A press conference was dedicated to the church of Magyarvista (Viștea, Romania) at the László Teleki Foundation, to announce the result of recent investigations inside the medieval church of the village. The following overview is written on the basis of the press release. The Calvinist church of Magyarvista in Cluj County is one of the most famous medieval monuments in Transylvania and the area of Kalotaszeg. The stone-built, single-nave, square-apsed building with a Romanesque western doorway was probably built at the end of the 13th century. The first documentary mention of the village ..read more

The year 2022 marks the 800th anniversary of the issuance of the Golden Bull by King Andrew II.  Issued at the 1222 Diet held at Fehérvár, the Golden Bull is one of the cornerstones of the medieval Hungarian constitutional system and its anniversary created a perfect opportunity to organize a major exhibition dedicated to Hungary's first ruling house, the Árpád Dynasty. Such an exhibition has been planned for at least a decade and curators at the Hungarian National Museum have prepared a proposal for a major exhibition with international loans. In 2017 government support came, along with ..read more

The restoration of the medieval church of Sóly was finally completed after two decades of research and renovation. The village of Sóly is located near Veszprém and its church was first mentioned in 1009, in the foundation charter of the bishopric of Veszprém, issued by King Saint Stephen. There is a theory that Sóly is the location where the young Stephen defeated Koppány in 997, three years before his coronation. The present church, however, dates from the 13th century and was dedicated to St. Stephen Protomartyr. Archeological research identified the traces of an earlier, wooden church unde ..read more

From the 11th to the 31st of March, an exhibition presents the medieval manuscripts of the Cathedral Libray of Esztergom. Titled "For They Watch for Your Souls..." - Codices in the Cathedral Library of Esztergom, the exhibition is on view in the newly restored exhibition rooms of the Bibliotheca. The Cathedral Library of Esztergom preserves forty-five medieval manuscript books, which are displayed together for the first time now, in March 2022. The exhibition honors the archbishops and canons of Esztergom as well as the donators and previous owners of the manuscripts, by whose generosity th ..read more

László Beke (1944-2022) On January 31, 2022, art historian László Beke passed away in Budapest. He was 78 years old. He was one of the most well-known figures of Hungarian art history in recent decades and he was primarily known for his research of 20th-century art. As chief curator of the Modern Department at the Hungarian National Gallery (1988-1995) and as director of the Műcsarnok (Kunsthalle, 1995-2000), he was instrumental in making Hungarian conceptual art and neo-avantgarde known to the wider public. From the beginning of his career in 1968, Beke was actually a key figure in t ..read more

Charter of King Béla IV, 1256 On August 2, 2021, it was announced at a press conference that the collection of the Hungarian National Archives had been enriched with 520 original charters, which the Hungarian state had purchased from the Batthyány family for a price of 5,6 million EUR. This collection consists of the most important documents in the Batthyány family archives originally held at Körmend. Members of the family took these charters with them in 1945 and preserved them in Austria until now. The remainder of the archives was badly damaged when the Soviet army plundered the ..read more

Ernő Marosi in 2017 Ernő Marosi (1940–2021), professor emeritus of the Institute of Art History of ELTE and a full member of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences, died on July 9, 2021, at the age of 81. With his death, we lost one of the most important Hungarian art historians of our time. His impact as a researcher and author of groundbreaking books as well as a teacher for almost six decades is immeasurable. A simple listing of his professional positions does not do justice to his career. He started teaching at the Department of Art History at ELTE in 1963, immediately after gradua ..read more

In the middle of June 2021, two exhibitions opened at the Hungarian National Museum in Budapest, each dedicated to the history of a monastic order. The first exhibition is dedicated to the 900 anniversary of the foundation of the Premonstratensian (Norbertine) order. The members of the order have been present in Hungary almost since its foundation. In the last centuries, the Premontreians were also participants and shapers of Hungarian society, religious life, art and science. On the occasion of the anniversary, the Hungarian Norbertine Order  and the Hungarian National Museum p ..read more

Detail of one of the reliquary plaques It is well-known that the majority of the medieval monuments of the Hungarian Great Plains had been destroyed, primarily during the Ottoman Period. However, the territory had already suffered a major trauma before that: the Mongol invasion of 1241. Already at that time, entire settlements were destroyed and many of these locations were never rebuilt in later centuries. One such place was the medieval town of Péteri. The town was located near present-day Bugac, just south of Kecskemét, on the Kiskunság plains between the Danube at Tisza rivers. It ..read more

After many decades of restoration, the High Altar of Kisszeben (Sabinov, Slovakia) has been assembled in the Hungarian National Gallery. The restoration of one of the largest and most ornate winged altars from the medieval period of the Kingdom of Hungary began in 1954 and was completed in the summer of 2020. The high altar was put on view from 24 September at the Gallery’s exhibition titled Late Gothic Winged Altarpieces (it is currently not on view due to the national lockdown). I wrote on this altarpiece several years ago, when it was first put on display at the National Gallery, at  ..read more