István András Kiss spent many years playing for the Kolozsvár (Cluj) team CFR; he even won the national youth league with their youth team in 1985. In this interview he speaks about what it was like to be an ethnic Hungarian football player in Communist Romania, where ‘class warfare and chauvinism could easily co-exist’.
It has been 174 years since Major Pál Vasvári and his Rákóczi Free Army were massacred near Havasnagyfalu (today Mărișel in Romania), on 6 July 1849. Despite all resistance forces, the memory of the young revolutionary and his fellow martyrs is a powerful cohesive force for the dwindling Hungarian community of the Kalotaszeg (Țara Călatei) region to this day.
Commemorating the canonisation of King Ladislas creates an opportunity to delve into the fascinating world of medieval art in Transylvania, with a particular focus on the narrative cycle depicting the legend of Saint Ladislas, an iconic figure in Hungarian history.
According to poet and politician József Bajza, the Teleki House was a true bastion of the Hungarian language, which was in danger of erosion at the time. For his political activities, his role in improving public education, and his efforts in advancing Hungarian culture, Sámuel Teleki should be regarded as one of the greatest Hungarian figures in 18th–19th century Transylvania.
Deputy State Secretary Péter Szilágyi reminded that the government-sponsored Mentor Programme aiming to train and organise ethnic Hungarian entrepreneurs, has been implemented in the Carpathian Basin since 2019, with the additional benefit that a relationship of trust has been established between mentors and mentees everywhere.
From the time of the regime change to the present day, the solid community of Hungarians living in Romania has regularly requested, and is requesting, unfortunately so far without success, the right to autonomy, which should normally be enjoyed by all communities that claim it within the European Union.
‘Hungarian Jews were generally known for their assimilated and law-abiding nature. By and large, they saw themselves as loyal Hungarian citizens and followed the law of the land to the letter. This was part of a well-rehearsed strategy on the part of their leaders. Between the emancipation of Hungarian Jewry and its nearly complete annihilation, Hungarian Jewish leaders experienced various levels of antisemitism. For most of their history, they could and did turn to the state authorities to ease their suffering. This strategy, useful during the previous decades, turned self-destructive in 1944–45.’
‘The importance of the Orthodox rite of St Catherine’s Monastery at the foot of the 2,300-metre Mount Sinai (Jebel Musa, also known as Horeb) in the Sinai Peninsula grew only after the loss of Jerusalem in 1187 and the fall of the Latin states in the Holy Land in 1291…It is the oldest monastery in the world to have survived in this way, where, among other things, the oldest 4th-century Greek-language manuscript of the Bible, the Codex Siniaticus, has also been preserved.’
‘We’ve been approached much more often by local American organizations to present Hungarian culture to various schools or other groups as part of a larger, multicultural performance. These collaborations have been so invigorating for our whole team that we’ve come to the conclusion that this could be the path for us. This was one of our missions in the first place: to open up to others.’
In October 1951, Zoltán Vasvári, a.k.a. ‘Zolibá’, a former Hungarian military officer, gathered the sons of many Hungarian families in his New York apartment to introduce them to Hungarian scouting. Viktor Fischer joined the first patrol in the spring of 1952, and, as he puts it, ‘the scout bug has remained’ in him ever since. A conversation about a long and fruitful life, dedicated to teaching and to the Hungarian American community of the New York area.
Hungarian Conservative is a quarterly magazine on contemporary political, philosophical and cultural issues from a conservative perspective.