Corneliu Codreanu
1899 – 1938 Romanian Founder and leader of the Iron Guard
Founder of the Iron Guard, Romania's mystical Orthodox fascist movement.
- Religion
- An intense Romanian Orthodox mystic who built the Iron Guard as a religious-nationalist movement steeped in Orthodox ritual, martyrdom and a cult of death and sacrifice.
- Affiliations
- Founder of the Legion of the Archangel Michael (the Iron Guard). No occult ties in the Western sense; its mysticism was a militant, heterodox Orthodox nationalism.
Codreanu founded the Legion of the Archangel Michael, a fascist movement uniquely fused with Romanian Orthodox spirituality, martyrdom cults and violent antisemitism. His followers venerated him as a near-saintly leader. He was arrested and killed by the Romanian state in 1938, becoming a martyr-figure for the movement.
Connections
- successor of Horia Sima — Inherited leadership of the Iron Guard.
- successor of Horia Sima — Sima led the Iron Guard after his killing.
- rival of Ion Antonescu — Antonescu later crushed the Guard Codreanu had founded.