 His grandfather, Pierre Edmond van Saanen (born Smyrna in 1813), had arrived in Wallachia during Gheorghe Bibescu’s reign (between 1843-1848) and had started a dynasty active in business and the arts.His mother's family had been active in the unification of Italy before moving to Bucharest.Edmond's parents divorced and his mother remarried Alexandru Algi (from whom Edmond obtained a longer surname), and not much later Constantin C. Arion, a former foreign affairs minister and a distinguished intellectual.