Romania's traditional sport Oina to be proposed for UNESCO heritage

Romania wants to introduce its national sport Oina (similar to baseball) into the Unesco Intangible Heritage Patrimony and is currently preparing the proposal for the UNESCO committee. Virgil Niţulescu, the President of the National Committee for Preserving the Intangible Cultural Heritage within the Ministry of Culture started working on this project, hoping to send the proposal to UNESCO by the end of March next year, and have it considered for inclusion in the international patrimony in 2014. Romania's proposal this year is to include the Horezu ceramics on the intangible heritage list. The next session of the UNESCO Committee for the protection of intangible heritage of humanity will take place between November 25 and 30. Oina is a traditional Romanian game that has been played since the late fourteenth century, according to chronicles, where it was first mentioned in 1364, during Vlaicu Voda’s kingship. In 1899, Spiru Haret, the Minister of Education at the time introduced oină in sports classes and organized the first annual oină competitions. The game is no longer popular in Romania, even though an Oina Federation exists in Bucharest. Oina is in many ways similar to baseball, being a more simple version of it. Ioana Toader, ioana.toader@romania-insider.com (photo source: National Oina Federation)