János Végh
How European Is Hungary?
Ernő Marosi, ed., On the Stage of Europe. Budapest: Balassi, 2009,
363 pp. (Also in Hungarian and German)
László Csontos, who found refuge in
England after the 1956 Revolution, left
the Hungarian Academy of Sciences a
substantial sum of money in his will, "to
spread awareness of Hungary's millennial
contribution to the idea of the European
Community." In discussions about the
nature of this contribution, Hungarians
show themselves proud of it while
doubting, however, whether the rest of
Europe agrees. Small nations do not
particularly interest large countries and
other small nations take their cue from the
major centres. At best close neighbours
will take notice. The isolation of the
language adds to the problem. Hungary's
written heritage is incomprehensible even
to many historians of the region and for
the great majority of educated Europeans
it might as well not exist. That is a fact of
life which Hungary's accession to the
European Union in 2004 did little to
change. If anything, it has made the sense
of isolation keener. Scepticism, indeed
aversion, is palpable on the part of the
older member states—never officially, of
course, but certainly by opinion makers.
The volume under review clearly helps
to make Hungary better known to the
wider world by presenting so far less
known aspects of its history. The editors
chose not to put together a volume of
source material such as a compilation of
laws, official documents, private letters
and extracts from the press and literary
works. Instead they offer a variety of
images, trusting that works of art can be
interpreted as historical sources defined
by their visuality. The authors of the
explanatory texts—historians and art
historians—had no wish to produce what
would essentially have been a simple
illustrated history book. A well-reasoned
selection turned the book into an
interesting experiment.
[...]
King Matthias Corvinus (1458–1490),
keenly interested in Antiquity and
scholarship, built up a library that was the
envy of humanists the length and breadth
of Europe. Plates in the volume show
flyleaves from two of the several hundred
still extant codices, many of which are
embellished with lavish miniatures. The
title page of the so called Philostratus
Codex has the greatest wealth of
decorative elements, in the all'antica
style: medals, cameos, a firework of
architectonic elements, mythological
scenes and a triumphal procession. A portrait of Matthias can be seen among
the cameo-like golden coins of Roman
emperors in the frame on the left-hand
sheet. The miniaturist placed the title in
the form of a golden panel with carved
roman-type letters. The reproduction
from the Ptolemaios Codex is a map, the
first known depiction of Hungary and its
surroundings. Based on the system of
Ptolemy, widespread at that time, it was
drafted in line with the new methods of
the age, with north at the top and latitude
and longitude indicated.
[...]
This is an illustrated history book with
illustrations assembled along descriptive,
sometimes just documentary, lines as
is the case with the etching entitled
"Bringing the Holy Crown of Hungary
Home from Vienna to Buda." The event on
21 February 1790, represented somewhat
naively on the etching, was a triumph
which did give a major push to national
consciousness. (The absolutist Habsburg
ruler Joseph II ordered the royal insignia
to be placed in the Treasury in Vienna in
1784.) The spectacle we see is interesting
rather than beautiful, but in most of
the pictures, the two aims coincide. The illustrations add value, and in particular
the increasing number of photographs
over the most recent decades. The
survey is not without occasional gaps, but
sometimes those absences in themselves
are revealing. This can happen when a
suitable work has not been found or when
it was destroyed "in the course of the
bloodstained centuries of our history."
In short, the book is a rich selection
for anyone with an interest in Hungarian
history, both for those who already have
some knowledge and those just becoming
acquainted with it. 
János Végh
is Professor of Art History at the Academy of Applied Arts, Budapest. His books include
Fifteenth-Century German and Bohemian Panel Paintings in Hungarian Museums
(1967), Sixteenth-Century German Paintings in Hungarian Museums (1972), Early
Netherlands Paintings (1977), all from Corvina Press, Budapest, and also in English.
