J. Antall szerk.: Medical history in Hungary 1972. Presented to the XXIII. International Congress of the History of Medicine / Orvostörténeti Közlemények – Supplementum 6. (Budapest, 1972)

G. Jeszenszky: Medical and Sanitary Conditions in Hungary as Seen by British Travellers, 1790—1848

G. Jeszenszky : Medical and Sanitary Conditions in Hungary

... 71 between what she saw and the prosperity and splendour of Hungary before the onslaught of the Turks.

4 The population of the country was reduced to two and a half millions, nearly the half of what it was during the reign of Matthias Corvinus. In seventy years it was augmented to 8 millions by massive colonization, but the newcomers were not Hungarians and so the Magyars became a minority in their own country, thus laying the foundations of later conflicts and the loss of much of their former territory after World War I. It was relatively easy to invite new settlers, but to make the land once more habitable was more difficult. The climate of the regained territories was considered as the most unhealthy in Europe due to frequent floods and permanent marshes. These generated intermittent fever, malaria, while the country was constantly threatened by the plague and other contagious diseases arriving from the Balkans where the Ottoman Empire was still holding out. The hospitals and the sanitary institutions of the 15th century towns disappeared during the two centuries of incessant warfare and plunder, together with the apothecaries and doctors. Their place was filled by quacks and their remedies, or by barbersurgeons at best.

5 The government started to improve matters by taking a census of all medical personnel (1724), prescribing all the counties to employ a medical officer (1752), drawing up a general regulation of all health-matters (1770), and by establishing the first medical faculty at the University of Nagyszombat (1769) transferred to Buda in 1777.

6 The Hungarian Diet also prepared its plan for the reform of public health in one of its committees in 1792 — 93, but the reaction that set in as a result of the French revolution set aside and even prohibited all measures which aimed at improving the social and political basis of the existing evil state of all public matters and instead concentrated on their superficial treatment like quarantine stations and orders that could not be enforced. Gradual change and improvement started only in the late 1820-s when the best elements of the nation partly succeeded in taking matters in their hands and the period of national revival known as the Age of Reforms started. The late 18th century saw a great increase in the number of travellers in Europe, among whom the British led the way. The more venturesome went as far as Turkey and on the way there or back Hungary was sometimes included in the itinerary. An increasing number or these people were now travelling for pleasure but that did not prevent them from making interesting, frequently very pertinent observations on the country and its institutions. The circumstances of these visits had many common features throughout 4"Indeed nothing can be more melancholy, than travelling through Hungary

..." Letters of Lady Montague, written during her travels (Paris, 1799). 5 For a detailed description of the health situation in Hungary in the period following the ejection of the Turks see György Gortvay, Az újabbkori magyar orvosi művelődés és egészségügy története (The History of Medical Culture and Public Health in Moderne Hungary) (Budapest, 1953), esp. pp. 1-44. 6 The early years of the Medical Faculty has quite rich recent literature. Cf. Communications de História Artis Medicinae, 19G9, No. 51-53 and 1971, No. 57-59.