Editing Moldovan language (section)

=== Birth ===
[[File:Stamp of Moldova 413.gif|alt=|thumb|1999 Moldovan stamp celebrating 10 years since reverting to the Latin script]]
[[File:Vietile sfintilor, Chisinau, 1928.jpg|alt=|thumb|Book in a supposed Moldovan language published in interwar Romania]]
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The history of the Moldovan language refers to the historical evolution of the [[glottonym]] ''Moldavian''/''Moldovan'' in Moldova and beyond. It is closely tied to the region's political status, as during long periods of rule by [[Russia]] and the [[Soviet Union]], officials emphasized the language's name as part of separating the Moldovans from those people who began to identify as Romanian in a different nation-building process. Cyrillic script was in use. From a linguistic perspective, ''Moldovan'' is an alternative name for the varieties of the [[Romanian language]] spoken in the [[Moldova|Republic of Moldova]] (see [[History of the Romanian language]]).

Before 1918, during the period between the wars, and after the [[union of Bessarabia with Romania]], scholars did not have consensus that Moldovans and the Romanians formed a single ethnic group.{{sfn|King|2000|pp=57–59}} The Moldovan peasants had grown up in a different political entity and missed the years of creating a pan-Romanian national political consciousness. They identified as Moldovans speaking the language "Moldovan". This caused reactions from pan-Romanian nationalists.{{sfn|King|1999|p=120}} The concept of the distinction of Moldovan from Romanian was explicitly stated only in the early&nbsp;20th&nbsp;century. It accompanied the raising of national awareness among Moldovans, with the Soviets emphasizing distinctions between Moldavians and Romanians.<ref name="Fedor">{{cite book |editor-last1=Fedor |editor-first1=Helen |title=Belarus and Moldova: Country Studies |date=1995 |publisher=Federal Research Division, Library of Congress |location=Washington DC |pages=121–122 |url=https://www.loc.gov/resource/frdcstdy.belarusmoldovaco00fedo_0/?sp=155 |access-date=4 June 2020 |language=en |quote=Stalin justified the creation of the Moldavian SSR by claiming that a distinct "Moldavian" language was an indicator that  "Moldavians" were a separate nationality from the Romanians  in Romania. In order to give greater credence to this claim, in  1940 Stalin imposed the Cyrillic alphabet on "Moldavian" to  make it look more like Russian and less like Romanian; archaic  Romanian words of Slavic origin were imposed on "Moldavian"; Russian loanwords and phrases were added to "Moldavian"; and a new theory was advanced that "Moldavian" was at  least partially Slavic in origin. In 1949 Moldavian citizens were  publicly reprimanded in a journal for daring to express themselves in literary Romanian. The Soviet government continued  this type of behavior for decades.   Proper names were subjected to Russianization (see Glossary) as well. Russian endings were added to purely Romanian  names, and individuals were referred to in the Russian manner  by using a patronymic (based on one's father's first name)  together with a first name. |archive-date=8 March 2021 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210308190618/https://www.loc.gov/resource/frdcstdy.belarusmoldovaco00fedo_0/?sp=155 |url-status=live }}</ref> ''Moldavian'' has also been recorded by the 1960s' ''Romanian Linguistic Atlas'' as the answer to the question "What [language] do you speak?" in parts of [[Western Moldavia]] ([[Galați County|Galați]] and [[Iași County|Iași]] counties).<ref>{{cite book |last1=Arvinte |first1=Vasile |title=Român, românesc, România |date=1983 |publisher=Editura Științifică și Enciclopedică |location=București |page=50}}</ref>

Major developments since the fall of the Soviet Union include resuming use of a Latin script rather than Cyrillic letters in 1989, and several changes in the statutory name of the official language used in Moldova. At one point of particular confusion about identity in the 1990s, all references to geography in the name of the language were dropped, and it was officially known simply as ''{{lang|ro|limba de stat}}'' — 'the state language'.

Moldovan was assigned the code <code>mo</code> in [[ISO 639-1]] and code <code>mol</code> in [[ISO 639-2]] and [[ISO 639-3]].<ref>[[SIL International]]: [http://www.sil.org/iso639-3/documentation.asp?id=mol ISO 639 code sets: Documentation for ISO 639 identifier: mol] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20121011195553/http://www.sil.org/iso639-3/documentation.asp?id=mol |date=11 October 2012 }}</ref> Since November&nbsp;2008, these have been deprecated, leaving <code>ro</code> and <code>ron</code> (639-2/T) and <code>rum</code> (639-2/B), the language identifiers {{as of | 2013 | lc = on}} to be used for the variant of the Romanian language also known as Moldavian and Moldovan in English, the ISO 639-2 Registration Authority said in explaining the decision.<ref>{{cite web |url=https://www.loc.gov/standards/iso639-2/php/code_changes.php |title=Code Changes: ISO 639-2 Registration Authority |publisher=US [[Library of Congress]] |quote=The identifiers mo and mol are deprecated, leaving ro and ron (639-2/T) and rum (639-2/B) the current language identifiers to be used for the variant of the Romanian language also known as Moldavian and Moldovan in English and ''moldave'' in French. The identifiers mo and mol will not be assigned to different items, and recordings using these identifiers will not be invalid |access-date=29 December 2017 |archive-date=28 April 2019 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190428235442/http://www.loc.gov/standards/iso639-2/php/code_changes.php |url-status=live }}</ref><ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.alvestrand.no/pipermail/ietf-languages/2008-November/008635.html |title=ISO 639 JAC decision re mo/mol |date=3 November 2008 |publisher=www.alvestrand.no |access-date=26 February 2011 |archive-date=7 June 2011 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110607074517/http://www.alvestrand.no/pipermail/ietf-languages/2008-November/008635.html |url-status=live }}</ref>

In 1989, the contemporary Romanian version of the [[Latin alphabet]] was adopted as the [[official script]] of the [[Moldavian SSR]].<ref name="lege-rssm">{{in lang|ro}} [[s:ro:Legea cu privire la funcționarea limbilor vorbite pe teritoriul RSS Moldovenești|Legea cu privire la funcționarea limbilor vorbite pe teritoriul RSS Moldovenești nr.&nbsp;3465-XI din 01.09.89&nbsp;Vestile&nbsp;nr.&nbsp;9/217, 1989]] (Law regarding the usage of languages spoken on the territory of the Republic of Moldova): "Moldavian SSR supports the desire of the Moldovans that live across the borders of the Republic, and considering the really existing linguistical Moldo-Romanian identity – of the Romanians that live on the territory of the USSR, of doing their studies and satisfying their cultural needs in their mother tongue."</ref>