Mioarele

Mioarele, formerly known as Mățău, is a commune in Argeș County, Muntenia, Romania. Located 4 kilometers southeast of Câmpulung, on the way to Târgoviște, it touches both the Argeș River valley and the banks of its Argeșel tributary. It is composed of five villages: Mățău (the commune center), with Chilii and Cocenești, as one cluster; Suslănești, the oldest surviving village, is located farther to the east, alongside Aluniș. The commune, like Câmpulung itself, sits just below the Southern Carpathians, and includes Mățău peak, held as the tallest hill in Romania, as well as sediments with fossilized fish from the Oligocene period. Mățău and especially Suslănești are traditional centers for horticulture, as well as for the related plum-brandy industry.

The area engaged in commerce since Antiquity, when it was used as a trading post by the Dacians. Its history remained obscure during the early medieval interlude, and down to the foundation of an early Romanian polity, though archeological finds suggest that the defunct village of Hobaia, located on commune grounds, was inhabited as early as the 10th century AD. Toponymic clues have led historians to suppose that Mioarele's inhabitants included Early Slavs and Cumans, and that some part of the village may be known in written records from 1401 or 1402. A component of Muscel County in Wallachia, Suslănești was first mentioned in 1503, due to its participation in trade with the Transylvanian Saxons; it and Hobaia were inhabited by yeomen—some of whom advanced into Muscel's boyardom, while others became their serfs, and then their sharecroppers. While Hobaia was destroyed in mysterious circumstances, a dominant clan, the Jumăreas, emerged at Suslănești during the 17th century. The Jumărea ascendancy coincided with a regional migration, at the end of which Mățău was established as a secondary hamlet.