Dénes Dienes: History of the Reformed Church Collég in Sárospatak (Sárospatak, 2013)

János Ugrai: „THE PERIOD OF NATIONAL ADVANCEMENT” 1777-1849 - Environmental conditions - The spirit of the age: from the enlightenment to the fall of the war of independence

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FROM THE ENLIGHTEMENT

TO THE END OF THE WAR

OF INDEPENDENCE

decree triggered a reaction on the part of the Hungarian nobility which indirectly served the interests of renewing the Hungarian language. Suddenly, the cause of language renewal became the subject of public discourse and the token of a national coming of age. Then, during the course of a few decades, the thorough transformation of the Hungarian language was successfully achieved under the leadership of the lord of literature, Ferenc Kazinczy, also a former student of the College in Sárospatak. As a result of vehement differences being resolved by the end of the 1810s, a system of rules was established which regulated grammar and the mode of generating technical terminology, thus making it possible for the individual academic disciplines to devise their own relevant terminology. Based on this success, the passing of legislation decreeing Hungarian as the official language became the highest priority of the parliamentary sessions convened in the Age of Reforms. The extended debates achieved their aims in 1844 when Hungarian was decreed by the sovereign to be the official language. From hereon Hungarian was used in all matters of polity as well as in education, be that in administration or public discourse.

The relatively rapid success in the matter of language renewal inadvertently brought to the forefront in parliamentary sessions of the Age of Reforms and in the forums of the cultural elite the push for more national character in other spheres of cultural activity. The ever-increasing popularity of national romanticism in literature, the foundation of the National Museum and then that of the Academy of Sciences and the unfolding and consolidation of the Hungarian press and national dramaturgy all contributed to the creation of a solid cultural hinterland which served a select but continuously growing, culturally literate and culture-observing layer of society. The propagation of the written word led to an upswing in book culture. The number of printing presses and book vendors multiplied rapidly and, in addition to the more traditional religious publications and stories of knights in shining armour, almanacs, romantic and tragic comedy, pulp fiction and informative medical publications became popular fare. Although there already existed a solid base of subscribers to periodicals, the circles which publications regularly reached were continuously expanding in the form of book-reading groups, clubs, student associations undergoing reorganization and cultural casinos first established in the 1820s. In addition to the members of the swelling intellectual class, members of the aristocracy were also content to turn the pages of these publications. The rise of the culture of the printed word was most positively influenced by the relaxing of censorship policies by the imperial court of Joseph II. Censorship was tightened once again in the initial decades of the 19th century but only for a transitional period of time. These cultural processes led to a new capital for the country being chosen, the bulk of public administration and life having gradually moved from Pozsony (Bratislava at present) - as did the parliament - to the centre of the country, to the city of Pest-Buda, where the middle class was rapidly evolving.