O N LY IN BUDAPEST Contents Introduction 8 BUDA (Districts I–II, XI–XII, XXII) 1 The Legend of the Turul Bird 11 2 Buda by Funicular 14 3 Scars of the Second World War 16 4 History under the Hill 19 5 Of Mummies and Alchemists 22 6 The Oldest Coffee House in Town 24 7 Treasures of the Painted Church 27 8 The Historical Hilton 30 9 Gothic Glimpses on Castle Hill 32 10 The Saviour of Mothers 35 11 A Much Loved Empress 38 12 The Ottomans’ Bathing Legacy 42 13 The Budapest Bastille 44 14 The Chapel in the Rock 46 15 Baths of the Belle Époque 48 16 Floating History on the Danube 51 17 The Park of the Toppled Statues 53 18 The Budafok Calvary and the Champagne Castle 56 19 Runic Gravestones and the Ribcage Mortuary 58 20 Gizi Bajor’s Museum of the Theatre 60 21 The Children’s Railway 62 22 A Belvedere Tower in the Buda Hills 65 23 A Hidden Medieval Monastery 67 24 From Bauhaus to Buda 71 25 An Unusual Park for the Millennium 73 26 A Baroque Odyssey 75 27 Staircases, Stoves and the Art of Forging 78 28 The Tomb of the Father of the Roses 80 29 Subterranean Buda 83 Contents 5 ÓBUDA (District III) 30 Some Most Unusual Museums 85 31 Art Amongst the Ruins 87 32 A Vanished District 89 33 Boat Factory Island 92 34 The Ruins of Roman Aquincum 94 PEST (Central and Inner Suburbs: Districts V–IX) 35 Bunkers, Boar’s Skin and Handmade Boots 97 36 Magistrates, Evita and the Great Plain Shepherds 99 37 The Statue of Imre Nagy 101 38 The Eternal Flame of ‘48 104 39 The Soviet Obelisk 106 40 The Sacred Right 109 41 A Superlative Parliament Building 113 42 A Family of Great Hungarians 115 43 Pubs in Ruins 118 44 Continental Europe’s Oldest Underground Railway 120 45 The Parisian Arcade 123 46 From Turkish Mosque to Baroque Masterpiece 126 47 Heathen Pepper and Herdsmen’s Soup 129 48 The Coffee House Revolutionaries 132 49 The Legendary Hotel Astoria 136 50 The Old Walls of Pest 138 51 The Garden Church of St. George 141 52 The Market Halls of Pest 144 53 A Powerful Centre for the Arts 146 54 Buildings for the Birds! 148 55 Brass Screws, Propaganda and the Monk’s Brick 151 56 Hungarian History in Paper and Stone 153 57 The Roma Quarter 156 58 Monuments and Mausolea, Poets and Politicians 158 59 The Forgotten Jewish Cemetery 161 60 Railway Stations and Steam Trains 165 61 Silver Screen Budapest 168 62 In the Ghetto 171 63 The Mystery of Raoul Wallenberg 175 6 Contents 64 Bright Sparks 178 65 The Secret Courtyards of Pest 180 66 The Mineral Water Millionaire 183 67 Monkeys, Angels and All Things Modern 185 68 The Magyar House of Photographers 188 69 The House of Terror 190 70 Remembering Zoltán and Béla 193 71 Where East Meets East 196 Pest (Outer Suburbs – North: Districts IV, XIII–XVI) 72 The Ruins on Rabbit Island 199 73 The Art Nouveau Elephant House 203 74 Budapest’s Answer to Coney Island 206 75 The Art of Socialist Realism 208 76 A Fairytale Castle and the Mulberry Garden 211 77 “Nothing is Worthier to a Free Man than Agriculture” 214 78 The Gaudí of Budapest 216 79 The People’s Stadium 219 Pest (Outer Suburbs – South: Districts X, XVII–XXI, XXIII) 80 Little-known Sights in Old Kőbánya 221 81 Plot 301 224 82 The Transylvanian Housing Estate 227 83 A Load of Old Junk 229 84 Red Csepel 231 APPENDICES Opening Times 234 Bibliography 240 Acknowledgements 242 Imprint 244 Contents 7 Introduction “All foreigners, who have visited Budapest, talk about it with praise, even those who are in the position to make a comparison between the Hungarian capital and the most beautiful and famous cities of foreign lands.” Lajos Kossuth (1883) Budapest is surely one of the most dramatic, and at the same time least known, capital cities in Europe. Straddling the mighty Danube (Duna), Buda on the west bank and Pest on the east, it is also one of the most fascinating. The relatively few available guidebooks offer the undemand- ing visitor an amazing (and effortlessly accessible) array of museums, churches, historic buildings and eateries, reflecting the history of the city from Roman and Magyar times, via the Ottoman and Habsburg Empires, up to the present day. However, for those with a little more time on their hands, and for those who want to discover something of the place for themselves, this new guide has been expressly written. It only takes a few minutes of planning, and a glance at a decent street map*, to escape the crowds and the orchestrated tours and discover a different Budapest. Based on personal experience, and footslogging all twenty-three of the city’s districts (kerületek), the author will point the explorer in a new and unusual direction. This is the Budapest of Roman ruins, medieval ramparts and Turkish tombs; hidden courtyards and colourful old mar- ket halls; unfrequented museums brimming with fascinating objects; secret caves and thrilling hillside railways; Transylvanian houses and Art Nouveau bath buildings; not to mention a former power station and an old Ukrainian river barge both recently refurbished as arts’ centres! It is also a city with a dark and turbulent past, its myriad monuments to the revolutions of 1848 and 1956, forgotten Jewish cemeteries, bombed-out structures and Stalin-era statues still bearing grim witness to terrible times. As would be expected, many of these curious locations, all of which are both visible and visitable, are to be found within the narrow streets of the ancient Castle Hill of Buda (Vár and Víziváros in District I) and the old medieval walled town of Pest (Belváros in District V). However, a similar number lie outside these long-established areas of occupation, for instance in Óbuda (District III), the former Roman town of Aquincum north of Buda, as well as the environs of the rolling Buda Hills to the west (Districts II, XI, XII and XXII). Equally interesting are the Inner Suburbs 8 Introduction surrounding old Pest (Districts VI, VII, VIII and IX), spread out beyond the nineteenth century Habsburg Boulevard known as the Kiskörút. These are bounded by a further, outer Boulevard, the Nagykörút, beyond which are the city’s sprawling Outer Suburbs (Districts IV, XIII–XVI in the north and Districts X, XVII–XXI and XXIII in the south). Using Budapest’s exten- sive transport network of underground trains (metró/földalatti), suburban trains (HÉV/vonat), trams (villamos), trolleybuses (trolibusz) and buses (autóbusz), the explorer can quite quickly reach all the places described within the following pages – and that’s without detracting whatsoever from the sense of personal discovery that each of these places has to offer. Indeed, directions have been kept to a minimum so as to leave the visitor free to find their own particular path. Whether exploring the maze of tun- nels below Castle Hill, searching Buda for Islam’s most northerly sacred site, rattling along under the suburbs of Pest on Continental Europe’s oldest underground railway, or visiting religious ruins on Margaret Island, it is hoped that the visitor will experience a sense of having made the discovery for his or her self. In embarking on these mini-odysseys in search of Budapest’s tangible historical legacy the author would only ask that telephones are switched off in places of worship (which should not be visited during services), and due respect is shown in the quiet city courtyards and backstreets that are home and workplace to many Hungarians. Other than that, treat Budapest as a giant oyster containing many precious pearls – I just hope you enjoy finding them as much as I did. Duncan J. D. Smith Budapest – Vienna * Most street maps of Budapest, for example the Falk Cityplan Extra, cover Castle Hill, central Pest and the inner suburbs; the invaluable Network Map of Budapest Transport Ltd. (BKV), available from the Budapest Tourism Office, details tram, bus, metro and rail routes across all twenty-three districts of the city. After each entry there is a selection of others within walking distance, wherever applicable. The dates given after the names of Hungary’s various monarchs are the actual years they reigned for, whereas those given after important non-royal personalities relate to their birth and death. An alphabetical list of opening times of museums and other places of interest men- tioned in the text can be found at the back of the book. Introduction 9 5 Of Mummies and Alchemists District I (Vár), the Golden Eagle Pharmacy Museum (Arany Sas Patikamúzeum) at Tárnok utca 18 on Castle Hill (Várhegy) Bus 16 from M1/M2/M3 Deák Ferenc tér; Funicular railway from Clark Ádám tér Even visitors without any interest in the histo- ry of medicine will find the tiny Golden Eagle Pharmacy Museum on Tárnok utca a fascinat- ing place. It is located in a 15th century house with a Baroque facade, making it one of the oldest extant buildings in the Castle District. The collection itself is truly eclectic, detailing the history of pharmacy from the Middle Ages up to the 17th century. This is told by means of several cabinets of curi- osities as well as two reconstructed rooms, one a medieval alche- mist’s workshop and the other a Baroque pharmacy, the building itself having been the first pharmacy in the district (for an exam- ple of an old fashioned pharmacy still in use visit the Opera Patika An alchemist’s laboratory in the Golden Eagle at Andrássy út 26, in Pharmacy Museum on Tárnok utca business since 1889).