Gura Teghii

The commune is the northernmost in Buzău county and occupies most of the Bâsca basin, and the basin of its tributary Bâsca Mică. The permanently inhabited regions are those in the southern low areas, whereas the commune territory extends into the mountains, covering the Penteleu Massif, with a maximum altitude of 1,772 metres (5,814 ft). Into the north-west, the communes limits are high on the Bâsca Mare valley, near the Szekler village of Comandău.

The oldest document mentioning a village of this commune refers to Păltiniș, and dates back to 11 December 1534; it is a document from the chancellery of hospodar Vlad VII Vintilă, and also mentions the Tega brook, and a shipment of merchandise from the villages in the Buzău river valley towards Brașov.[3]

Initially, the villages in the area were yeomen villages. The locals were working as lumberjacks and carpenters or hunters. In 1672, hospodar Radu Leon granted the land to the yeomen of Sibiciu. They took it as a common ownership and used it for shepherding, as in that area grasslands were insufficient.[3] During the reign of Constantin Brâncoveanu (late 17th, early 18th century), the ownership of the Buzău mountains was clearly established: five people were owning the land up until the Austrian Empire's border. One of the owners was Costache Sibiceanu, former yeoman who became a boyar.[4] During the phanariote period, a Wallachian of Greek origin, by the name of Enache Persescu, acquired the lands of the local peasants who could not prove their inheritance. In the meantime, they became serfs on the Bâsca-Gura Teghii estate, so they could not raise cattle, so they took on coopery, selling barrels and casks in the Buzău and Mizil market towns; the traditional trade was kept until the 1940s, but became lost due to industrialization—many locals were hired at the Göetz lumber mills in Nehoiu.[3]