Western Moldavia

Western Moldavia (Romanian: Moldova Occidentală, Moldova de Apus, or Moldova de Vest), also known as Romanian Moldavia, is the core historic and geographical part of the former Principality of Moldavia situated in eastern and north-eastern Romania. Until its union with Wallachia in 1859, the Principality of Moldavia also included, at various times in its history, the regions of Bessarabia (with the Budjak), all of Bukovina, and Hertsa; the larger part of the former is nowadays the independent state of Moldova, while the rest of it, the northern part of Bukovina, and Hertsa form territories of Ukraine.

Romanian Moldavia consists of eight counties, spanning over 18% of Romania's territory. Six out of the 8 counties make up Romania's designated Nord-Est development region, while the two southern counties are included within Romania's Sud-Est development region. It comprises roughly 48.67% of the wider region of Moldavia.

The names Moldavia and Moldova are derived from the name of the Moldova River; however, the etymology is not known and there are several variants:

A legend mentioned in Descriptio Moldaviae (1714) by Dimitrie Cantemir links it to an aurochs hunting trip of the voivode of the Voivodeship of Maramureș Dragoș and the latter's chase of a star-marked aurochs. Dragoș was accompanied by his female hound, called Molda; when they reached the shores of an unfamiliar river, Molda caught up with the animal and was killed by it. The dog's name would have been combined with the Romanian word for water, apă, and given to the river and extended to the country.

The Gothic Mulda (Gothic: 𐌼𐌿𐌻𐌳𐌰, ᛗᚢᛚᛞᚨ) meaning 'dust', 'dirt' (cognate with the English mould), referring to the river.

A Slavic etymology (-ova is a quite common Slavic suffix), marking the end of one Slavic genitive form, denoting ownership, chiefly of feminine nouns (i.e., 'that of Molda').

A landowner named Alexa Moldaowicz is mentioned in a 1334 document as a local boyar in service to Yuriy II of Halych; this attests to the use of the name before the foundation of the Moldavian state and could be the source for the region's name.

The delimitation of the Moldavian dialect, as with all other Romanian dialects, is made primarily by analyzing its phonetic features and only marginally by morphological, syntactical, and lexical characteristics.