During the succeeding century the pressure of Catholic and bureaucratic rule gradually broke down the old individuality of Transylvania, which was promoted, in compensation, to the title of a Grand Principality in 1765. The privileges of the Szeklers had already almost vanished in the i6th century and many of them had sunk into serfdom. In the 18th the Saxons were in danger of following suit, but were saved by their great minister, Brukenthal. Some of the Rumanians, on the other hand, emerged for the first time from serfdom when Maria Theresa extended the system of the Military Frontier (q.v.) to three Wallach districts in Transyl vania in 1766. They had already acquired a measure of religious liberty under the union of 1698-99, which allowed any Orthodox priest in Hungary immunities equal to those of the Catholics con ditional on his accepting certain dogmas. The creation of the Uniat Church was probably not meant as an attempt to play off the oppressed against the dominant classes ; but the Rumanians, who were largely reinforced during the 18th century by refugees from the Phanariot regime in Wallachia and Moldavia, were at last able to develop a national consciousness. The visits of Joseph II. to Transylvania (1773, 1783) gave rise to a rumour that the serfs were to be liberated and armed against their masters. In 1785 the Rumanian peasants, led by Nicola Horea, rose and had massacred many Magyar nobles before the revolt was suppressed. On Joseph's death, after recanting his reforms in Hungary, the Rumanians submitted to his successor, Leopold II., the supplex libellus V alachorum, in which they prayed to be set on an equality with the other nationalities and inaugurated the "Vlach contro versy" in modern politics by appealing to their "ancient rights" as the autochthonous inhabitants of Transylvania. The document was passed by Leopold to the Transylvanian diet of 1790-91, which, itself busily engaged in reaffirming its position after the disturbing Josefinean interlude, rejected it decisively and restored the old constitution Actually, however, under Francis I. and Ferdinand II. there was little liberty for any party. Meanwhile, the wave of the Magyar national revival swept through Transyl vania, bringing with it a strong demand among the Magyars for full union with Hungary and creating a corresponding antagonism among the non-Magyars.
On the outbreak of the revolution of 1848 the Magyars peti tioned for union with Hungary, promising the Rumanians the abolition of serfdom and other reforms in return for their sup port. The Rumanians, however, rejected the alliance, and at the "Field of Liberty" of Blaj (Blasendorf) declared themselves a free nation, forming an integral part of Transylvania, and swore fealty to the Hapsburgs (May 5). A political programme, based on "the principles of fraternity and liberty," was drawn up, but rejected by the diet at Klausenburg (Cluj), which proclaimed the union with Hungary, the Saxon representatives accepting this de cision by a majority, and declared the new Hungarian laws to be sufficient guarantee that all necessary reforms would be granted a conclusion also reached by a commission of the Hungarian par liament. In the subsequent fighting between the Hungarian and the Austro-Russian troops, much of which took place in Transyl vania, both Saxons and Rumanians took up arms against the Magyars, and a very bitter racial war resulted. The Austrian con stitution of 1851, which abolished both the Military Frontier and the Saxon privileges, treated all nationalities with equal severity, and the reaction affected all equally heavily. The diploma of Oct. 20, 186o, restored the old constitution and the Hofkanzlei, but these were abolished when Transylvania became an integral por tion of Hungary under the Austro-Hungarian Compromise of 1867. In the following year it was reorganized in "comitats" with the rest of Hungary.
From 1868-1918 Transylvania was dominated by the Magyar racial policy. The basic Nationalities Law of 1868 was in theory
extremely liberal, but in practice remained almost a dead letter. The Saxons, in view of their numerical inferiority, confined themselves to building up a close organization for the defence of their social and religious individuality. In spite of this they lost ground, especially after their ancient national status was abolished in March 1876. The Rumanian national movement was more active. In past centuries it had been essentially social rather than national. The idea of uniting all Rumanians in one body politic had, indeed, been mooted ; but so long as the Danubian provinces remained under Turkish suzerainty the suggestion most commonly put forward, even by Rumanian rulers, e.g., Michael the Brave and Matthew Bassarab, had been for a Rumanian state under Habsburg rule. Austria, however, lost her last chance of acquiring Moldavia and Wallachia through her unskilful diplomacy during the Crimean War; by the Compromise with Hungary she sealed the alienation of her Rumanian subjects. The immediate social struggle was ended by the abolition of serfdom in 1853-54; the agitation for a land reform dated chiefly from the loth century. The national struggle proper occupied the chief attention of the new Rumanian intelligentsia and middle-classes. A Rumanian irredenta, though invited by the creation of an independent Ru manian kingdom, never assumed the proportions of the Serb, ow ing to the discouragement given it by King Charles of Rumania, who was allied with Austria-Hungary ; but in the last years before the World War it was increasingly furthered by nearly all edu cated elements in Rumania; and the severity of the measures taken in Transylvania during the War by the Hungarian Govern ment and military, especially after the Rumanian advance into Transylvania in 1916, showed that practically all Rumanians desired the dissolution of Austria-Hungary.