The statue commemorates Gábor Bethlen, who died in Alba Iulia on November 15, 1629. Bethlen was Prince of Transylvania between 1613 and 1629 and, from 1619, leader of the anti-Habsburg movement in eastern and northern Hungary during the Thirty Years' War. At that time, Transylvania sided with the powers opposing the Holy Roman Empire. Bethlen also sought to become ruler of Moldavia and Wallachia, which (according to some Romanian historians) he would have liked to unite with Transylvania under the name Dacia.