Vălenii de Munte

Vălenii de Munte lies in the Vălenii de Munte depression, in the Teleajen valley, at an altitude of 350 m, 28 km north of Ploiești, 98 km from Bucharest and 89 km from Brașov. The town is crossed by the DN1A road (Ploiești-Brașov) and has a station on the Ploiești-Măneciu railway. At the 2021 census it had 12,044 inhabitants. The town is first recorded in an order of Prince Dan II from 1431, as the "market town of the Săcuieni" and a customs post, and the "Teleajen road", which linked Vălenii to Brașov over the Tabla Buții pass, is recorded from 1433. Between 1645 and 1781 Vălenii de Munte was the seat of Săcuieni County, and in 1684 the chronicler Miron Costin listed it among the towns of Wallachia. It later became the seat of the Teleajen district and, between 1950 and 1968, of Teleajen raion. The historian Nicolae Iorga settled here in 1907 and in July 1908 opened the Summer People's University, whose courses are still held every August. The Nicolae Iorga memorial complex, a listed historic monument (PH-II-m-A-16841), is now a museum. Next to it, the "Regina Maria" missionary school complex (mid-eighteenth century, with the school organised in 1922), also a listed monument, houses the Teleajen Valley Ethnography Museum. The town also has the Teleajen Valley Nature Museum. The oldest church in the town is the Dormition church of the former Văleni monastery, built in 1680 by Hagi Răzvan, a clucer (court official), and his wife Ilinca, during the reign of Șerban Cantacuzino (PH-II-m-B-16827). Other listed churches are the wooden church of St Spyridon in the Berevoiești district and the St Nicholas-Tabaci church complex. Town Day is celebrated on 9 May.