The short version
The University of Craiova was created by Law 138, published in the Official Bulletin on 25 April 1947. It is the reason Craiova is a young city in a shrinking region, and the single biggest force keeping the centre's cafés and bars in business.
But the founding is less tidy than the date suggests — and the university's own charter cites two dates, not one.
The founding, and the complication
Law 138 established the institution in April 1947. In practice, it opened with a single working faculty — Agronomy. The others existed on paper but could not organise courses in the early years.
The second date matters as much as the first. Sources differ on when it became a university in the full sense: some give 1965, others 1966, and the university's own charter cites a 1965 Council of Ministers decision alongside the 1947 law.
| Legal creation | Law 138, Official Bulletin, 25 April 1947 |
| Faculty operating first | Agronomy |
| Full university status | 1965 or 1966 — sources differ |
| Charter cites | the 1947 law *and* a 1965 decision |
Places in this piece
Why agronomy, and why that is the whole story
Because this is Oltenia. The region's wealth came out of the ground — grain, and the trade in it — which is the subject of the Ban and the money of Oltenia. A state building a university here in 1947 put agronomy first because agronomy was what the region was for.
What came after followed the factories. Electroputere opened in 1949, the car plant in 1976 and the aircraft works in 1972, and each needed engineers in numbers no distant university was going to supply. The university and the three works are one system, built in the same thirty years.
What it means for the city today
This is the part a visitor actually notices.
- The city is younger than its region. Dolj county is ageing; central Craiova is full of twenty-year-olds, because they are brought in.
- It is why the café scene exists. A provincial city of this size does not normally support this many specialty coffee places. Students do.
- It is why term dates change the city. Craiova in late July is a noticeably different place from Craiova in late October. Craiova for students covers the practical side.
- It is why English gets you further than you expect. A large student and teaching population means more confident English speakers than the city's tourist numbers would suggest.
Where to stay nearby
Live prices and availability on a map centred on this exact spot — hotels, apartments and hostels, so you can judge the walk from here rather than guess from an address.
Bookings made through this map earn us a commission. Your price is unaffected.
The campus, and what you can see
The main building is a landmark in its own right — see the university — and the surrounding area is part of any walk through the centre. There is no visitor circuit and no museum entry; treat it as architecture and street life rather than as an attraction.
It sits close enough to Calea Unirii that you will pass it without planning to.
The student quarter effect
Student housing and the cheap end of the eating and drinking economy cluster where the faculties are, and that is why the nightlife is concentrated rather than spread. If you are choosing where to stay, the practical consequence is that a central room is lively on a Thursday in November and quiet in August — and the price does not always reflect that.
Why a university changed a provincial city more than a factory did
A factory employs people. A university replaces them.
Every autumn a city of this size takes in several thousand eighteen-year-olds who were not here in June, most from towns across Oltenia that have no higher education of their own. A proportion never leave. Over seventy-five years that is not a supplement to the population — it is a substantial part of how the population was assembled, and it is why Craiova's professional class is regionally recruited rather than inherited.
Further reading on this site
The history of Craiova for the long frame. Electroputere, the car plant and the aircraft works for the industry the university was built beside. Craiova for expats and for digital nomads if you are thinking about staying.
*Founding dates and legal references here come from the university's own material and encyclopaedic sources; reviewed as a source set in October 2026. The 1965/1966 disagreement is printed rather than resolved.*
