Representations of the relations between the Gagauz minority and their Romanian political and administrative masters in the inter-war years have been characterised by mutual mistrust, persecution and recrimination. This picture is at least partly the product of both post-war Soviet propaganda and more recent experiences of conflict within the Moldovan state. However, gaining a satisfactory understanding of how a politically and economically marginalised and geographically peripheral group such as the Gagauz experienced this period of Romanian rule is particularly problematic.