Florentina Nicolae Ethnical Names in Dimitrie Cantemir’s De antiquis et hodiernis moldaviae nominibus and Historia moldo-vlachica The works analized here, De antiquis et hodiernis Moldaviae nominibus (On the Ancient and Contemporary Names of Moldavia) and Historia Moldo-Vlachica (History of Moldovlahia) are two projects written in Neo-Latin by Dimitrie Cantemir, at the beginning of the 18 th century. Their state of project allows certain linguistic comments regarding the author’s methods of work and the divers influences assimilated by Cantemir’s Neo-Latin. Numerous ethnical names that appeared in these texts (found in the same manuscript) are used in a scientific manner, advanced for that period of time. The author wrote even etymological observations or made comments on the etymologies found in the bibliographical sources. When writing about the Romanian people, Cantemir always presented the native variants. The ethnical names widely used are those collected from the prestigious sources, especially the historical works of Jan Dlugosz, Antonius Bonfinius, Johannes Leunclavius. Key words: Neo-latin, ethnical names, latinization Dimitrie Cantemir (1673-1723) is the most well-known Romanian writer who used Neo- Latin in his historical works. His international fame is due mainly to Incrementa et decrementa Aulae Othmannicae sive Aliothmannicae Historiae a prima gentis origine ad nostra usque tempora deductae Libri tres (History of the Ottoman Empire) and to Descriptio antiqui et hodierni status Moldaviae (Description of Moldavia). The manuscripts left by Cantemir reveal to readers a complicate process of creation, which included a lot of additions and corrections made directly on the texts. The works we will analyze below, De antiquis et hodiernis Moldaviae nominibus (On the Ancient and Contemporary Names of Moldavia) and Historia Moldo-Vlachica (History of Moldovlahia), are two small studies, two projects written in Neo-Latin. The first one was, in fact, the sketch of Description of Moldavia, while the second one was the Latin short version of Hronicul a vechimei romano-moldo-vlahilor (History of the Old Roman-Moldavian- Wallachians), a monumental history of the Romanian people, written in the author’s native tongue. The facsimiles of De antiquis et hodiernis Moldaviae nominibus and Historia Moldo- Vlachica are now deposited in the Library of the Romanian Academy; they were published in 1983, in the ninth volume of Dimitrie Cantemir’s Complete Works. They could become an object of interest both for historians, due to the scientific method of investigation, the information gained consulting an impressive bibliography, and for philologists, due to the Neo-Latin used by Cantemir in his works. The stage of project they were abandoned in