Hungary

Around 895-896 a confederation of Magyar tribes, led westward from the steppe by the chieftain Árpád, crossed the north-eastern passes of the Carpathians and took possession of the Carpathian Basin in the event Hungarians remember as the Honfoglalás, the 'land-taking'. Árpád, chosen to lead the seven tribes, gave his name to the dynasty that would rule Hungary until 1301; under it the nation was transformed from a confederation of tribes into a powerful state of east-central Europe. For half a century the Magyars raided deep into western Europe, until their defeat by the German king Otto I at the Lechfeld in 955 turned them toward settlement and statehood.

The decisive turn came at the close of the tenth century. Árpád's descendant Géza opened relations with the Latin West and began the Christianisation of his people; in 996 Benedictine monks were settled at Pannonhalma, founding the first Christian monastery in Hungary, a house that would convert the Magyars, found the country's first school and, in 1055, produce the first surviving document written in Hungarian. Géza's son Stephen completed the work. Crowned the first king of Hungary around 1000-1001, traditionally with a crown sent by Pope Sylvester II, Stephen organised the kingdom on German models, founded bishoprics and abbeys, made church-building and tithing obligatory, and secured Hungary's place among the Christian princes of Europe. He was later canonised as Saint Stephen, and the Holy Crown that bears his name became the sacred symbol of Hungarian statehood.

The kingdom Stephen founded grew into a major medieval power under the Árpád kings, reaching the peak of its authority under Béla III in the later twelfth century. That ascent was nearly ended by catastrophe. In 1241 the Mongols under Batu Khan and the general Subutai swept into Hungary and destroyed the army of King Béla IV at the Battle of Mohi on the Sajó River; the king fled to the Adriatic coast and for a year, in effect, the kingdom of Hungary ceased to exist. The Mongols withdrew in 1242 only because the death of the Great Khan recalled their leaders eastward, and Béla returned to rebuild a devastated realm, fortifying his towns in stone against any future invasion.

Turning points

1. c. 895–896Peoples & Migration

   The Magyar conquest (Honfoglalás)

   Seven Magyar tribes under the chieftain Árpád crossed the Carpathians and seized the Carpathian Basin, founding the Árpád dynasty and the settlement that gave rise to the Hungarian state.

   ↗See the data

   [1] [2]

2. 996Religion

   Pannonhalma Abbey founded

   Benedictine monks settled at Pannonhalma, founding Hungary's first Christian monastery; it would help convert the Magyars, found the country's first school and, in 1055, produce the first document written in Hungarian.

   [4]

3. c. 1000–1001Formation

   Coronation of Stephen I

   Stephen, of the Árpád line, was crowned the first king of Hungary, traditionally with a crown from Pope Sylvester II, founding a Christian kingdom organised on Western models. He was later canonised as Saint Stephen.

   [3] [5]

4. 11 Apr 1241War & Rupture

   Mongol invasion and the Battle of Mohi

   The Mongols under Batu Khan destroyed King Béla IV's army at the Sajó River and ravaged Hungary for a year, leaving much of the kingdom in ruins before withdrawing in 1242.

   ↗See the data

   [6] [7]

Figures of the era

When the Árpád line died out in 1301, the crown passed to foreign dynasties, among them the Angevins and, in the fifteenth century, Matthias Corvinus, under whose Renaissance court Hungary flourished as one of the leading powers of central Europe. But beyond the southern frontier the Ottoman Empire was advancing, and the kingdom's strength was sapped by noble factionalism and a great peasant revolt in 1514. The reckoning came on 29 August 1526 at the Battle of Mohács, where Sultan Süleyman the Magnificent annihilated the army of the young King Louis II. Louis himself died in flight, and with him the medieval Hungarian kingdom effectively ended.

Mohács opened Hungary to a century and a half of division. The country fractured into three parts: a 'Royal Hungary' in the north and west under the Habsburgs, who claimed the crown; a central 'Ottoman Hungary' ruled directly from Buda, which the Turks took in 1541; and an autonomous Principality of Transylvania in the east, a vassal of the sultan that nonetheless preserved a measure of Hungarian self-government and, in the Edict of Torda of 1568, an unusual degree of religious toleration. For ordinary Hungarians the era meant near-constant frontier warfare, depopulation and the burden of a divided homeland.

The tide turned only late in the seventeenth century. After the failed Ottoman siege of Vienna in 1683, a Habsburg-led Christian coalition pushed the Turks back across Hungary, retaking Buda in 1686. The reconquest was confirmed by the Treaty of Karlowitz in 1699, by which the Ottomans ceded almost all of Hungary to the Habsburgs. Liberation from the Turks, however, meant subjection to Vienna: Hungary was reunited, but as a kingdom firmly within the Habsburg monarchy rather than as an independent state.

Turning points

1. 1456War & Rupture

   Siege of Belgrade

   Hungarian forces under John Hunyadi broke an Ottoman siege of Belgrade, checking the Turkish advance into central Europe for decades and becoming a celebrated victory of the medieval kingdom.

   ↗See the data

   [8]

2. 29 Aug 1526War & Rupture

   Battle of Mohács

   Süleyman the Magnificent destroyed the Hungarian army and killed King Louis II, ending the medieval kingdom and opening Hungary to Ottoman and Habsburg domination.

   ↗See the data

   [8]

3. 1541Politics & Power

   Ottoman capture of Buda and the three-part division

   The Ottomans seized Buda and Hungary fractured into Royal Hungary under the Habsburgs, Ottoman Hungary ruled from Buda, and the autonomous Principality of Transylvania.

   [8]

4. 1686War & Rupture

   Reconquest of Buda

   A Habsburg-led Christian coalition retook Buda from the Ottomans, part of the campaign that drove the Turks from Hungary after more than a century.

   ↗See the data

   [8]

5. 1699Politics & Power

   Treaty of Karlowitz

   The Ottomans ceded almost all of Hungary to the Habsburgs, reuniting the country but binding it firmly within the Habsburg monarchy.

   [8]

Figures of the era

Eighteenth-century Hungary was a kingdom of the Habsburg monarchy, repopulated after the Turkish wars and ruled from Vienna, though the Hungarian nobility clung jealously to their ancient liberties. The early nineteenth century brought a vigorous national 'Reform Era', led by figures such as Count István Széchenyi and the radical Lajos Kossuth, who pressed for the modernisation of the economy, the spread of the Hungarian language and the loosening of Habsburg control. These currents converged in the European revolutions of 1848.

On 15 March 1848, inspired by revolution in Paris and Vienna and led by intellectuals including the poet Sándor Petőfi, a bloodless rising in Pest won sweeping reforms: the abolition of censorship and serfdom, general taxation and a responsible Hungarian government embodied in the March Laws. When Vienna moved to reverse these gains, the conflict turned to war. In April 1849 Hungary, with Kossuth as its leader, proclaimed full independence. The revolution was crushed only when the Austrian emperor called in a Russian army; the Hungarian forces surrendered in August 1849, and a period of harsh repression followed, with executions of rebel officers and Kossuth driven into lifelong exile.

Defeat abroad eventually forced compromise. Weakened by its defeat in the war with Prussia in 1866, the Habsburg monarchy came to terms with Hungarian demands. The Austro-Hungarian Compromise of 1867, the Ausgleich, transformed the empire into the Dual Monarchy of Austria-Hungary: Emperor Francis Joseph granted Hungary full internal autonomy with its own parliament and government, while foreign affairs, defence and their financing remained common to both halves of the realm. The half-century that followed was, for Hungary, an age of rapid growth, with Budapest blossoming into a great metropolis whose banks of the Danube, Buda Castle quarter and grand Andrássy Avenue, the latter built above continental Europe's first underground railway, would later be recognised as a UNESCO World Heritage site.

Turning points

1. 15 Mar 1848Politics & Power

   The Revolution of 1848

   A bloodless rising in Pest, with Sándor Petőfi among its voices, won the March Laws abolishing censorship and serfdom and establishing a responsible Hungarian government against Habsburg absolutism.

   [9]

2. Aug 1849War & Rupture

   Defeat of the war of independence

   After Hungary proclaimed independence under Kossuth, the revolution was crushed by a combined Austrian and Russian army; the surrender brought executions and Kossuth's exile.

   ↗See the data

   [9]

3. 1867Politics & Power

   Austro-Hungarian Compromise (Ausgleich)

   The Ausgleich transformed the empire into the Dual Monarchy, granting Hungary full internal autonomy with its own parliament while keeping defence and foreign affairs common to Austria-Hungary.

   [10] [11]

4. 1873Culture & Ideas

   The founding of Budapest

   Buda, Óbuda and Pest were unified into a single capital that grew into one of Europe's great cities; its historic core along the Danube is today a UNESCO World Heritage site.

   [12]

Figures of the era

Hungary entered the First World War as a partner in Austria-Hungary, and shared in the empire's collapse in 1918. As the monarchy disintegrated, a short-lived democratic republic gave way in 1919 to a communist regime under Béla Kun and then, after its overthrow, to the conservative-nationalist order of Regent Miklós Horthy, who ruled a 'kingdom without a king' from 1920. The new Hungary's borders were dictated by the victorious Allies.

On 4 June 1920, in the Trianon Palace at Versailles, Hungary signed the treaty that became the defining trauma of its modern history. By the Treaty of Trianon, Hungary was shorn of about two-thirds of its former territory and roughly two-thirds of its inhabitants. Transylvania passed to Romania; Slovakia and Ruthenia to the new Czechoslovakia; Croatia and the Vojvodina to the new Yugoslav state; and lesser districts to Austria, Poland and Italy. Around three million ethnic Hungarians were left living as minorities outside the borders of the truncated state, and the army was capped at 35,000 men.

The sense of mutilation defined interwar Hungary. Revision of Trianon became the central national cause, the slogan 'Nem, nem, soha' ('No, no, never') a popular refrain. The pursuit of the lost lands drew Hungary toward the revisionist powers, Italy and Nazi Germany, which rewarded it with the Vienna Awards of 1938 and 1940, restoring parts of Slovakia and northern Transylvania. These gains, made in Hitler's shadow, bound Hungary ever more tightly to Germany and set the country on the road to the Second World War.

Turning points

1. 1918Politics & Power

   Collapse of Austria-Hungary

   Defeat in the First World War destroyed the Dual Monarchy; amid revolution Hungary passed through a democratic republic and a brief communist regime before the conservative order of Regent Horthy.

   [13] [11]

2. 4 Jun 1920Politics & Power

   The Treaty of Trianon

   Hungary lost about two-thirds of its territory and population, leaving roughly three million ethnic Hungarians outside the new borders in Romania, Czechoslovakia, Yugoslavia and elsewhere; the trauma shaped Hungarian politics for a century.

   [13]

3. 2 Nov 1938Politics & Power

   First Vienna Award

   Nazi Germany and Fascist Italy awarded Hungary parts of southern Slovakia from Czechoslovakia, the first of the revisionist gains that drew Hungary toward the Axis.

   [13]

4. 30 Aug 1940Politics & Power

   Second Vienna Award

   Germany and Italy awarded Hungary northern Transylvania from Romania, deepening Hungary's dependence on the Axis powers in its quest to reverse Trianon.

   [13]

Figures of the era

Hungary entered the Second World War as an ally of Nazi Germany, joining the invasion of the Soviet Union in 1941 in the hope of securing the territories restored by the Vienna Awards. As the war turned against the Axis, the regent Horthy sought secretly to extract Hungary from the alliance. Germany pre-empted him: on 19 March 1944 German forces occupied Hungary and installed a compliant government, even as the country still held the largest surviving Jewish community in Europe, some 760,000 to 780,000 people.

What followed was among the swiftest and most concentrated episodes of the Holocaust. Between 15 May and 9 July 1944, with Hungarian gendarmes and officials carrying out the round-ups under German direction, approximately 437,000 Jews were deported from Hungary on 147 trains, the great majority to Auschwitz-Birkenau, where roughly three-quarters were murdered in the gas chambers on arrival. On 7 July 1944 Horthy ordered the deportations halted, but the killing resumed under the fascist Arrow Cross regime installed by Germany in October 1944, which murdered thousands more Jews in Budapest. In all, around half a million Hungarian Jews perished.

The war devastated Hungary itself. The country became a battlefield as the Red Army advanced; the siege of Budapest over the winter of 1944-45 reduced much of the historic city to rubble, with both Buda Castle and the bridges across the Danube destroyed. By the spring of 1945 the German and Hungarian forces had been driven out, the territorial gains of the Vienna Awards lost again, and Hungary lay open to occupation by the Soviet Union.

Turning points

1. 1941War & Rupture

   Hungary enters the war as an Axis ally

   Seeking to keep and extend the lands restored by the Vienna Awards, Hungary joined Germany's war and took part in the invasion of the Soviet Union.

   ↗See the data

   [14]

2. 19 Mar 1944War & Rupture

   German occupation of Hungary

   German forces occupied Hungary to keep it in the war and to deport its Jews, then the largest surviving Jewish community in Europe, numbering some 760,000 to 780,000 people.

   ↗See the data

   [14]

3. May–Jul 1944Catastrophe

   Deportation of the Hungarian Jews

   Between 15 May and 9 July 1944 about 437,000 Jews were deported, mostly to Auschwitz-Birkenau, where some three-quarters were murdered on arrival; Horthy halted the trains on 7 July.

   ↗See the data

   [14]

4. Oct 1944Politics & Power

   The Arrow Cross seizure of power

   After Horthy's attempt to leave the war, Germany installed the fascist Arrow Cross, which murdered thousands more Jews in Budapest before the Soviet conquest of the city.

   [14]

5. Feb 1945War & Rupture

   The siege of Budapest

   The months-long battle for the capital between German-Hungarian and Soviet forces destroyed much of historic Budapest, including the castle and the Danube bridges, as the Red Army completed its conquest of Hungary.

   ↗See the data

   [12] [14]

Figures of the era

Liberation from Germany brought subjection to the Soviet Union. By 1949 the communists, backed by Moscow, had seized total power and proclaimed the Hungarian People's Republic, a one-party state under the Stalinist Mátyás Rákosi marked by terror, show trials and forced collectivisation. Discontent erupted in October 1956. Beginning with a student demonstration in Budapest on 23 October, a nationwide revolution swept the country; the reform communist Imre Nagy became premier, formed a multi-party government and declared Hungary's withdrawal from the Warsaw Pact. The Soviet response was overwhelming: at dawn on 4 November 1956 the Red Army attacked, crushing the rising within days. Some 2,500 Hungarians were killed, around 200,000 fled abroad as refugees, and Nagy was seized and, two years later, executed.

Soviet power was restored under János Kádár, installed in 1956, who ruled until 1988. After an initial wave of reprisals, Kádár softened the regime under the maxim 'he who is not against us is with us'. His New Economic Mechanism of 1968 admitted limited market forces and private enterprise, producing a relative prosperity and personal latitude unusual in the Soviet bloc, the system nicknamed 'goulash communism'. Hungary remained a one-party state loyal to Moscow, but daily life was freer and more comfortable than elsewhere behind the Iron Curtain.

In 1989 Hungary helped bring the whole communist order down. On 19 August 1989, at the Pan-European Picnic on the Austro-Hungarian border near Sopron, a symbolic gate was opened and some 700 East Germans fled west; weeks later Hungary opened its border fully, breaching the Iron Curtain and setting off the chain reaction that toppled the Berlin Wall. On 23 October 1989, the anniversary of the 1956 rising, Hungary proclaimed itself a free republic. The country built a democracy and a market economy, joined NATO on 12 March 1999 and acceded to the European Union on 1 May 2004 in its largest-ever enlargement, completing Hungary's return to the West. The fate of the roughly three million ethnic Hungarians left beyond the borders by Trianon, in Romania, Slovakia, Serbia and Ukraine, has remained a defining theme of the country's relations with its neighbours.

Turning points

1. 1949Politics & Power

   The Hungarian People's Republic

   Backed by the Soviet Union, the communists seized total power and proclaimed a one-party People's Republic, imposing Stalinist terror, show trials and forced collectivisation under Mátyás Rákosi.

   [16] [15]

2. 23 Oct – 4 Nov 1956War & Rupture

   The Hungarian Revolution of 1956

   A nationwide rising under premier Imre Nagy declared Hungary's withdrawal from the Warsaw Pact; the Soviet army crushed it on 4 November, killing some 2,500 Hungarians and driving about 200,000 into exile.

   ↗See the data

   [15]

3. 1968Economy & Trade

   'Goulash communism' and the New Economic Mechanism

   János Kádár's reforms admitted limited market forces and private enterprise, giving Hungarians a relative prosperity and freedom unusual in the Soviet bloc.

   ↗See the data

   [16]

4. 19 Aug 1989Independence

   The Pan-European Picnic and the opening of the border

   A border gate opened near Sopron let some 700 East Germans flee west; Hungary's subsequent full opening of its frontier breached the Iron Curtain and helped bring down the Berlin Wall.

   ↗See the data

   [17]

5. 23 Oct 1989Independence

   Proclamation of the republic

   On the anniversary of the 1956 rising Hungary proclaimed itself a free republic, ending four decades of communist rule and beginning its transition to democracy.

   ↗See the data

   [16] [15]

6. 1 May 2004Politics & Power

   Accession to NATO and the European Union

   Having joined NATO on 12 March 1999, Hungary acceded to the European Union on 1 May 2004 in the bloc's largest single enlargement, completing its return to the West.

   [18] [19]

Figures of the era