Wine Cellars [antikvár]

HISTORICAL SKETCHUnderground HeavenThe practice of feudal distribution introduced by King St. Stephen has been taught us at school. Also that the veiy first form of tax mentioned in his first laws was the tithe paid in wine. School education however, did not show us more. If the elements of paying taxes, the Christian ceremonies, the traditional Hungarian meat dishes and some water resources of the Carpathian Basin had been connected by analysers' attention we should have also seen the many vineyards and wine cellars, even from our school desk.In the age of King Matthias wine flew from the fountains of his Visegrád Castle at festive occasions - well we have learnt about that. It was a sign of Renaissance vigour and that vigour was the cradle of the delicate Hungarian humanism. It was not clear for us school children though, that the apparent lavishness proved respect for wine and an appreciation of its vital strength at the same time.When talking about the heroes of Captain üobó's Eger Castle evety Hungarian school child associates them with the Bull's Blood, the drink that frightened and amazed the Turks and steeled the Hungarian castle defenders' heart. One may ask: From where have somany casks of robust red wine been delivered to the cellar of the castle? How could they keep nearly two thousand warriors fighting for several months and help to lessen their physical and emotional pain in the evenings? No syllabus of any school puts an emphasis on that. Nor on the beautiful vineyards of the Eger Archbishopric, nor the red wine production skill of the Serbs, who had escaped to the north from the Turks and settled in the Eger region. There is no mention of the spectacular Eger taverns owned by the bishopric either.We have learnt that Prince Ferenc Rákóczi 11 financed the Hungarian national uprising from the income of his own estates, but it was never emphasized that the worid-famous Tokaji wine had been produced on those veiy estates. Tokaji was considered as the wine of kings and as the king of wines by the Russian tsar's St. Petersburg courts and by all the rich courts ranging from Vienna or Warsaw even to the Vatican. Wine had served as the main financial basis of the decade-long war of independence against the Austrian Empire, but we still did not regard it as a determinative factor of life and of viewing the worid. It is not commonly known