Transsylvania Nostra Journal

The Unitarian Fortified Church in Dârjiu is one of the best known ecclesiastical historic buildings in Transylvania. The church was protected by a defensive wall with corner bastions and a tower, moreover there is also a defensive level on the church (with loopholes and pitch pouring slots, built on buttresses and corbels). These were built following the havoc from the beginning of the 17^th century based on the researchers various considerations. We sampled the wooden elements and structures of the building ensemble on several occasions between 2006 and 2013 in order to perform their dendrochronological analysis and determine the construction or reconstruction period of the analysed wooden structures and building elements.
The most important result of the research is that the current roof structure of the church – including the wooden structure of the defensive level – was built at the turn of the 15^th and 16^th centuries and still stands with its subsequent additions. Thus the defensive level of the Church in Dârjiu is not a late copy of the similar historic buildings in the Saxon Land but their contemporary edifice. Regarding the tower, we did not find any elements from the construction period, the dated wooden elements can be related to the repairs from the beginning of the 17^th century. The defensive walls and the corner bastions were also built at the beginning of the 17^th century according to the analysis of the wood samples.

Keywords: dendrochronology, historic roof structure, dating, Fortified Church in Dârjiu