February 2005: Hungary & Slovakia |  print |
Varkastely Melczer Keked
The Tisza valley, long, flat and broad, lies snowbound; buzzards perch nonchalantly on the posts of the deer-fences that guard the road to Miskolc. The afternoon merges into a murky evening, snowflakes pitter-patter down out of the enveloping fog. I drive through villages apparently deserted until one knows the secret of what lies behind the slatted blinds through which no chink of light escapes. The only tell-tale sign of human life in the darkening gloom are the wisps of smoke lazily escaping from the chimneys.
The varkastely is tucked away in a little valley on the western edge of the Zempleni mountains in a village of maybe three hundred souls. Originally the seat of the Kekedi family, the Kastely opened its doors in 1613, a date still commemorated in a crudely carved lintel adorning the wall of the entrance hall. After many alterations, Keked still remains a superb example of a fortified manor house, with two rounded bastions on its northern corners and two square bastions to the south. The moat, unlike the wasser kastiles of Westphalia, has long since been filled in.
My welcome is ecstatic: "Well, hello, we have bowling club, swimming pool, sauna, solarium, "exudes the receptionist, with a lavish sweep of his arm. Then, a lady called Maria appears from behind a pillar in the hall, clutching a menu. She has been imported from Miskolc for the duration of my stay and volunteers: "I learn English, very bad, near town of New York." She is enchanting and stands over me like a guardian angel throughout my stay. During dinner that night, she props herself up against a column in the cellar and solicitously asks me if the food is "OK", the wine "good" and what would I like for breakfast.
Janos, the chef/manager of this erstwhile gourmet hotel, is equally concerned about my gastronomic welfare and, dressed in his chef's finery, stands over me as I sample the first spoonful/forkful of the smoked salmon starter, veal with noodles entree and then the cheese board, while sipping first on an Eger white, then an Eger merlot.
The Balazs Kekedis died in 1658 and his daughter Katakin, who was married to Janos Melczer, a wealthy merchant from Eperjes, inherited the varkastely. But it was not for long because at the end of the 17th century "the mansion was badly damaged again by fire" and I suspect it was caught up in the Rakoczi uprising. It was not until 1757 that repairs were effected.
An expedition to Kosice or Kassa ("Khosho"). Scene of fierce fighting throughout the uprisings, the old fortified town is completely obscured by forests of tower blocks. But once these 20th century defences have been penetrated, the mighty towers of the Cathedral of St Elizabeth reveal themselves, marking the centre of Kuruc resistance, even if the fortifications have been systematically dismantled.. Coloured frontages of mainly 18th century houses, some grand like the 19th century State Theatre, most modest, some stuccoed, others ornamented with emblems, line the main street, Hlavna, like brightly uniformed soldiers.
There is a Mass in progress and I cannot gain entry to the crypt where the remains of Ferenc Rakoczi II, his mother Ilona Zrinyi- and son, Gyorgy, are laid to rest. The Rakoczi Museum, despite a raft of reassuring emails from the curator about 'opening times', is shut and so I join the Sunday throng of fur-stitched hats, muffs and coats that waddles on parade up and down Hlavna avenue, almost as if nothing had changed from the gracious days of 1914. Coffee in a cafe reaffirms the enduring influence of Vienna; the young angry nationalists have given way to the solid burgers who preceded them and who it seems will always replace them.
Borsa, fifty miles east of Kosice, is where Ferenc Rakoczi was born. Once a typical North European stone 'wasser kastel', built post the Mongol invasion of 1242 by Bela IV, the house is situated on the banks of the River Bodrog and as such defies my theory of the necessity to build noble houses on the top of impregnable crags. The moat has long gone though its indentations remain and the house would have too unless rescued by the Hungarian government. The two-storied facade now boasts a brand new red tiled roof and on the inner courtyard a great deal of restoration or should I say rebuilding is taking place. I suspect that the restorers have a conference centre in mind.
A large bust of Ferenc Rakoczi II surmounts a plinth, almost guarding the entrance to this 17th century Renaissance manor house, each glassless window decked with a ribbon of the Hungarian national colours. The melting snow has generated weeping puddles of mud, which squelch and slurp underfoot as I traipse around the deserted rooms and outhouses. Surrounded by small, grey-faced modern houses with an unusually high quota of bad-tempered, snarling dogs, Borsa raises poignant questions why did Ferenc bring Ilona here for the birth of Ferenc II? Did they wish to escape from his mother at Sarospatak or was there plague? Or was it a more mundane reason like the builders were refurbishing Sarospatak? It may simply be that after his huge fine of 400,000 crowns, Rakoczi had to curtail his grand lifestyle and live modestly in this unassuming manor house.
Border post at Zapony
The car rental company had made it quiet clear: under no circumstances was I to take their vehicle into the Ukraine. So leaving it in a car park supervised by a man in black overalls sporting a large Yellow Cobra Security badge, I walked towards the border station. Three heavily armed but fortunately genial border policemen stopped me and informed me that it was not possible to cross on foot. When I explained about my car, they exclaimed in chorus "No problem!", opened the door of a 20 year old Mercedes in the queue of cars and propelled me into the back seat. This is how I met Vitali.
Fortunately Vitali had a smattering of English gleaned from American TV shows and as we sat idly for the next two hours, suspended above the frozen Tisza River, about 200 yards wide at this point, we chatted about life in general and what a glorious sunny day it was. I was quietly worrying about how I would get back into Hungary without a similar introduction, when Vitali announced: "Now, Ukraine!", pointing to a red stripe on the side of the bridge. The symbolism of this stripe seemed to have a strange effect on the queue as irate Ukrainians heading north defiantly set off into the oncoming traffic only to meet head-on with a southbound car. Horns tooted and blared, engines revved and died and we entered the third hour.
Vitali had just finished explaining to me the intricacies of East-West trade, in his case smuggling of cigarettes and petrol, when a posse of female Passport Control officers descended on us. I wondered what contraband he had on board, then reassured myself that this must be 'the empty leg' for what could one buy cheap in Hungary and sell expensively in the Ukraine. As it happened, the ladies were far more interested in my British passport than what lay under Vitali's back seat and fussed over me as I filled in the Immigration forms. Rarely I have come across such an attentive and charming service! As we entered the Ukraine, Vitali announced that eh would be able to take me to Mukachevo but first we had to go to Uzgorod where he needed to drop off fourteen cartons of American cigarettes which were secreted in the boot.
Racing at high speed on the Kiev road Vitali had two more 'border' trips to make that day we followed the foothills of the Carpathian Mountains which formed a long, white shoulder pointing East until we reached the centre of Mukachevo, where I alighted at the Star Hotel after settling up with a delighted Vitali. We both agreed that the profit margins in ferrying tourists to and from the border were infinitely more attractive and less risky than smuggling cigarettes and furthermore the 'goods' could not be confiscated!
I had arranged to rendez-vous outside the Star with Otokar, an English-speaking Ukrainian friend of Zdena, my daughter's Czech au pair. I dialled his mobile number.
"Hello, Otokar? It's Alan."
A voice exclaiming "Yes, hello, this is Otokar" boomed in my ear and, ending the call, I turned round and introduced myself to the tall fair-haired young man I had noticed standing next door to me! We retired for coffee to Anna Maria's Cafe, a respectable meeting place for town worthies during the week and a hedonistic disco for crazed youth at the weekends. It turned out that Otokar was not an ethnic Ukrainian but an exotic Eastern European mix.
"My mother's father was Russian, her mother German from Berlin. My father's father Hungarian and his mother Polish. Me, I am born in Budapest, then studied economics at Uzhgorod and, you know, Ukraine is good for business." He explained that although currently working in tourism with his father, his ambition was to study for a Master's Degree and then work in a bank in Kiev. I am confident that anyone, like Otokar, who can learn passable English from a 1991 edition of Microsoft Windows will go a long way.
The taxi ride to the castle took us through the centre of Mukachevo, a typical 18th and 19th century Austrian-Hungarian town with its streets of pale coloured neo-classical facades. I had been expecting to be a little disappointed by the location of the castle which lies to the west of the town for I suspected that the engravers of the 18th century had over-exaggerated the height of the hill on which it is built. Far from it, for out of nowhere, a huge mound materialises on top of which sits a castle with three courts, surrounded by curtain walls and bastions. It is even more dramatic than its depictions.
After cordial greetings with Vasyl Chihak, the Museum Director, I am passed on to Mrs Zita Karpova, and we set off round the precincts. I ask her about Ilona Zrinyi at Mukachevo.
"Mukachevo came with Rakoczi family when Gyorgy bought it in 1635 for 200,000 forints." She paused, and then added: "A lot of money".
Ilona, she continued, had first come here with Ferenc Rakoczi I and then after his death, returned here as a widow. She inserted that Ilona did not like her mother-in-law and the feeling was reciprocated as a precursor to telling me that Ilona had met Thokoly at Munkacevo. Her eyes glazed over as she recounted, almost in a whisper, that they had married in the castle and the wedding had lasted for 'one whole week.' Wistfully, she announced with a sigh, Ilona was 39 and Imre 25. The statistic that really impressed her covered the domestic help their personal staff numbered 313, exceeding the garrison by a headcount of 74! In the autumn of 1685, the Emperor laid siege to Munkacevo and it was only in January 1688 that Ilona surrendered.
Ilona's rooms are on the 2nd floor on the north side of the innermost courtyard. An entrance room leads to the young Ferenc Rakoczi's room then to Juliana's room and finally to Ilona's bedroom at the end. With its simple white painted vaulted ceiling and tiny fireplace in one corner, it is almost the cell of a nun rather than the chamber of a Princess. None of these rooms offer any protection against artillery fire and the family must have spent much of its time below ground.
"What is your opinion of Ilona? I asked Zita.
"She was very brave lady who had an interesting and very hard destiny. She was from well-known political family, very well educated and did everything for her freedom. She was very tough to last out the siege. Wonderful mother."
The Museum Director then reappeared and as a parting story told me that Sandor Petofi (Hungary's National poet) had visited here as a young man in 1847 when the castle was used by the Austrians as a prison for political dissidents. The place had a strange effect on him as he wrote in a letter to his wife, Juliska, that July:
"I had a quick lunch and rushed off to look at the castle which has been turned into a state prison God knows, my heart was so sick within those walls that I could scarcely breathe. I described my feelings in a poem. They were painful feelings. All the time I was there some spirit whispered sad things into my ear. I could not understand its words so softly did it speak; I only heard it whispering, and in such sad tones. Nor do I know who this whispering spirit was."
Otokar had arranged to drive me back to the Chop border post in his father's tourist bus and, like Vitali, he drove as if the Mongol hordes were bearing down on him in his rear view mirror. Hurtling across the snow-covered plains criss-crossed with networks of pylons, we swept through villages where I glimpsed babushkas proffering broomsticks to passing motorist, here and there a cottage gate draped with a sack of walnuts and occasionally a table laden with apples set up in front of it. The sun had airbrushed a fuzzy yellow tinge on the fields imbuing the snow with a soft internal illumination.
The return crossing started badly for no one cared to stop for Otokar as he flagged down their cars. Finally, he ushered me into the back of a beaten up Audi, bade me fond farewell and tore off back to Mukachevo. Although it was a relief to be stationary for a moment and not thinking about death on a Ukrainian country road, I began to wonder if the Audi was capable of going anywhere as I watched the dashboard twinkle with a selection of red warning lights. It appeared that Igan, the gypsy driver, was exclusively relying on the battery to get him across to Hungary for the alternator had packed up. A seasoned border crosser, such mechanical hitches did not worry him nearly as much as the note he had to slip into the back of his passport when a burly Ukrainian border guard tapped on the car window. When the passport was returned minus its pecuniary insertion, Igan rolled down the window and ill-temperedly spat as the guard wandered off down the line of traffic. As he dropped me at the Yellow Cobra car park, I thrust a twenty note at him: it was the first time I had seen him smile all evening and the array of white teeth against a nut brown face perfectly matched the sliver of moon suspended over him in the night sky.
North to Ilona's Zborov wedding
Farewell to Keked. Since I had been the only guest, the occasion warranted a full send-off led by the 'boss' who appeared wearing chef's jacket and checked trousers but minus shoes or socks. The sight of him standing bare foot in the snow reminded me of his cooking hardy and eccentric. Maria, my indefatigable interpreter, was moved to tears. No more supervision of every mouthful I ate; no more inquiring "Tasty?"; no more impromptu weather forecasts such as "I think not cold" when the temperature was struggling around Minus 10C.
Through the urban sprawl of the Kosice suburbs, the road runs due north to Presov, the former Eperjes where in 1687 General Caraffa had so brutally persecuted the Protestant population. Industrialization has all but obscured the old town until one suddenly finds oneself in the central spindle-shaped square, flanked by bright coloured houses. Despite a terrible fire in 1887 and bombing in the Second World War, many of the old buildings have survived including the former Evangelical College which sits obstinately in the middle of the road. I continued north, following a tributary of the Torysa river until Bardejov, a town which had once played a major role in the fortunes of the Rakoczis.
Originally an important trading post on the Black Sea - Baltic trade route, in 1376 Bardejov had been granted the status of a Royal Free Town by the Hungarian King and enjoyed uninterrupted prosperity until the 17th century when two nemesis befell it: Thokoly and the plague. Today the inhabitants remember Juraj Winter, a converted Catholic who was elected mayor in 1674. Four years later, he was captured by Thokoly's men and incarcerated in Transylvania until released after payment of a 800 florin ransom. By 1679, he was once more the mayor but this time perished during a siege by Thokoly that June. The next year, Thokoly set fire to Bardejov and raised most of it to the ground. Plague followed and Bardejov was never the same again.
While these tales of woe are perfectly true, the remarkable fact is that Bardejov still has one of the most perfectly preserved medieval town centres in Europe. Nowhere have I seen a better collection of Gothic triptych altars than the eleven that decorate the interior of the Church of St. Aegidius. The 16th century Renaissance Town Hall with its delicate oriel staircase stood like a dark jewel box on the snow covered square, the light prinking the lilac and tope, yellow and blue exteriors of the facing facades of merchants' houses which form the other three sides of the square. But the reason I was here lay not in the town but a few miles to the north, the site of Zborov castle where Ilona had married Ferenc Rakoczi I in 1676.
Whoever owned the castle of Zborov effectively controlled Bardejov. Built around 1250, it passed to the Seredy family in 1548, who spend a large amount of time and money rebuilding it and then the Rakoczis acquired it. Zborov was reputed to be the most extensive and 'most efficiently fortified' residence in Northern Hungary until its capture and subsequent destruction by Imperial troops in 1684. Today it is a ruin and as I stopped at the foot of the hill it crests, the leaden sky unleashed a blizzard, making it impossible to see more than a few yards ahead. Why did Ilona come all this way to marry Ferenc? The Rakoczis had many other houses nearer to Osalj. Maybe it was symbolic that Zborov was the northernmost of their possessions, marking the boundary with Poland.
Rakoczi's Polish exile
Ferenc Rakoczi II fled to Poland twice: in 1702, when he escaped from jail at Wien Neustadt, and in 1711, when he set off in a desperate attempt to find allies for his cause, never to return to Hungary. From Bardejov, the road to Poland leads east to Svidnik and then turns north to Dukla. The area round here was the scene of a titanic battle between German and Russian armies in the late autumn of 1944; tank hulks still litter the landscape like giant armoured insects. Hidden away in small valleys are dozens of memorials to the 130,000 soldiers who died here, their names now forgotten.
Beyond the Dukla Pass, the landscape changed into broad valleys, each hillock occupied by a church or neat coppice. Reed beds defiantly stuck out of the snow, attracting hungry deer to forage in dangerous daylight hours. Outside the little theatre in the town of Dukla, a well-vodka'd elderly Pole greeted me like his lost son. "Ein, Vei, trei, Arbeit macht frei" he chortled and then stiffly marched off with a cheery laugh. Further on, at Sanoc, the 13th century fortress with its imposing 17th century manor house houses an eclectic collection of art: on the first two floors, sumptuous Orthodox and Greek Catholic icons form the 15th to 17th centuries, and in the attic, a collection of intensely haunting and mysterious paintings from the 'fantasist realist' by Beksinski, the Polish artist who was found murdered in his home in Warsaw aged 84, the very day of my visit. His paintings project a nightmarish quality reminiscent of the surrealist; superficially they make an odd couple with the icons but beneath the surface, a deep and troubled spirituality binds them together.
Once I had crossed the frozen San river, which starts life in the Carpathians in the furthest south east corner of Poland, the countryside became more and more deserted, the woods and hills electrified by a vivid blue light that lay in a great streak across the horizon. Soon I was enveloped by pine forests, their unrelenting ranks punctuated occasionally by small clearings hosting tiny wooden villages. I met up again with the San as it emerged out of the forests at Krasiczyn, just west of Przemysl. Here the great 16th century castle is now the Zamkowe hotel. I am sure that Rakoczi would have visited it during his first exile in Poland. Likewise, he most surely would have been a guest at nearby Lancut, the great fortress palace of Stanislaw Lubomirski. Built between 1629 and 1642, Lancut was converted into a Baroque palace and park by Isabella Czartoryska-Lubomirski in the second half of the 18th century and what with further major alterations by the Potocki family in the 19th and 20th centuries, there is little of the original house left. Despite the insurmountable language barrier, no English guidebook material and general unhelpfulness of a platoon of po-faced Polish ladies, a visit to the interior proved scintillating magnificent furniture, passable paintings and an exquisite family theatre.
Still in search of real sighting of Rakoczi, I headed northeast to Palac Sieniawa, where his friends the Sieniawskis had once lived. The little Baroque summer palace in the park was alas later originally there was an orangery and arboretum on this site, the palace was designed and laid down by Giovanni Spazzio between 1718 and 1726. The Czartoryskis, who owned the palace from 1743 onwards, made various changes over the years which have resulted in the beautifully proportioned and symmetrical building of today with 'his wing' on the left and 'her wing' on the right.
Outside the village was one of the most grotesque architectural monstrosities I have ever seen. Imagine grafting a Teutonic Knights' castle onto a Baroque Palace. The resultant Galician hybrid should be christened "Post-modern Camelot". I asked Angelica at Palac Sieniawa about it.
"A man, he has factory which makes chairs. It is his"
"He must have a very large factory", I ventured.
"No, he make this house with friends all very rich too."
"What does the village think?"
She ducked the question, so I changed tack.
"What is Sieniawa like today?"
"One church. One disco. We all want to leave."
The hotel restaurant lay deep in the cellar of a nearby building. When I entered, ten men in dark suits were hard at it, eating, smoking, toasting and occasionally breaking into patriotic songs. To the relief of the other dinners, the air visibly cleared and the noise audibly subsided as they finally departed. Within five minutes they were back, coats hung up, hats back on pegs, sitting around the long table as if they had never left. Vodka was ordered, toasts made upstanding and then they all left again. I never did find out what it was all about! One of life's little difficulties is to study a Polish menu without a smidgeon of the language. For instance, "Poledwica wieprzowa na sposob dworski faszerowana jablkami i orzechami podawana z aromatycznym sosem sliwkowyn i ziemniakami opiekanymi" equates to "pork chop with apples and walnuts with plum sauce and potatoes". As a rule, I advise ordering the longest entry. For a digestif, the waiter suggested Sliwowica Passover. Pass Out would have been a better description!
In Rakoczi's day, Poland extended far to the east of where its present day borders lie and the main Sieniawski home was on the other side of L'vov at Berezhany, a bustling town in 17th century with four large annual fairs and sixteen smaller ones. Built for the family by Italian masters to the design of the French military engineer Beauplan in 1674, Berezhany was the greatest Renaissance castle in Eastern Poland. It was here that Rakoczi arrived after his escape from prison and here that he issued his famous Declaration in 1704. Like Lancut, the castle passed to the Potocki family in 1816 but did not manage to weather the destructive decades of the 20th century. Today it is officially described as being "in a desolate state and needs renovations." In other words, a ruin.
Looking for Thokoly
The road from Krakow to Budapest has long been a busy trade route and it is here at Oravsky Podzamok that the great Thurso castles straddles the Orava valley, at this point no more than three hundred meters wide. On the journey south from Krakow, there were no high passes to be crossed for the Tatra mountains lie someway to the East. These were the valleys along which the Hungarian cattle drovers brought their herds to the flourishing cities of the north.
I had picked up the Orava river at Trstena, where it was broad and fast enough to be free of ice as it danced south past poplar-lined banks, cormorants patrolling the skies overhead. A fox hurried by along the icy bank. The first sight of Oravsky Hrad ranks as one of the most dramatic this is not just another castle on a hilltop; it is a castle built on the edge of a razor blade, soaring into the sky. Castle and rock balance precariously, collapse seemingly minutes away. Yet this is no folly for in one form or another, a robust fortification has stood here for over 800 years.
Attaching myself to the end of a party of Slovak Tourist Board management trainees, I asked about Thokoly.
"No, this is Thurzo castle, not Thokoly."
It began to slowly dawn on me that I might be at the wrong address. There were portraits of beefy 16th century Thurzos on the walls, all manner of stuffed animals secured to the walls or floor and pretty peasant blouses displayed in glass cabinets. However there was no sign of a Thokoly or even any Mecontents memorabilia. As we ascended floor after floor, the views over the surrounding countryside became grander and the genius of the man who sited the Hrad clearer this was a medieval peage sited on the equivalent to a medieval motorway: there was no way round it and so there was no option other than to pay up.
The interiors with their wood panelling and parquet floors were surprisingly inhabitable, despite the outside temperature of -10C. If the tiled stoves had been lit and the open fires places aglow, a winter's night at the Hrad would have held few hardships. As I left, the night was closing in and with a last look at the battlements towering above me, I went in search of lodgings.
A few miles on, I found a little wooden chalet in a nearby valley, with cattle corralled in the wood outside my window and sheep penned in the meadow on the other side. With a metre and a half of snow on the ground and night time temperatures of -18C, the hardiness of these mountain animals was impressive. Just after dark, roe deer emerged out of the forest and slowly crossed the open field in search of food, each step an effort as spindly legs sank deep into the snow.
The newspaper on the bar top, Vikend, led with a story about Charles and Camilla but quickly gave way to more practical pages about pruning plum trees, tending vines and storing potatoes, each article written by a "Doc.Ing" or "Prof.Ing". It made British journalists look distinctly under-qualified. Dinner was preceded by an aperitif dispensed from a stone jar marked "Elixir"; it was a first cousin to Romanian palinka and Polish sliwowica. Seated in front of a blazing stove, I tucked into pork stroganoff with Slovakian Cabernet Sauvignon. The label on the bottle advised me I might enjoy it so much that "I would disappear into the bottle". A new born lamb is brought by the shepherd to the house in the middle of supper; as I go up to my room, I see the shadowy outlines of red deer against the snow.
Along the Vah valley
Oravsky Hrad had indeed been a case of mistaken identity. The Thokoly castle is at Likava, fifteen miles to the south. On a rocky outcrop above the village, this former fortress of Janos Hunyadi and later residence of the Pekry and Thokoly families is now a ruin like Zborov and Regec and in the deep snow it lay inaccessible to all by the most determined hill walker. I was anxious to reach the Wesselenyi castle at Strecno, the pivotal point where the Magnates Rebellion had started. Strategically sited on a bend, Hrad Strecno towers over the river Vah and dominates the roads on either side. From the west you can see it from afar but from the east it is hidden until you are almost under it and by then it is too late to turn around. I stood on the river bank, watching sheets of ice float forlornly past, and tried to imagine how Vienna saw the threat represented by the Conspirators. Did these mountain top fortresses hold any real danger for the Emperor?
Past a pretty manor house at Gbel'any, I bypassed Zilina and followed the Var valley south west, along its northern bank of the river. It lurches from the sublimely picturesque hills, woods, castles to the ugly effrontery of industrial zones depots, factories, chimneys. Along its way to the Danube, the river is dammed several times which violates the natural landscape along which Thokoly and Rakoczi once led their troops. Povazsky hrad at Povazska Bystrica is a reminder of those days; Imperial troops demolished it in 1698 as a result of Thokoly's activities in the area. A sad baroque mansion stands empty below the ruin. Further on, as the valley widens at Puchov, there are two more late 18th century baroque houses at Ledwicke Rovne (Pruske) and Orlove. They are barrack-like and forbidding.
Neither Thokoly or Rakoczi managed to capture the great medieval castle complex at Trencin. Hardly surprising since from 1663 it had been garrisoned by a 400-strong German contingent under the command of Count Ernest Leopold Suys; its owners, the Illeshazy family, were not trusted by Leopold for in the past they had rebelled against Vienna. Rakoczi besieged it in 1704 and managed to set fire to the town but that did not precipitate surrender. When the garrison finally left in 1782, their defensive record was impeccable. I was tempted to stay at the all pink Hotel Tatra in the old town but with time in hand, I decided to go on to view the infamous castle of Elizabeth Bathory at Cachtice. This was a poor decision for when I reached the village, the road up to the castle turned out to be completely impassable with snow and ice. An encounter with a tramp at the local pub had left my clothes impregnated with the smell of raw sewage, night was closing in and I was hungry. No different to how a kuruc soldier probably felt as he advanced towards Trnava on Christmas Eve in 1704.
My entry into Trnava was from the north-west. It was a remarkable approach, past rows of grey tower blocks until I reached the old city walls, where the atmosphere completely changed save for the appalling graffiti which cannot differentiate between a factory wall and the side of the Bishop's 16th century Palace. The Bishop himself, I was informed by the proprietor of a small pensione, was "opening a new company" and all the best hotels, including his establishment, were full. This came as a blow for I was particularly looking forward to staying at the Hotel London and if that was full at the Hotel Dream, both located on Kapitulska. I finally found a bed at the Hotel Europa, the last berth in town.
With no thanks to Rakoczi, who would have burnt the town down given a chance, Trnava's glory is its churches, starting with St. Helen's Church of 1325, the Church and Convent of the Clarists and St Nicholas's Parish Church of 1380, then the early Baroque Church of St John the Baptist of 1629, the 1633 Franciscan Church of St. James and the lovely 17th Franciscan Church of St Joseph; then post-Rakoczi, the High Baroque Church of the Holy Trinity 1720 and Ursuline Church of St Anne 1729.
From Trnava, I drove east, crossing the Vah at Hlohovec, until I reached the town of Nitra on a river of the same name. A small city squatting below the southernmost spur of the Tribec hills, Nitra's former martial importance is now masked by the complex of monastery buildings on and below the site of the castle, which stem from around 1760. Nitra's true purpose should not been mistaken for an 18th century seminary and monastery: it was a fighting fortress as the inscription on the castle gate reminds us, "ANNO DNI LEOPOLDO I ROM IMP VNG REGE MDCLXXIII". The bastions and ramparts of Leopold's military engineers are still in evidence, dotted with pepper box sentry posts overlooking the river far below. They sit in utilitarian contrast to the flowering column of 1750 outside the castle entrance, a piece of ornate fussiness that commemorated Maria Theresa's reign.
Leaving Nitra, I collided with a small flock of wax-wings which suddenly took off from the road to my front and flew straight into the car. These little artic visitors were obviously unused to traffic and I felt terrible about the demise of two of them. A third one had a broken leg and I managed to persuade the village shopkeeper to look for a temporary home for it.
My journey ended at Beladice a few miles to the West of Nitra, where I stayed in the beautiful 1820s manor house of the Jesenskys, a Slovak version of Sieniawka but with the two side wings demolished. With a 1904 neo-classical makeover, the house epitomised a turn of the century prosperous manor. I walked past the village church just as mourners were dispersing from a funeral, long-faced but with quietly animated conversation. The gravediggers, shovelling the reddish earth back into the dark hole, paused to watch me pass by. Snow-covered fields rolled languorously towards the Danube. Footprints of hares dotted the white crusty icing on the ploughed furrows, then a dozen or so hares themselves ran determinedly away from me. Old cherry trees and coppices of sycamores separated the huge fields, both casting long shadows in the setting winter sun. To the north, I could make out the ruins of Gymes Castle, once home to the Forgachs, presiding over the little village of Jelenec.
Rebel portraits and pictures of daring do
South to the Danube via the Esterhazy manor house at Zeliezovce. Here Franz Schubert arrived in July 1818, introduced by the singer Karoline Uger as a suitable music tutor for the two Esterhazy girls, Marie (15) and Carolina (13). Count Johanne got more than he bargained for when the young composer launched himself into a raunchy love affair with the Countess's chambermaid, Pepi Pockelhofer. In a letter to a mate in Vienna, Schubert wrote:
"The cook is rather jolly,
the ladies maid is 30,
The housemaid very pretty,
The nurse a good old soul.
The butler my rival,
The count is rather rough,
The Countess haughty
Yet with a kind heart."
He left Zeliezovce on 19 November that year, supposedly with syphilis contracted from Pepi. When he returned in 1824, Schubert fell madly in love with Carolina, his former pupil, but the disease, by now well advanced, prevented any physical contact with his 'star'.
The manor house stands empty, its windows boarded up. Schubert's lodgings are in a small house behind the park, well looked after by Mrs Kovacs and attentively guarded by the family dog. For Schubert aficionados, a visit here, strolling through the park, will conjure up Lieder der Wanderer and other Zeliezovce inspired compositions.
From afar, the Basilica on the castle hill at Estergom dominates the countryside around it. The Emperor Hadrian was here in 121AD (Salva Aelia), then the Franks (Osterigen). King Stefan I was born here and crowned fist King of Hungary on 15 August 1001. This was the first Hungarian capital, sited on a shallow crossing of the Danube, where the great Frederick Barbarossa passed through on his way to the Third Crusade. The fort here played a vital role in the long war against the Ottomans and in the rebellions Thokoly besieged it from 25 to 27 October in 1683. With such an illustrious history, one can understand why the Hungarians built this vast Basilica between 1822 and 1869 (in 1877?). The sheer scale of it doesn't work for me a reproduction of the Dome of St.Peter's in Rome, it is too large a monument on an almost indecent scale and magnified many times by its isolation on top of a hill. These buildings sit better in cities where their design came from. Pigeons have taken over the lofty spaces beneath the portico and tympanum; the great main doors are closed and sealed with their droppings. This is the Temple of Karnak. Inside the nationalistic proportions are excessive they fail to relate to people unlike the vast Gothic cathedrals of Northern France and indeed St Paul's cathedral in London which somehow mange to pull this trick off. The reason , I suspect, is the exact symmetry of the transept, knave and altar which has the effect of ballooning the space rather than dispersing it. Highest European cathedrals
St Peter's in the Vatican: 186.30 m
St Paul's, London: 158.10 m
The Duomo, Florence: 149.28 m
Sacred Heart of Jesus, Brussels: 140.94 m
Rheims Cathedral: 138.69 m
The Duomo, Milan: 134.94 m
Cologne Cathedral: 134.94 m
Speyer Cathedral: 134 m
San Petronio, Bologna: 132.54 m
Seville Cathedral: 132 m
St Paul's Outside the Walls, Rome: 131.66 m
Notre Dame, Paris: 130 m
St Vitus, Prague: 124 m
Toledo Cathedral: 122 m
St John Lateran, Rome: 121.84 m
Antwerp Cathedral: 118.60 m
Santa Giustina, Padua: 118.50 m
Esztergom Cathedral: 118 m
Estergom town has definitely seen better days. There is a replica of St Stefan's crown in the Var Museum and a long gallery full of dreadful life-size paintings of Hungarian Kings by latter day artists with the one exception of Stefan V competently executed by a Venetian artist. On an overcast cold March afternoon, Ewstergom could be forgiven for her shoddy drabness; clad in her summer foliage and draped with a haze of soft heat over her rooftops, she would be sweeter if still a little dowdy. Her youthful motherhood of the new Hungarian nation of late 19th century is gone forever. I found lodgings at the Alabardos (Bastion) Hotel, aptly positioned under the western ramparts of the castle.
My visit ended on a high note, thanks to a wonderful dinner at the Padlizsan Etterem the Aubergine Restaurant - in Pazmany Street. Here is the set menu prepared by the charming chef, Jakab Ferenc:
Cream of garlic soup with croutons, spiced with tarragon and a slice of lemon for zest, with a glass of Balatonlellei sauvignon Blanc 2003 St.Donatus.
Fillet steak au point with carrots cooked with thyme, accompanied by a glass of Egri Rose 2003 Cox Vinum.
Pear stuffed with cheese and covered in chocolate sauce, washed down with a glass of Tokaji Sargamuskotaly 2001 Roy Mathias.
As I drove along the Danube towards Budapest the next day, a blizzard raged over the hills. Visegrad fortress loomed overhead, ghostly in the thick white sky, Easterly winds whipped up waves of slate grey, making the normally dignified river look angry and perturbed. Vec on the far bank was a mere smudge.
Rakoczi would be content to know that one of the main thoroughfares in Pest is named after him. And he would be proud to observe that the legacy of his Hungarian national movement has survived in my two favourite period hotels, the Astoria and the Mathyas. The latter is a 1904 creation, built more or less at the same time as my other favourite Hungarian fin de siecle building, the Palace of Culture in Tirgu Mures in Transylvania. Indeed it was not just the Hungarians who sought o rediscover the purity of the medieval world before Progress corrupted it with Industrialisation and Materialism. There is much in common with England's Pre Raphaelites and William Morris's Arts and Crafts movement as well as Tolstoy's admiration for the universal peasant. For the neo-Hungarians post 1877, the spirit of Hungary meant courage, glory and abundance. The architectural tragedy about the rest of Budapest is that between 1848 and 1890, the establishment replicated all that is bad about Florence and Sienna by mimicking the gloomy fortresses of their narrow streets. It may be Renaissance in spirit but in effect it is aggressive, granite, defensive. By no stretch of the imagination could anyone have foreseen the street fighting battles of 1945 and 1956, when these monsters came into their own. The Esterhazys and Illeshazys were not Medicis and Savronola.
The Hungarian National gallery sits within the royal Palace on Buda hill. Here is the famous 1712 portrait of Ferenc Rakoczi II by Adam Manyoki (1673-1757), who was the artist in residence for the Prince throughout the Rebellion and then followed him into exile. Manyoki, the son of a Protestant priest, had trained in Hamburg and Hannover. It was at the Prussian Court that he met the wife of Ferenc Rakoczi II, then the prince himself, who soon made him his court painter. He was sent on a diplomatic mission to the Netherlands. On Rakoczi's recommendation, he was taken into the service of Augustine the Strong, Saxonian prince-elector and Polish king. He worked in Warsaw in 1713, in Dresden and in Berlin in 1714 where he painted mostly portraits of people and famous beauties of the court.
Then come the Victor Madarasz paintings of F.K.Frangepan and Peter Zrinyi, awaiting sentence in Wiener Neustadt prison, the older man's hand resting on the arm of the visibly distressed F.K.; the Trial of Ilona Zrinyi and her children at Mukachevo, the sinister General Caraffa in the chair. Victor, like the Rebels, had fought against the Habsburgs in the 1848-49 war of independence, an experience which affected him through the rest of his life. He dedicated his art to the idea of independence and recalled the heroic and tragic memories of Hungarian history.
Lastly, like Madarasz, Szekely Bertalani depicted chapters from Hungary's romantic past - "The Discovery of Louis II's Dead Body", "Women of Eger", "Mohacs", "Ladislas V" are among the most important of his paintings. In a very dark canvas, he depicts the escape from Likana castle of Imre Thokoly, his dying father handing him his sword as anxious faces peer from the gloom intent on spiriting him away.