Miklós Kásler - Zoltán Szentirmay (szerk.): Identifying the Árpád Dynasty Skeletons Interred in the Matthias Church. Applying data from historical, archaeological, anthropological, radiological, morphological, radiocarbon dating and genetic research (Budapest, 2021)

Foreword

crypts in Matthias Church, and it also covered the costs of foreign researchers joining the team. To date, the Hungarian participants have neither requested nor received any financial consideration for their work. I endeavoured to gather together all the people who were motivated. This is how I invited Ms Piroska

Biczó, archaeologist,

and the Archaeology working group of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences led by Professor Elek

Benkő, to

whom I hereby express my gratitude for the work he has done. In the project he assigned Balázs Mende

to

participate in the genetics work. Professor Béla

Meleg joined

the team, who participated in lifting and sampling the bones, while he also invited the foreign participants. Specifically, he invited the internationally renowned archaeogenetics department associated with the University of Göttingen,

another

major research centre from Germany, and after identifying the DNA of the ancient bones it was he who involved Péter

Nagy,

a US-based geneticist of Hungarian origin and motivated by Hungarian sentiments, who after initial examinations joined the DNA sequencing process. Having been granted financial support, I contacted Cardinal Péter

Erdő, who

with an extremely generous gesture and motivated by his deep commitment to science immediately assured us of his support for the research. He consented to the lifting of the skeleton currently located in Matthias Church - transported there from Székesfehérvár

in the 19th century and laid under appropriate circumstances - and to the sampling of the bones. After this, Erzsébet

Csernok,

a student of Professor Szentirmay, joined with great enthusiasm from the National Institute of Oncology, as did my colleague Judit Olasz,

who

participated in this project in her free time with the permission of her superior, Orsolya

Csuka.

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