Dobrossy István szerk.: A miskolci Avas (Miskolc, 1993)
A miskolci Avas (összegezés angolul) (Dobrossy István)
The Avas of Miskolc T he Avas of Miskolc is the symbol of the town. The former orchards and vineyards of the hill played an important role in the economic life of the town, ensuring work for the vine-growing wine dressers, for the white coopers and craftmen making storing vessels, as well as for the merchants carting the full casks of wine to remote regions. The Avas was a spot of society life and entertainment. The place attracted the writers, poets and artists who worded their memories in poems, painted on canvas or immortalized on photographs for themselves and for the succeeding generations. In the religious life of the more and more expanding town with growing number of inhabitants the several century old Calvinist Church of Avas and the All Saints' Roman Catholic Church equally played important role. There are three cemeteries on the hill serving as final place of repose for the personalities of many generations who took part in the building and development of the town. The several century old baulk names of the Avas, the names of buildings serving as well for determination of position and the notions connected with the Avas have been supplemented with new ones for three decades. A housing-estate has appeared and grown with its unusual view; the Avas housing-estate or the Avas quarter gives home for as many citizens as the number of inhabitants in a smaller town. The built-up Avas, well surrounded by roads, nowadays lives together with its old northern part giving place for villas, cellars and cave-dwellings; our ancestors aspired to make this area of the hill the „acropolis" of the tourism in the town. In the mind of the previous generations the Avas always was a place where they could „look up to" from the town, and the town was a place what they could see around when they looked down standing in front of their cellars on the hill. Hardly could anyone imagine speaking about the Avas that at the end of the 20th century a town would look down at a town. In the travels books of the 18th and the 19th centuries introdicing our town, the Avas was described as a point of direction and orientation. Samuel Benkő in his historicalmedical topography writes that the town is situated in a valley between two hills, it is bounded from the south by the wine-growing Havas, Tapolca and Mindszent hills, which turn into gentle slopes towards the river Sajó yielding rich cereal crops and vintage. Elek Fényes in his detailed introduction on Miskolc, made in 1851 mentions the Avas only once: „the town itself is situated between the Tetemvár and Avas-hill". Samuel Szrogh writes in his work published in 1800 and titled „Values of Miskolc": „Here are the Avas, the Angyal valley, the Tetemvár and the Bábonyi crag, hiding such a great treasure which yields money much easier than gold."
