1. Samoilă Mârza
Iacob Marian, MIEADR IEA, Group 8101
University of Agronomic Sciences and Veterinary Medicine of Bucharest, Romania
Born to peasant parents Ștefan and Ana in Galtiu village, Sântimbru Commune, Alba
County, Mârza attended a Greek-Catholic primary school in the village and high school in
Alba Iulia.[1][2][3] Between 1909 and 1911, his parents sent him as apprentice to a
photographer in Sibiu, where he learned the profession. With the outbreak of World War I
in 1914, he was mobilized and sent into battle as a soldier in the Austro-Hungarian Army,
where he served first on the Austrian front in Galicia, reaching as far north as Riga, before
being transferred to the Italian Front in 1916. As part of the army's topographic and
photographic service for over three years, he took pictures of fighting soldiers and scenes
of the war's devastation,[1] likely making him the first Romanian war photographer.[3]
As the war drew to a close in late 1918, Mârza was in Trieste, whence he left for Vienna
together with many other Transylvanian Romanian soldiers. He arrived there in early
November, planning to head home. That month in the Austrian capital, he took three
pictures depicting the blessing of the first tricolor flag belonging to the Central National
Romanian Council, in the presence of General Ioan Boieriu, of political leader Iuliu Maniu
and the assembled troops. Together with several thousand soldiers, he returned to
Transylvania from Vienna in order to participate at the Alba Iulia assembly. The road
through Budapest and Arad was blocked by Hungarian forces hostile to the Council, so they
went instead via Zagreb, Belgrade and Timişoara, where Serbian forces allowed them to
pass provided they were disarmed.[1]
![Samoilă Mârza
Iacob Marian, MIEADR IEA, Group 8101
University of Agronomic Sciences and Veterinary Medicine of Bucharest, Romania
Born to peasant parents Ștefan and Ana in Galtiu village, Sântimbru Commune, Alba
County, Mârza attended a Greek-Catholic primary school in the village and high school in
Alba Iulia.[1][2][3] Between 1909 and 1911, his parents sent him as apprentice to a
photographer in Sibiu, where he learned the profession. With the outbreak of World War I
in 1914, he was mobilized and sent into battle as a soldier in the Austro-Hungarian Army,
where he served first on the Austrian front in Galicia, reaching as far north as Riga, before
being transferred to the Italian Front in 1916. As part of the army's topographic and
photographic service for over three years, he took pictures of fighting soldiers and scenes
of the war's devastation,[1] likely making him the first Romanian war photographer.[3]
As the war drew to a close in late 1918, Mârza was in Trieste, whence he left for Vienna
together with many other Transylvanian Romanian soldiers. He arrived there in early
November, planning to head home. That month in the Austrian capital, he took three
pictures depicting the blessing of the first tricolor flag belonging to the Central National
Romanian Council, in the presence of General Ioan Boieriu, of political leader Iuliu Maniu
and the assembled troops. Together with several thousand soldiers, he returned to
Transylvania from Vienna in order to participate at the Alba Iulia assembly. The road
through Budapest and Arad was blocked by Hungarian forces hostile to the Council, so they
went instead via Zagreb, Belgrade and Timişoara, where Serbian forces allowed them to
pass provided they were disarmed.[1]](https://image.slidesharecdn.com/samoilamarza-180528231314/85/samoila-marza-1-320.jpg)
