Romania is situated in Central Europe, in the northern part of the Balkan peninsula and its territory is marked by the Carpathian Mountains, the Danube and the Black Sea. On this territory, traces of human presence are dating back as early as the Lower Palaeolithic (approximately two million years BC).

At the turn of the second millennium, when the Palaeolithic age made way for the Bronze age, the Thracian tribes of Indo-European origin settled alongside the population that already lived in the Carpathian-Balkan region. Burebista (82 - around 44 BC), who succeeded to unite the Geto-Dacian tribes for the first time, founded a powerful kingdom called Dacia.
After a first confrontation during the reign of Domitian (87-89), other two extremely tough wars had been necessary (101-102 and 105-106) for the Roman Empire, at the peak of its power under Emperor Trajan (98-117), to defeat Decebal and turn most of his kingdom into the Roman province called Dacia.
The locals adopted the Roman way of living, the law system, the Latin language, while many Roman soldiers married local women, their children becoming later member or the Roman army. In this way the local population was under a Romanization process till 271 when the Romans, due to the increasing number of invasions, had to retreat south of the Danube River.
The Aurelian Retreat, as it is known, meant the reposition of the active army, while the Roman colonist, already married with local women remained in Dacia together with the other locals. This led to a complete ethno-cultural symbiosis between the Romans and locals. By the end of the 6th-7th centuries this process was finalized. In the meantime they had adopted the new Christian religion.

During the 4-13th centuries the Romanian people were under the domination of migrating peoples - the Geats, the Huns, the Gepids, the Avars, the Slavs, the Hungarians, the Pechenegs, the Cumans, the Tartars.

Starting with the 10th century, small Romanians feudal states were formed and later, in the 12th-13th century, three Romanian principalities: Wallachia, Moldavia and Transylvania were formed. Until the 13th century, Hungarians occupied Transylvania and made it part of the Hungarian Kingdom.

In the14th century, a new power will rise: The Ottoman Empire. During many centuries, Romanian Voivodes like Mircea the Elder, Vlad the Impaler (the legendary Dracula), Stephen the Great and Holy, struggled with the Ottomans.

In 1600, for a short time, Michael the Brave (1593-1601) united all three Romanian Principalities for the first time.

Only in 1859 and just two principalities, Wallachia and Moldavia, succeeded to reunite in one country, under the name of Romania. First prince of Romania was Alexandru Ioan Cuza.

In 1866, the new constitution proclaimed Romania a constitutional monarchy. The first king of Romania was, Charles I of Hohenzollern-Sigmaringen, a relative of the royal family of Prussia. In May 9/21, 1877 Romania declared its full state of independence.

After the World War I, Romania united with Bukovina and Transylvania. Romania was recognized as one big state at the international peace treaty from Paris in 1919.

After World War II Romania lost in favor of USSR Bessarabia and Northern Bukovina. The whole power in Romania was taken over by the communists supported by USSR. The first communist leader was Gheorghe Gheorghiu Dej. The next one was Nicolae Ceausescu who led Romania till 1989 when he was shout together with his wife at the order of the new so called “democratic” leader, Ion Iliescu.

Now, the democracy was re-established and the country joined European Union in 2007.