Csernus Lukács - Triff Zsigmond: The Cemeteries of Budapest - Our Budapest (Budapest, 1999)

Béla Lajta’s lions

ON THE GüTTMANN TOMB

eszlár trial of alleged ritual murders; and Mór Mezei, lawyer, member of parliament, journalist and president of the Pest Jewish Community.

Here, too, were buried József Kiss, poet, founder and editor of the literary magazine Hét, and József Vészi, who was the editor-in-chief of Pester Lloyd for almost three decades. There are also the graves of famous scientists and scholars here, such as that of József Kőrösy, director of the Budapest Bureau of Statistics; the grave of Mózes Bloch, first principal of the College of Rabbinical Studies and the grave of historian Dávid Kaufmann.

Of the notable works of art found here, mention must be made of the following: the vault of the Tószegi-Freund family, designed by Emil Vidor (1910); the tombstone of the Madarassi-Beck family by Albert Kőrössy; and two more tombstones designed by Béla Lajta located in the row behind the place of rest - one over the resting place of the Guttmann family protected by two lions and the other belonging to the Sváb family decorated with two allegorical bird figures (c 1907). Lajta’s great talents are highlighted by the white marble mausoleum, evocative of Classicism in its style, of the Sváb family of Gavosda (1912) and by the huge, black granite tombstone of József Bródi, featuring ornamental motifs characteristic of wood carv34