The Institute for Advanced Studies in Levant Culture and Civilization was pleased to welcome another conference in the "Meetings of the Society for Classical Studies" series, hosting Dr, Cristina Bîrsan (Institut National des Langues et Civilisations Orientales, Paris – INALCO) who gave a masterful presentation of "Dimitrie Cantemir's History of the Ottoman Empire: A Comparison of the French Edition with the Latin Manuscript."
The institute's mission is to promote knowledge and dialogue among and between the cultures that have shaped the Levant and South-Eastern Europe. In this light, few figures better embody the Levantine spirit than did Dimitrie Cantemir - a prince, scholar, diplomat, musician, and one of the most profound experts on the Ottoman world of his day. Cantemir lived at the intersection of several worlds and cultural traditions, and understood that history cannot be reduced to political borders but must instead be regarded as a continuous encounter between civilizations.
Dimitrie Cantemir can be considered one of the first great cultural mediators between Europe and the East, and his work remains of utmost relevance today.
The conference offered participants an opportunity to rediscover *The History of the Ottoman Empire* from a particularly valuable perspective, through a comparison between its French edition and the original Latin manuscript - a theme that brings us closer not only to Cantemir's work but also to the process by which knowledge circulates, is translated, and is transformed over the centuries.
Dr. Cristina Bîrsan has devoted a significant part of her career to researching Cantemir's work, serving as a translator and author of numerous studies and papers dedicated to Dimitrie Cantemir. Recently, in Istanbul, she published a comprehensive comparative edition of "The History of the Ottoman Empire," a remarkable contribution to contemporary studies of Cantemir.
Also present at the event was Professor Vlad Alexandrescu, another leading expert on the work of Dimitrie Cantemir, who presented a project begun five years ago and completed with its launch at the Mega Publishing House booth during the 2026 BookFest Book Fair: the volumes of collected correspondence belonging to his father, archaeologist Petre Alexandrescu, director of the archaeological site at Histria (1981–1999) and of the Vasile Pârvan Institute of Archaeology (1990–1999), and Professor in the Department of Ancient History and Archaeology at the University of Bucharest (1995–2000), in a curated edition Professor Alexandrescu edited with the aid of Dr. Liviu Iancu, an Associated Researcher of the Institute for Advanced Studies in Levant Culture and Civilization.
