It was the continuator of the
Princely Academy from Bucharest, and was initially located in the buildings of Saint Sava Monastery, nowadays the site of the
University of Bucharest. Its origines are connected to the lectures delivered in Romanian by
Gheorghe Lazăr in the Princely Academy, beginning with 1818. After the
Filiki Eteria movement from 1821, the
Ottoman Sultan forbade the existence of Greek schools, but he allowed the existence of Romanian schools. Thus, by the efforts of Lazăr and of other professors that associated with him, like
Eufrosin Poteca,
Ion Heliade Rădulescu, Vasile Ardelean, a.k.a. Laszlo Erdely, or
Petrache Poenaru, the Saint Sava Academy managed to hold the same academic level as the former Greek-language Princely Academy. The Academy was split in 1864 on orders from
Domnitor Alexandru Ioan Cuza, the purely academic branch being converted into the University of Bucharest, while the secondary education one was organized as the current
Saint Sava National College. ==See also==