Naïve Mistake or Scientific Fraud? Eugeniu Coșeriu and the Issue of Moldovenism

This paper attempts to present Eugeniu Coșeriu's positions on the issue of Moldovenism, understood as an ideology whose aim is the affirmation of a Moldavian ethnolinguistic identity that is different and separate from the Romanian one. More specifically, the opinions of the prominent Bessarabian-born linguist have been considered with reference to the linguistic realities of the territory of the current Republic of Moldavia, to the negative effects that different language policies have had in that region and to the consequences and future evolution of the status of the Romanian language in the left bank of the Prut. Eugeniu Coșeriu has expressed himself on several occasions both on the question of the so-called 'Moldavian language' and, more generally, on the aspects inherent the language planning in Bessarabia, especially in the Soviet era, but without neglecting what happened in the previous century. The result is a clear and scientifically unexceptionable picture that unequivocally dismantles the bizarre theses that would like to support the existence of a Moldovan language and cultural identity in a purely political function.