‘Le Coquin Grec’ vs. ‘le Véritable François’ Being a foreigner in the Danubian Principalities in Eighteenth Century

Abstract

Being foreign in the Romanian lands in the eighteenth century is the subject of this investigation. The article starts from the particular case of the Linchou family, who, through their diplomatic activities in the Levant and the Romanian Lands, open up an entire dossier regarding the process of identification staged by a foreigner. With the help of diplomatic correspondence and commercial archives, we observe how Francois-Thomas Linchou engages in a series of social and political games aimed at attracting advantages and privileges to uphold the commercial activities he had developed in Wallachia and Moldavia. However Linchou’s attempt to remain in the sphere of social representations, claiming privileges, without accepting the staus of re’aya was to lead to the failure of his integration into a social network and consequently his decapitation.