Romanian Language Day Date in the current year: August 31, 2024

The Romanian language is a language of the Romance language family. It is an Eastern Romance language that evolved from Vulgar Latin (a colloquial variety of Latin spoken in the Late Roman Republic and Roman Empire). The first reference to the Romanian language predates the foundation of Romania as a state.

Romanian is spoken by approximately 24 million people as their native language and by 4 million people as their second language. Romanian is the official language of Romania and Moldova; it is sometimes referred to as Moldovan in the latter country. Outside Romania and Moldova, it is spoken by the Romanian and Moldovan diaspora around the globe. There are large Romanian-speaking communities in Italy, Spain, Germany, the United States, the United Kingdom, Canada, Ukraine, and a number of other countries.

Interestingly, the holiday celebrating the Romanian language didn’t originate in Romania. The first country to celebrate the language was Moldova, where Romanian is the official language. Throughout the Soviet era, the variant of the Romanian language spoken in Moldova was called the Moldovan language and used Cyrillic script instead of Latin script.

During the collapse of the Soviet Union, the Cyrillic alphabet was replaced with the Romanian version of the Latin alphabet as the official script in Moldova. The change was legitimized by a language law adopted on August 31, 1989.

The following year, August 31 was declared National Language Day by the Moldovan government. Since 1994, the official name of the holiday has been Limba noastră (“Our Language”) to avoid naming the language directly because some people still refer to the version of the Romanian language spoken in Moldova as Moldovan language.

In 2011, members of the Parliament of Romania proposed the celebration of Romanian Language Day that would coincide with National Language Day in Moldova. The main goal of the celebration was to highlight the importance of the Romanian language as the foundation of national identity and strong and united society. The next year, the holiday was celebrated by Romanian cultural organizations and associations in Bulgaria, Hungary, Serbia and Ukraine despite having no official status in Romania yet.

The Senate of Romania approved the celebration of Romanian Language Day in December 2011, the Chamber of Deputies followed suit in February 2013, and the president of Romania officially established the holiday in March 2013. Since then, Romanian Language Day has been celebrated every August 31, both in Romania and internationally.

Romanian Language Day is marked by various cultural and educational events dedicated to the Romanian language and literature. They are held by public and private organizations and institutions, including diplomatic missions and Romanian cultural institutions abroad. In Romania, the sate flag is flown to celebrate the occasion.