Dragoslavele is a commune in the northern part of ArgeÃÂ County, Muntenia, Romania, located by the former border between Wallachia and Transylvania, on the Wallachian side. It is a relatively important location for boarding house tourism. The commune is composed of two villages, Dragoslavele and Valea Hotarului.
The commune lies at the bottom of the Southern Carpathians' slopes, at one end of the RucÃÂr-Bran Pass (the narrow valley separating the Piatra Craiului and Bucegi mountains), on the banks of the DâmboviÃÂa River.
Dragoslavele is located from Câmpulung and from the county seat, PiteÃÂti. To the north and northeast it borders the communes of RucÃÂr and Dâmbovicioara, to the south with the commune of StoeneÃÂti, and to the west with the commune of Valea Mare-PravÃÂÃÂ. It is crossed by the national road DN73, which connects PiteÃÂti to BraÃÂov. At Dragoslavele, the county road DJ725 branches off from the national road, leading south to the commune of StoeneÃÂti, where it ends in .
From the Middle Ages until 1916, Dragoslavele was an important border crossing point between Wallachia and Transylvania.
In a commercial privilege confirming the relations with BraÃÂov, on 20 January 1368, Vladislav I, Lord of Wallachia, also known as "Vlaicu VodÃÂ", mentioned that merchants paid "customs at Câmpulung, or near". In 1413, Mircea the Elder renewed the old customs and fairs from Câmpulung and mentioned "the customs from DâmboviÃÂa". The name is mentioned in documents from the BraÃÂov archive, and in a document from 1451, where Vladislav II referred to Dragoslavele and RucÃÂr. In 1510, Vlad voivode wrote about the "carpenters" from Dragoslavele. The historian Nicolae Iorga located Posada in the Dragoslavele-Bran area and estimated that Charles Robert's troops passed through there in 1330. This is also where King Sigismund came in 1395; after "giving a deed near the village called Câmpulung", he was beaten in battle, according to the same historian, by the troops of Vlad-VodÃÂ.
Documents from the 17th century show that the people of Dragoslavele were in charge of guarding the border, had properties outside the village boundaries, and were exempted from taxes through princely charters. Around 1641–1642, new residents came from the HaÃÂeg area, called "rudari", meaning goldsmiths. The term "rudar" comes from the Slavic word "ruda", or (golden) rock.
Also in the 17th century, VintilÃÂ Vornicul enslaved the inhabitants of the settlement but, through the intercession of Matei Basarab, they redeemed themselves with 3,000 gold coins. The stone cross in the center of the village, a cross from 1642, consecrates this event, and in 1647 the same voivode mentioned on 10 April "the royal customs from RucÃÂr and Dragoslavele", the latter having 12 more villages under its command "until CoteneÃÂti, NucÃÂoara, SlÃÂnic, AlbeÃÂti, LereÃÂti, and NÃÂmÃÂieÃÂti".
At the end of the 19th century, the commune was part of the DâmboviÃÂan area of Muscel County and consisted only of the village of residence, with 1,104 inhabitants. Two churches and a school functioned in the commune. The Socec yearbook from 1925 records it in the same area, with 1,864 inhabitants in the villages of Dragoslavele and Valea Caselor and in the hamlets of Fundata and Lunca GârÃÂii.
During World War I, in October 1916, the area between Dragoslavele and MateiaÃÂ was the scene of a particularly violent battle between Romanian Army and German Army forces (see Romania during World War I).
During World War II, Dragoslavele was a place of refuge for the Polish Marshal Edward Rydz-à Âmigà Ây, at that time Commander-in-chief and General Inspector of the Armed Forces, considered "the second man in the state after the President". On 7 September 1939, along with most of the government, he left Warsaw under attack from Nazi Germany, and ten days later, when Soviet forces attacked Poland from the east, realizing that the fight against the two aggressors is impossible, à Âmigà Ây-Rydz ordered the Polish troops to retreat to Romania, avoiding the fight with the Red Army. Having managed to avoid capture by German or Soviet troops, à Âmigà Ây-Rydz crossed into Romania on 18 September 1939, along with the government, the Polish treasury and the remnants of the army. During his exile in Romania, Rydz-à Âmigà Ây was officially interned in the summer villa of the Patriarch Miron Cristea in Dragoslavele, by one of his friends, the former Romanian Prime Minister Armand CÃÂlinescu, but he remained free. The Marshal of Poland was accommodated in the patriarchal villa in Dragoslavele until 10 December 1940, when he fled, clandestinely crossed the borders with Hungary and Slovakia, returning to Poland.
In 1950, the commune was transferred to the Muscel district of ArgeÃÂ region. In 1968, it moved to ArgeÃÂ County.
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According to the census carried out in 2011, the population of Dragoslavele commune amounted to inhabitants, increasing compared to the previous census in 2002, when of inhabitants were registered. The majority of the inhabitants were Romanians (76.12%), with a minority of Roma (21.24%); for 2.64% of the population, the ethnicity was unknown. At the 2021 census, Dragoslavele had a population of 2,474; of those, 66.37% were Romanians and 23.32% Roma.