Magyar News, 1992. szeptember-1993. augusztus (3. évfolyam, 1-12. szám)

1993-07-01 / 11-12. szám

OFFICERS ELECTED

We are pleased to announce the election of Suzanne Sontra Virgulák, a resident of Norwalk, CT., as National Treasurer of the Hungarian Reformed Federation of America, with home offices in Washington, DC.

Mrs. Virgulák, formerly manager of Branch 52, South Norwalk, CT., served as a Vice President on the HRFA Board of Directors for eight years prior to this election.

She is a life-long member of the Hungarian Reformed Church (UCC), South Norwalk, CT., where she served on the Consistory, and many church committees. She also represented the Calvin Synod as a board member on the United Church Board for Homeland Ministries.

Elected as President of the HRFA is

Suzanne S. Virgulák

George Dózsa, New Brunswick, NJ., and as National Secretary, Endre Csornán from Beaver Falls, PA. The elected officials will serve a four-year term in office. The Hungarian Reformed Federation of America will observe its 100th Anniversary in 1996.

INSURANCE

1896

HUNGARIAN REFORMED FEDERATION OF AMERICA

2001 Massachusetts Ave., N.W. Washington, D.C. 20036-1011 Telephone: (800) 255-0864

BR. 1 Margaret Csuka BR. 52 Linda Sontra Van Buskirk

(203) 374-2438 (203) 846-1999

John Koi, Agent Ernest P. Virgulák, Agent

(203) 336-5046 (203) 847-0114

BR. 63 Louis Reszoly (203) 367-8835

IN THE TRUE SPIRIT OF FRATERNALISM SERVICE WITH SECURITY IS ASSURED

HOLLYWOOD

control it until 1003, when Stephen I placed it under the Hungarian crown. In the 12th and 13th centuries the Saxons, a German people, settled in Transylvania’s southern and northeastern region. Around 1222 “large numbers of Rumanians, called Vlachs or Walachians” moved into the Transylvania region from south of the Carpathian Mountains. The Vlachs then began to settle down and farm the land.

Now I was beginning to get a good picture of Transylvania’s history. The Vlachs were now becoming permanent inhabitants, on a part of this land. Finding all this information made me dive deeper. This no longer became an assignment, it became an adventure into the past. I felt as if I was being pulled into this paper by an unseen force. I had to find the true Transylvania and not the Hollywood version.

In the early 13th century the Hungarian King, Andrew II, asked the Teutonic Knights to help protect his people from the Cumans, a nomadic people of Turkic origin coming from the east. After the Cumans came the Mongols. They invaded the land around 1241. By the mid-13th century “Transylvania was in the hands of a royal governor” who split the society into three “nations, the Magyars, the Szekely (Seklers) and the Saxons.” He split them up by social class. Now I’ve come to a crossroad, I can no longer talk about Transylvania’s history without mentioning the infamous Count Dracula and his connection with Transylvania.

There is a region south of Transylvania that is called Walachia, named after the Walachians. In my search I found that Prince Vlad Basarab III, known to us as Vlad the Impaler or Dracula, ruled this region. In the book A Night in Transylvania: the Dracula Scranbook by Kurt Brokaw he says, “Dracula lived barely forty-five years, and most of his life was a nightmare filled with betrayal, revenge, depravity, and horror.” “Dracula was bom in 1431, the year that

J oan of Arc was burned at the stake. Exactly 500 years later, in 1931 Bela Lugosi made his debutand introduced the vampire to the

masses.”

To those of you who don’t know who Bela Lugosi was, he played Dracula in the movies. But who was Dracula and what was he like? I had to find out, I had to know about the true Dracula. To start off Dracula’s father was Vlad II. He was“lhe commander of a guard unit charged with overseeing the border of Walachia south of Transylvania.”

His father was called Dracul, which means devil, by the Turks and Hungarians. Vlad II was in the Order of the Dragon which was an elite military unit. The dragon in those days was a symbol of Satan. “S ince in the fifteenth century the dragon was a symbol of Satan, one may theorize that Vlad Dracula simply meant son of the dragon, or son of the devil.” Later on in Dracula’s life he earned the name Vlad Tepes, which means Vlad the Impaler.

In order for me to explain how he got his name I have to start off before Dracula became Prince of Walachia. Dracula’s father signed a treaty with the Turks. In this treaty Dracula’s father had to supply the Turkish army with Walachian children. To prove his loyalty to the sultan, Vlad gave two of his three sons to the Turks as hostages, oneof them being Dracula. “Dracula’s career decision to be a warrior/soldier was probably formed by three events: the forced humiliation and eventual homosexuality of his younger brother Radu; the defeat of his father and older brother Mircea in 1447; and the brutal assassinations of Mircea and his father.”

Now I was getting to know how Dracula became infamous. I had never known that Dracula had brothers. This was really getting interesting. So onward I went. In 1448 Dracula was set free by the sultan because he saw in Dracula a great warrior. When Dracula became an officer in the army, he was appointed to his father’s throne in Tirgoviste. “This was the first of three reigns, and it lasted only two months.” Dracula was only seventeen.

When Dracula regained the throne after fleeing to Moldavia, because he feared his father’s assassins were after him, he got married. After getting married Dracula was to be a Prince for six, long bloody years. Dracula assumed his throne bristling with confidence and authority and backed by a fanatical army. Dracula is famous to us as a ruler who impaled his enemies. I had thought he only impaled his enemies until I read that, “Dracula impaled enemies, wrongdoers, thieves and sinners by the thousandsperhaps 75,000 to 100,000 people over six years.”

I’ll bet the crime rate dropped real quick. “There is no evidence suggesting that Dracula practiced vampirism in the accepted sense of the word - drawing blood from a bite in the neck.”

To sum up the end of Dracula’s life and reign goes as follows; Dracula impaled Turkish soldiers so he lost his throne a second time to Mohammed the Conqueror. While fleeing from his invaders, his wife committed suicide. Dracula would not surrender to the Turks, but eventually was captured.

The year of his death was 1476. His body was found beheaded. In the process of searching on his death, it seems that no one knows who did it. Perhaps his father’s and brother’s killers finally caught up with him, perhaps the Turks took care of him. This is the real story of Dracula.

Walachia was south of Transylvania, south of the Carpathian Mountains. That area was under the control of the Hungarian King, and the Walachians paid tax to the king. Vlad II, and Dracula were never in Transylvania, they were put there by Hollywood probably because the name Transylvania is more palatable to the English language than Walachia.

In some other article we will learn about the 1000 years of Transylvania's history under Hungarian rule, its contribution to the world's culture and civilization.

(Editor)

7