in Iaşi during that period was the former Carboneria revolutionary Niccolò Livaditti, to whom Asachi did not, however, assign a teaching post. In 1843, four years before the Iaşi Academia was radically transformed, the art classes were disestablished due to the protest of various boyars (who objected to the fact that members of all social groups could attend them). Gheorghe Asachi's own works, many of which date back to the time he spent in Rome, show the influence of Classicism. Noted for their rigorous use of artistic conventions and nature study, they are nonetheless considered inferior to both their creator's contributions to other cultural fields and the works of many other painters active in Moldavia at the time. Asachi himself is known to have sketched out works which were completed by his foreign collaborators or students (among these is a since-lost painting of Stephen the Great facing his mother, signed by the Italian artist Giani, and an 1845 painting of Moldavians in the battle of Malbork Castle). A series of Classicist drawings from the early decades of the 19th century have only tentatively been attributed to Asachi. Descendants Elena, Gheorghe Asachi's widow, died in 1877. Of his adopted children, Dimitrie Asachi was to be the most famous: a pupil of his stepfather's, he was to author the first original book on mathematics in his country (1841). Alexandru Asachi, who joined the Romanian Army and became an officer, was himself known as an artist: a lithographer and author of historical works, he published several albums of hand-colored prints during the 1850s. In 1835, Hermiona Asachi (whose given name was often Francised as Hermione) fell in love with Alexandru, the underage son of former Prince Alexander Mourousis, who soon after moved into Asachi's house; this scandalized other members of the Mourousis family, and the conflict was ended only when the two youths agreed to marry. They had a son, George Moruzi, who died in 1856. In 1843, Hermiona translated and published Silvio Pellico's collection of maxims, Dei doveri degli uomini. She got married a second time, in 1852, to the well-known French historian Edgar Quinet (between 1841 and 1845, she had attended Quinet's lectures at the Collège de France); five years later, Asachi translated and Quinet's collected works into Romanian — according to historian Nicolae Iorga, the edition was toned-down and censored. The Quinets did not have any children. Landmarks and portrayals