Union Museum, Iași

The Union Museum stands at 14 Strada Alexandru Lăpușneanu in the centre of Iași and is part of the Moldova National Museum Complex. The building was erected in the early nineteenth century in neoclassical style (the List of Historic Monuments dates it to 1806) and in the first half of that century belonged to several boyar families: Catargi, Paladi, Cantacuzino-Pașcanu and Ghica. From 1859 to 1862 the house was rented as the residence of Alexandru Ioan Cuza, ruler of the United Principalities, and it remained in the city's memory as the "Cuza Palace". From 1886 to 1937 it belonged to the Iași Urban Credit Society. During the First World War, while Bucharest was occupied, King Ferdinand took up residence here. In 1937 the state bought the building and declared it a historic monument, and at the urging of Nicolae Iorga a museum called the "Cuza-Vodă Palace" was set up on the upper floor. Under its present name the museum opened on 24 January 1959, the centenary of the Union of the Principalities. The ground floor covers the era of the Union: Cuza's double election, the people of the Union, the reforms of his reign and the history of the house. Upstairs, the princely apartments of the mid-nineteenth century are recreated, with the studies of Cuza and of his wife Elena, the dining room, the salon, the billiard room, the lady's drawing room and the bedroom. The collections include documents, rare books, old maps, photographs, costumes, furniture, porcelain, silverware, clocks, carpets, coins and medals, many connected with the Cuza family and with figures of the period such as Mihail Kogălniceanu and Vasile Alecsandri. The building, listed as the "Palace of Prince Alexandru Ioan Cuza", is a class A historic monument, LMI code IS-II-m-A-03930.