Ienăchiƫă Văcărescu

Alecu’s father, Ienăchiƫă, a moralist poet, also wrote the first Romanian grammar, while his son Iancu, the father of Romanian poetry, overshadowed his predecessors with his poems. The fourth poet of the Văcărescu family was Nicolae. The lyric tradition was carried on in Walachia by B.P. Mumuleanu.

Ienăchiţă (1740–99), after traveling and studying in St. Petersburg and Vienna, wrote poems inspired by Russian folk songs. He wrote the first Romanian grammar book (Gramatica românească, 1787). His chief poems, Amărîtă turturea (“Sad Turtledove”) and Testamentul, reveal a high artistic level and a mastery…