Eastern Moldova

The name eastern Moldova (usually with either a lowercase "e") refers—usually in a historical context—to the eastern territory of the old Principality of Moldova, roughly equal in territory to the present-day Republic of Moldova, minus Transnistria. This territory was annexed in 1812 by the Russian Empire together with Ottoman Bessarabia, a region that had at that time been part of the Ottoman Empire for 328 years.

While Ottoman Bessarabia corresponded mainly to what now is known as Budjak and is part of Ukraine (along the Black Sea south of Moldova), the Russians applied the name Bessarabia to the entire annexed territory. Although this usage was ahistorical when first adopted, Bessarabia has come to refer more commonly to the so-named portion of the Russian Empire than to the older Ottoman Bessarabia. Thus one sees usages such as "1812... Treaty of Bucharest grants Russia control of eastern Moldova or Bessarabia, the area between the River Prut and the west bank of the Dniester," or "In 1940, Romania was forced to cede eastern Moldova to the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (U.S.S.R.)…"

Eastern Moldova (often with an uppercase "E") is also used at times to refer to the entire Republic of Moldova, in order to differentiate it from Western Moldova which is a Romanian region, as in "Moldovans are Romanians, they speak Romanian, and the republic is in fact just Eastern Moldova, or Bessarabia, which was once annexed by Russia."

The expression eastern Moldova can also refer to the eastern portion of the present-day Republic of Moldova. It may refer precisely to Transnistria, or the use may be less specific.