Transylvania was originally inhabited by the Gctce or Dad, as they were called by the Romans, and with the rest of Dacia was reduced to a Roman province by Trojan. Having been successively sub dued by the Sarmatians, Goths, and Huns, the Saxons, driven from their country by the conquests of Charlemagne, established themselves in this pro vince, then known by the name of Mediterranean Dacia. Its principal towns and its cultivation owe their origin to this people, who bestowed upon it the name Sibenburgen, or the seven cities. Stephen, the first king of Hungary, annexed this province to his dominions in 1002, and governed it by viceroys, called waywodes. It continued subject to this power until 1527, when John Zapoli aspired to the throne of Hungary, in opposition to Ferdinand of Austria. The issue of this struggle was the conquest of Hun gary by Sultan Soliman, and the conferring of Tran sylvania upon Stephen, the son of John Zapoli, to be held as a fief of the Ottoman throne. From this period Transylvania was regarded as a distinct state, and its princes entered into negotiations with the neigbouring potentates. About 1602, Sigis mund the waywode formed an alliance with the house of Austria, and afterwards endeavoured to cede the principality to the empire; but the govern ment of that power was odious to the inhabitants, who, under a succession of patriotic leaders, drove out the Austrian garrisons; and Bethlem Gabor, a noble Hungarian and a calvinist, extended his con quests over the greater part of Hungary. In 1657,
Prince Ragotski excited, by his disobedience, a war with the Porte, which was terminated by his defeat and death; but the Transylvanians, enraged at the encroachments of the Ottomans, deposed their way wode, and having conferred the principality on He milli, one of Ragotski's generals, threw themselves under the protection of the Emperor Leopold, and admitted German garrisons into their principal fortresses. Kemeni, however, was soon after killed in a skirmish with the Turks, when Michael Abaffi, a vassal of the Porte, was elected waywode by the states. In the reverses which subsequently befel the Ottoman arms, Transylvania was relinquished to the emperor in 1698; since which time it has formed a part of the Austrian dominions. See Demian's Tableau Geographique ct Politique de Hongrie, &c.