Hello !

As I was saying in my last article, I want to talk to you about the Hungarian History because I get really interested about it.

So, I tried to know more of it by visiting some museums about History : I’ve went to the “House of Terror” which is a museum about how the Hungarians lived during two terror regimes, and a museum about the first World War. I also make some web researches about it. To make it more simple I’ve made a chronological approach of it :

Around 895 – Hungarians were nomads called “Magyars” (they still call them like this) and they were living near the Ural Mountains. Under the leadership of “Árpád”, the Hungarians took over the land around.

1000 – King Stephen I (St. Stephen) founded the state of Hungary.

1241-1242 – Invasion of the Mongols, the Hungarians fought back and they finally won.

1526 – A Turkish conquering army defeat the Hungarian royal army at Mohács.

1541 – The country get split in three parts : the Hungarian Kingdom, the Habsburg dominion and the Turkish dominion.

It took 150 years before the Hungarians could reunite and drive out the Turks :

1711 – Under the leadership of Ferenc Rákóczi II. Hungarians partly took back their independence, and signed the treaty of peace at Szatmár, they were still under the Habsburg dominion.

1848 – There were independence revolutions in Europe, as well as in Hungary.

1867 – A Hungarian delegation, led by Ferenc Deák finally came to an agreement with the Habsburgs => the Austrian-Hungarian Monarchy was born.

In World War I Hungary was ally to Germany and Austria and had to send hundreds of thousands of troops to die for foreign interests.

1918 – The country became the Republic of Hungary. After losing the war, the allied Atlantic countries overran Hungary and in accordance with the Treaty of Trianon, split up the country.

World War II brought more tribulations to the people of Hungary. They were fighting with the Germans against the Soviets. The Hungarian government tried to change sides to the allied Atlantic countries but the Germans then overran Hungary with tanks near the end of the war and deposed the government to their nationalist allies. Hundreds of thousands died during the war or were deported to German concentration camps.

After the Germans were beaten by the Allies, Soviets took over the country, drove out the Germans, and stayed for 44 years.

1956 – The people tried to force the leadership to stop this domination, and dictatorship by the soviets, but the attempt was unsuccessful.

1989 – Hungary finally became an independent democracy.

1999 – Hungary joined North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO).

2004 – Hungary became a member of the European Union.

So, it was a little resume of the Hungarian History and there is much more to discover. But what I will remember of it is that this country has stayed a long time under someone elses domination and his people have never stopped fighting back from its oppressors.

This article wasn’t really about my Erasmus program in Budapest, but it was important to me to talk about this subject and I think that it is a big step into a new culture to know more about its history.

That was all for today, thank you for reading, and see you next time.