Berceni

Where the name comes from

A place or district

The Berceni area, a district built from the 1960s towards the commune of the same name.

The often-told story links the name to the Hungarian general Miklós Bercsényi, but the ethnologist Gheorghiță Ciocioi notes there is no historical evidence for it and that villages called Berceni appear more than two centuries earlier. He proposes another origin: the Berceni were the people of a Berciu, a diminutive of Berivoi. Neither version is proven.

How the name travelled

1. BerceniBucharest metro station
2. the Berceni area and communedocumented
3. Berceni commune, towards which the district was builtdocumented
4. the origin of the name Bercenidisputed

Other explanations

• popular explanation The name comes from the Hungarian general Miklós Bercsényi, said to have camped south of Bucharest. Ciocioi says there is no historical evidence and that the name Berceni appears more than two centuries earlier.
• a researcher's proposal 'Berceni' means the people of Berciu, a name derived from Berivoi, 'gatherer of the host'. Proposed by the ethnologist Gheorghiță Ciocioi in a newspaper article, not a place-name study.

Earlier names

• Depoul IMGB 1986 – 2009

IMGB Depot: the metro depot built next to the IMGB (Bucharest Heavy Machinery Works) industrial zone.

Worth knowing

• It is one of only two above-ground stations (the other is Tudor Arghezi); until 2023 it was the only one.
• The Metrorex Berceni depot, which maintains M2 trains, is next to the station.
• It straddles the boundary between Bucharest and the town of Popești-Leordeni.
• It was the southern terminus of M2 until 2023.