near Bucharest), and their bodies had been buried in the courtyard of the Jilava prison.[124][125] Their bodies were dissolved in acid, and placed under seven tons of concrete.[124]

Legacy

Lifetime influence and Legionary power

1940 stamp issued by the National Legionary State and showing Codreanu. The caption reads: "Captain, may you give the country the likeness of the Holy Sun [that shines] up in the sky"

According to Adrian Cioroianu, Codreanu was "the most successful political and at the same time anti-political model of interwar Romania".[13] The Legion was described by British researcher Norman Davies as "one of Europe's more violent fascist movements."[124] Stanley G. Payne argued that the Iron Guard was "probably the most unusual mass movement of interwar Europe", and noted that part of this was owed to Codreanu being "a sort of religious mystic";[75] British historian James Mayall saw the Legion as "the most singular of the lesser fascist movements".[56]

The

charismatic leadership represented by Codreanu has drawn comparisons with models favoured by other leaders of far-right and fascist movements, including Hitler and Benito Mussolini.[68][126] Payne and German historian Ernst Nolte proposed that, among European far-rightists, Codreanu was most like Hitler in what concerns fanaticism.[126] In Payne's view, however, he was virtually unparalleled in demanding "self-destructiveness" from his followers.[126] Mayall, who states the Legion "was inspired in large measure by National Socialism and fascism", argues that Corneliu Zelea Codreanu's vision of "omul nou", although akin to the "new man" of Nazi and Italian doctrines, is characterized by an unparalleled focus on mysticism.[56] Historian Renzo De Felice, who dismisses the notion that Nazism and fascism are connected, also argues that, due to Legionary attack on "bourgeois values and institutions", which the fascist ideology wanted instead to "purify and perfect", Codreanu "was not, strictly speaking, a fascist."[127] Spanish historian Francisco Veiga argued that "fascization" was a process experienced by the Guard, accumulating traits over a more generic nationalist fibre.[128]

According to American journalist R. G. Waldeck, who was present in Romania in 1940–1941, the violent killing of Codreanu only served to cement his popularity and arouse interest in his cause. She wrote: "To the Rumanian people the Capitano [sic, Căpitanul] remained a saint and a martyr and the apostle of a better Rumania. Even skeptical ones who did not agree with him in political matters still grew dreamy-eyed remembering Codreanu."[129] Historiographer Lucian Boia notes that Codreanu, his rival Carol II, and military leader Ion Antonescu were each in turn perceived as "savior" figures by the Romanian public, and that, unlike other such examples of popular men, they all preached authoritarianism.[130] Cioroianu also writes that Codreanu's death "whether or not paradoxically, would increase the personage's charisma and would turn him straight into a legend."[131] Attitudes similar to those described by Waldeck were relatively widespread among Romanian youths, many of whom came to join the Iron Guard out of admiration for the deceased Codreanu while still in middle or high school.[132]

Conducător of Romania Marshal Ion Antonescu and Iron Guard leader Horia Sima salute underneath a portrait of Iron Guard founder Codreanu, October 1940

Under the leadership of

posthumously exonerated of all charges by a Legionary tribunal.[135] His exhumation was a grandiose ceremony, marked by the participation of Romania's new ally, Nazi Germany: Luftwaffe planes dropped wreaths on Codreanu's open tomb.[124]

Codreanu's wife Elena withdrew from the public eye after her husband's killing, but, after the

communist regime took hold, was arrested and deported to the Bărăgan, where she grew close to women aviators of the Blue Squadron.[136] She also met and married Barbu Praporgescu (son of General David Praporgescu), moving in with him in Bucharest after their liberation.[136] Widowed for a second time, she spent her final years with her relatives in Moldavia.[136]

Codreanu and modern-day political discourse

The movement was eventually toppled from power by Antonescu as a consequence of the

Legionnaires' Rebellion. The events associated with Sima's term in office resulted in conflicts and infighting within the Legion and its contemporary successors: many "Codrenist" Legionnaires claim to obey Codreanu and his father Ion Zelea, but not Sima, while, at the same time, the "Simist" faction claims to have followed Codreanu's guidance and inspiration in carrying out violent acts.[137]

Codreanu had an enduring influence in

Italian Fascism itself, is owed to Mussolini's failures in setting up "a true fascist state", and to the subsequent need of finding other role models.[141] Evola's disciple and prominent neofascist activist Franco Freda published several of Codreanu's essays at his Edizioni di Ar,[142] while their follower Claudio Mutti was noted for his pro-Legionary rhetoric.[143]

In parallel, Codreanu is seen as a hero by representatives of the maverick

Neo-Nazi movement known as Strasserism,[144] and in particular by the British-based Strasserist International Third Position (ITP), which uses one of Codreanu's statements as its motto.[145] Codreanu's activities and mystical interpretation of politics were probably an inspiration on Russian politician Alexander Barkashov, founder of the far right Russian National Unity.[146]

After the

Tâncăbești, where they organize festivities to commemorate Codreanu's death.[149][150]

In the early 2000s,

Oglinda Television cameras, called for Codreanu to be canonized.[152] The station was fined 50 million lei by the National Audiovisual Council (around $1,223 USD in 2004).[152]

In a poll of the Romanian public conducted by

Romanian Television in 2006, Codreanu was voted 22nd among the 100 Greatest Romanians, coming in between Steaua footballer Mirel Rădoi at 21 and the interwar democratic politician Nicolae Titulescu at 23.[154]

Cultural references

Late in the 1930s, Codreanu's supporters began publishing books praising his virtues, among which are

post-communist Noua Dreaptă, which publicizes portraits of Codreanu in the form of Orthodox icons, often makes use of such representation in its public rallies, usually associating it with its own symbol, the Celtic cross.[149]

In November 1940, the Legionary journalist Ovid Țopa, publishing in the Guard's newspaper

N. Crevedia, Radu Gyr, Traian Herseni, Nae Ionescu, Constantin Noica, Petre P. Panaitescu, and Marietta Sadova.[161]

The Legionary leader was portrayed in a poem by his follower Radu Gyr, who notably spoke of Codreanu's death as a prelude to his resurrection.[162] In contrast, Codreanu's schoolmate Petre Pandrea, who spent part of his life as a Romanian Communist Party affiliate, left an unflattering memoir of their encounters, used as a preferential source in texts on Codreanu published during the communist period.[163] Despite his earlier confrontation with the Iron Guard, the leftist poet Tudor Arghezi is thought by some to have deplored Codreanu's killing, and to have alluded to it in his poem version of the Făt-Frumos stories.[164] Mircea Eliade, whose early Legionary sympathies became a notorious topic of outrage, was indicated by his disciple Ioan Petru Culianu to have based Eugen Cucoanes, the main character in his novella Un om mare ("A Big Man"), on Codreanu.[143] This hypothesis was commented upon by literary critics Matei Călinescu and Mircea Iorgulescu, the latter of whom argued that there was too-little evidence to support it.[143] The neofascist Claudio Mutti claimed that Codreanu inspired the character Ieronim Thanase in Eliade's Nouăsprăzece trandafiri ("Nineteen Roses") story, a view rejected by Călinescu.[143]

Notes

  1. ^ Although "Zelea" is in fact a surname, not a middle name, dictionary entries generally refer to Codreanu as "Codreanu, Corneliu Zelea".
  2. ^ At the time of Corneliu's birth, his father was legally known as "Ion Zelinsky" (alternate spellings "Zelinschi", "Zilinschi", or "Zelinski"). When registering his son's birth on 14 September 1899, Ion declared the child's name to be "Corneliu Codreanu", and his own name to be "Ion Codreanu". According to the margin of the birth certificate, on 17 March 1902, having changed the family name to "Zelea-Codreanu", Ion amended Corneliu Codreanu's birth certificate through a verbal process to add "Zelea". See: Arhivele Naționale din Iași, Registru stăreĭ civile pentru nascuțĭ, no. 1104/1899.
  1. ^ "Registru stăreĭ civile pentru nascuțĭ, no. 1104/1899". Arhivele Naționale din Iași. 14 September 1899.
  2. ^ a b Hugh Seton-Watson, The East European Revolution, Frederick A. Prager, New York, 1961, p. 206
  3. Humanitas
    , Bucharest, 1993, in Ornea, p. 198)
  4. ^ a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o p q r s t u v w x y z aa ab ac (in Romanian) Ilarion Țiu, "Relațiile regimului autoritar al lui Carol al II-lea cu opoziția. Studiu de caz: arestarea conducerii Mișcării Legionare"[permanent dead link], in Revista Erasmus Archived 23 February 2008 at the Wayback Machine, 14/2003–2005, at the University of Bucharest Faculty of History; retrieved 13 February 2008
  5. ^ Ornea, p. 286
  6. ^ a b Barbu, pp. 196-197; Veiga, pp. 49–50
  7. ^ a b Barbu, p. 197; Veiga, pp. 48–49
  8. ^ a b Veiga, pp. 48–49, 54
  9. ^ Veiga, pp. 51, 68
  10. ^ Veiga, pp. 41, 47
  11. ^ Veiga, p. 47
  12. ^ a b c Barbu, p. 196
  13. ^ a b c Cioroianu, p. 16
  14. ^ Catherwood, p. 104
  15. ^ Final Report, pp. 35, 44, 45
  16. S2CID 144944383
    .
  17. ^ a b c Barbu, p. 197
  18. ^ a b Veiga, pp. 49–50
  19. ^ Veiga, pp. 46–47
  20. ^ Veiga, p. 52
  21. ^ Cioroianu, p. 17; Ornea, p. 288; Veiga, pp. 52, 55
  22. ^ Ornea, p. 287
  23. ^ Ornea, p. 287; Veiga, p. 74
  24. ^ Catherwood, p. 105; Veiga, p. 75
  25. ^ Final Report, p. 44
  26. ^ Ornea, p. 287; Veiga, pp. 62–64, 76
  27. ^ Final Report, p. 46
  28. ^ Ornea, p. 287; Veiga, p. 77
  29. ^ Final Report, pp. 44–45; Brustein, p. 158; Sedgwick, p. 113
  30. ^ Final Report, p. 45; Ornea, pp. 287–288
  31. ^ a b Yavetz, Zvi "An Eyewitness Note: Reflections on the Rumanian Iron Guard" pp. 597–610 from Journal of Contemporary History, Volume 26, Issue 4, September 1991 p. 601.
  32. ^ Barbu, p. 197; Veiga, pp. 82–83
  33. ^ Veiga, p. 78
  34. ^ Ornea, p. 288; Scurtu, p. 41
  35. ^ Scurtu, p. 41; Veiga, p. 80
  36. ^ a b c d e Scurtu, p. 41
  37. ^ a b c d Crampton, Richard Eastern Europe in the Twentieth Century-And After, London: Routledge, 1997 p. 114.
  38. ^ Andrei, in Scurtu, p. 41
  39. ^ Ornea, p. 288; Scurtu, p. 42
  40. ^ Scurtu, p. 42; Veiga, p. 80
  41. ^ Ornea, p. 289; Veiga, p. 80
  42. ^ Bucur, Maria "Romania" pp. 57–78 from Women, Gender and Fascism in Europe, 1919–1945 edited by Kevin Passmore, New Brunswick: Rutgers University Press, 2003 pp. 73–74.
  43. ^ a b Bucur, Maria "Romania" pp. 57–78 from Women, Gender and Fascism in Europe, 1919–1945 edited by Kevin Passmore, New Brunswick: Rutgers University Press, 2003 p. 74.
  44. ^ Ornea, pp. 289–290
  45. ^ Veiga, pp. 92–93
  46. ^ Barbu, p. 197; Benedict, p. 457; Ornea, p. 290; Jelavich, p. 206; Veiga, pp. 107–110
  47. ^ a b Jelavich, p. 205
  48. ^ Barbu, p. 200; Mayall, p. 141
  49. ^ Barbu, p. 200; Benedict, p. 456
  50. ^ Benedict, p. 456
  51. ^ Catherwood, pp. 104, 107
  52. ^ Final Report, pp. 46–47; Mayall, p. 141; Payne, p. 116
  53. ^ Jelavich, p. 205; Mayall, p. 142
  54. ^ Mayall, pp. 141–142
  55. ^ a b Davies, pp. 968–969
  56. ^ a b c Mayall, p. 141
  57. ^ Barbu, p. 197; Ornea, pp. 348–376; Payne, p. 116
  58. ^ Codreanu, in Barbu, p. 197
  59. ^ Mayall, p. 141; Ornea, pp. 348–353; Payne, p. 116
  60. ^ Brustein, p. 158; Catherwood, pp. 104–195
  61. ^ Codreanu, in Final Report, p. 45
  62. ^ Final Report, pp. 46–47
  63. ^ Codreanu, in Catherwood, p. 105
  64. ^ Ancel, Jean "Antonescu and the Jews" pp. 463–479 from The Holocaust and History The Known, the Unknown, the Disputed and the Reexamined edited by Michael Berenbaum and Abraham Peck, Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1999 p. 463.
  65. ^ Ancel, Jean "Antonescu and the Jews" pp. 463–479 from The Holocaust and History The Known, the Unknown, the Disputed and the Reexamined edited by Michael Berenbaum and Abraham Peck, Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1999 pp. 463–464.
  66. ^ Ancel, Jean "Antonescu and the Jews" pp. 463–479 from The Holocaust and History The Known, the Unknown, the Disputed and the Reexamined edited by Michael Berenbaum and Abraham Peck, Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1999 p. 464.
  67. ^ Brustein, p. 158; Catherwood, p. 105
  68. ^
    ISBN 0-415-23046-2
  69. ^ a b Brustein, p. 158
  70. ^ Benedict, p. 457
  71. ^ Final Report, pp. 28–29
  72. ^ Codreanu, Corneliu "The Resurrection of the Race" pp. 221–222 from Fascism edited by Roger Griffin, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1995 p. 221.
  73. ^ Barbu, pp. 198–200; Cioroianu, p. 17
  74. ^ Barbu, pp. 198–200; Benedict, pp. 457–458; De Felice, p. 101
  75. ^ a b c Payne, p. 116
  76. ^ Barbu, p. 199
  77. ^ Tismăneanu, p. 65
  78. ^ Benedict, p. 457; Payne, p. 116
  79. ^ Ornea, pp. 291–295
  80. ^ Veiga, p. 108
  81. ^ a b Veiga, pp. 113–116
  82. ^ Ornea, p. 291
  83. ^ Ornea, p. 294
  84. ^ a b Ornea, p. 295
  85. ^ Veiga, pp. 140–147
  86. ^ a b Ornea, p. 296
  87. ^ a b Barbu, p. 198
  88. ^ Veiga, pp. 251–255
  89. ^ Veiga, pp. 229, 230
  90. ^ Jelavich, p. 206; Veiga, pp. 196–197
  91. ^ Jelavich, p. 206
  92. ^ Ornea, p. 298; Veiga, pp. 197–198
  93. ^ Ornea, pp. 244, 298; Veiga, p. 201
  94. ^ Veiga, pp. 197, 200
  95. ^ Stelescu, 1935, in Ornea, pp. 298–299
  96. ^ Yavetz, Zvi "An Eyewitness Note: Reflections on the Rumanian Iron Guard" pp. 597–610 from Journal of Contemporary History, Volume 26, Issue 4, September 1991 p. 602.
  97. ^ a b c Yavetz, Zvi "An Eyewitness Note: Reflections on the Rumanian Iron Guard" pp. 597–610 from Journal of Contemporary History, Volume 26, Issue 4, September 1991 p. 606.
  98. ^ Ornea, pp. 302–305
  99. ^ Ornea, pp. 305, 307; Pop, p. 47; Veiga, p. 233
  100. ^ Pop, pp. 46–47
  101. ^ Ornea, pp. 309–311
  102. ^ Final Report, pp. 35, 45
  103. ^ Veiga, p. 222
  104. ^ Veiga, pp. 216–222, 224–226
  105. ^ Veiga, pp. 233–234
  106. ^ Benedict, p. 457; Cioroianu, p. 17
  107. ^ Final Report, p. 35
  108. ^ Final Report, pp. 39–40; Brustein, p. 159; Cioroianu, p. 17; Jelavich, p. 206; Ornea, p. 312
  109. ^ Final Report, p. 39; Brustein, p. 159; Cioroianu, p. 17; Ornea, pp. 312–313; Veiga, pp. 234–236
  110. ^ Cioroianu, p. 17; Jelavich, p. 206; Ornea, pp. 312–313; Veiga, pp. 234–236
  111. ^ Veiga, p. 224
  112. ^ Final Report, pp. 40–42; Veiga, pp. 245–247; Sedgwick, p. 114
  113. ^ Final Report, p. 43; Veiga, pp. 246–247
  114. ^ Ornea, pp. 313, 314; Veiga, p. 247
  115. ^ Ornea, p. 314
  116. ^ Codreanu, in Ornea, p. 315
  117. ^ Ornea, p. 316
  118. ^ Iorga, in Ornea, p. 316
  119. ISSN 0362-4331
    . Retrieved 12 September 2023.
  120. ^ Jelavich, p. 207; Ornea, p. 317; Veiga, p. 250, 255–256
  121. ^ Clark, Roland (2015). Holy Legionary Youth: Fascist Activism in Interwar Romania. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press. p. 219.
  122. ^ Ornea, pp. 314, 320; Veiga, pp. 256–257
  123. ^ Barbu, p. 198; Jelavich, p. 207; Ornea, pp. 320–321; Sedgwick, p. 115; Veiga, p. 257
  124. ^ a b c d Davies, p. 968
  125. ^ Ornea, pp. 320–321; Sedgwick, p. 115; Veiga, p. 257
  126. ^ a b c Payne, p. 117
  127. ^ De Felice, pp. 101–102
  128. ^ Veiga, pp. 315–330
  129. ^ Waldeck, in Benedict, p. 457
  130. ^ Boia, pp. 316–317
  131. ^ Cioroianu, p. 54
  132. ^ Final Report, p. 110
  133. ^ Final Report, pp. 46, 110; Ornea, pp. 339–341; Veiga, 292–295
  134. ^ Final Report, pp. 110–111; Ornea, pp. 333–334
  135. ^ Ornea, pp. 333–334
  136. ^ a b c (in Romanian) Daniel Focșa, "Mariana Drăgescu și Escadrila Albă (V)", in Ziarul Financiar, 8 June 2007
  137. ^ Ornea, pp. 329–330, 346–348; Veiga, pp. 291, 302–304, 308–309
  138. ISBN 0-691-00540-0
  139. ^ Sedgwick, p. 114
  140. ^ Evola, in Sedgwick, p. 114
  141. ^ De Felice, p. 101
  142. ^ Sedgwick, p. 185
  143. ^
    22
    , Nr.636, May–June 2002
  144. ISBN 0-7146-5065-X
  145. ^
    ISBN 0-7391-2118-9
  146. ISBN 0-7656-0634-8
  147. ^ Davies, p. 969
  148. ^ Final Report, p. 365
  149. ^
    Dilema Veche
    , Vol. III, Nr. 127, June 2006; retrieved 11 February 2008
  150. ^ (in Romanian) Mediafax, "Zelea Codreanu, comemorat de legionari", in Adevărul, 28 November 2005; retrieved 11 February 2008
  151. ^
    22
    , Nr. 844, May 2006 (retrieved 11 February 2008)
  152. ^
    Radio Free Europe
    , OMRI Daily Digest, 13 December 2004; retrieved 11 February 2008
  153. ^ Tismăneanu, p. 255
  154. ^ (in Romanian) Top 100 Mari Români Archived 23 October 2006 at the Wayback Machine, at the Mari Români site Archived 20 February 2008 at the Wayback Machine of the Romanian Television; retrieved 11 February 2008
  155. ^ Final Report, p. 48
  156. ^ a b Cioroianu, p. 435
  157. ^ Cioroianu, p. 435; Tismăneanu, p. 255
  158. ^ a b Boia, p. 320
  159. ^ Ornea, p. 381
  160. ^ Cioran, 1940, in Ornea, p. 197
  161. ^ Ornea, passim (listed together pp. 376–386)
  162. ^ Final Report, p. 47
  163. ^ Veiga, p. 68
  164. ^ Pop, p. 47

References

Further reading

External links

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