 By the 15th century this metropolitan was elected by the autocephalous Church of Ohrid, but following the abolition of the latter it returned to the jurisdiction of the Church of Constantinople.During this time, in the 17th century, the Metropolis of Moldavia transitioned from using Church Slavonic to Romanian language.In 1812, the eastern half of Moldavia (renamed as Bessarabia) was annexed by the Russian Empire, which placed the Orthodox churches in this territory under the jurisdiction of the Russian Orthodox Church.