Budapest [antikvár]

I'd like just to waylay the owner of this beautiful book for a few short moments while I add one or two introductory thoughts, because although l'm convinced that the two hundred and fifty colour photographs which follow will more than adequately reflect the Budapest of today, a few words must be said about the historical layers which-be they hidden or spectacularly apparent-have defined the modern face of this two thousand-year-old city.The oldest, or if you prefer the lowermost layer is that of the Román era. Between the 13th and 9th centuries before Christ, the armies of Emperor Augustus occupied the territories to the West and South of the Danube and set up the province of Pannónia. On both the right and left banks of the river they built up the fortified boun-daries protecting the Empire from Barbarian assault, one of the strategic points being the garrison town of Aquincum. The plentiful remains of the dual town which flourished in the 2nd century A.D. can be ad-mired today in the Northern area of the Buda side of known as Óbuda, but the town performed a far more significant function at the time of the birth of the Hungárián state.This then is the next layer of the city's history, the first of the Middle Ages. The reigning Hungárián prin-ces, from the end of the 9th century, settled into the am-phitheatre of the former Román garrison town, whose high walls provided adequate protection. The first seeds of the town of Pest were alsó sown at that time, where the walls of Contra-Aquincum stood protecting the most important crossing point at the harbour of Tabán. Further increasing the significance of Óbuda, traders and craftsmen set up shop among the remains of the Román town-or at least with the use of them-and a Royal Court, monasteries and churches were built alongside.It was the same in Pest, although up on the Castle Hill of Buda quiet still reigned. The first golden age of Óbuda and Pest then came to an end with the invasion (in 1241) and terrible destruction and slaughter by the Tartars. The reconstruction constituted the next great period. In the interests of effective defence, the Castle Hill was occupied, with houses, churches and monas-tic buildings handling unter the protection of the castle walls. Of course Óbuda and Pest were alsó rebuilt and the "triple city", now risen again from the ashes, creat-ed the suitable conditions for a royal seat to be es-tablished at the southern end of the Castle Hill somé one hundred years later. For two hundred years, more and more splendid palaces were built, adorned with works of Gothic renaissance art ranking among the best in Europe.Then for nearly a centurv and a half, from the dawnof modern history in 1541 until 1686, the Turks held possession of Buda and Pest. The magnificent royal palace, the town houses and monasteries gradually feli into ruin, the Christian temples being replaced by mosques and the silhouette of the town diversified by slender minarettes and domed bath-houses.Following the victory of the united Christian armies, baroquetowns appeare in the first half of the 18th century, the traces of which are still discernible today. Town houses, palaces of the nobility, public buildings, parish and monastic churches were built, and the squares were graced with statues. The widest oppor-tunities for development were enjoyed by Pest, while Buda became a quiet provinciai town and Óbuda, as the seigniorial centre, a markét town.In the first half of the 19th century, an abrupt leap in development was unequivocally felt in Pest. Through a calculated programmeof úrban planning, neo-classical public buildings, mansions, town houses and churches sprung up. The town had far outgrown the proportions of a medieval village, and through the selfless efforts of the "greatest Hungárián" István Széchenyi, the long-awaited permanent link between the two cities came about by means of the construction of the Chain Bridge. By the middle of the century Pest was effectively the centre of the nation.With the unification of the three towns in 1872, the city of Budapest thereby created became in the closing decades of the last century not merely a capital, but-by the scale and dimensions of thattime-a metropolis. Not only was it an administrative capital for the Hungary of that time a country considerably larger then than it is now but a centre of industry, trade, communications, intellectual and artistic life, education and last but not least architecture, a fact which the boulevards and avenues, public and religious buildings, aristocratic mansions, apartment houses, banks, schools, univer-sities and so on bear ample witness to. This metropolis, growing up in the eclectic and then Art Nouveau style, led a flourishing and radiant life, perceptible and in-fluential throughout almost all points of the Carpathian basin, right up until the outbreak of World War I.At that time, and even more so today, the layers of history can be felt and enjoyed: the city has an eclectic character, not merely in the architectural or historical sense, but rather in that ancient, medieval and modern values sit comfortably side by side. In a modern en-vironment, the remnants of the province of Pannónia, along with the medieval fragments of baroque houses, and the baroque churches and neo-classical palaces nestling among eclectic and Art Nouveau buildings, all gather together under the shadow of modern hotels. All this can be relished in this magnificent book.