Szablyár Péter: Step by step - Our Budapest (Budapest, 2010)

The man for whom a stairway was named - Móric Sándor the Devil Rider

The count was born in Bajna, in 1805. His father, who owned the palace (Sándor- palota) that now serves as the official residence of Hungary’s president, had a small roofed bridge built to connect the palace and the Castle Theatre so he could easily get from one to the other. After his father's death the count became enamoured of horseback riding (the old count had protected the puny boy from everything). His hair- raising stunts were duly covered in the contemporaneous press. During the 1825 session of the Pozsony Diet, he dazzled the royal couple with his amazing riding skill, but he also rode his horse up to the second floor of the Inn to the White Swan in Vienna, which made him the talk of the imperial city for years to come. He came out in support of plans for building the Chain Bridge advanced by István Széchenyi (whose enthusiasm for horse-breeding and racing he more than shared), but he made no bones about thinking rather little of Széchenyi’s other pet idea, the establishment of Hungary's Academy of Sciences.

He also set a speed record when he won a wager by covering the distance between Baden and Vienna within 48 minutes (and thus pocketed two hundred pieces of gold!); he rode, according to a report that appeared later in Vasárnapi Újsás

■ Móric Sándor hrom Vasárnapi Újság (The Sunday News)

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