Buza Péter: Spring and Fountains - Our Budapest (Budapest, 1994)

Novelties after the thousandth year

A new fountain, built in a scale comparable to the grandiosity of the one discussed above, was completed in 1896, the year of the millenary celebrations, and was meant to be one of the attractions of the Exhibition held to commemorate the one thousandth anniversary of the Magyar conquest of the Carpathian Basin. The fountain was designed by Lajos Mátray, whose smaller ornamental fountains could already be found in the city, such as the ones where today the sculptures of Ady and of Jókai can be seen in Ferenc Liszt tér and in Jókai tér on opposite sides of Andrássy út. These cast zinc ornaments have since vanished from the city’s public spaces, as has, during the war again, the Sió Fountain or, as it was called with an undue degree of refinement, the Fountain Lumineuse. However, it was indeed illuminated. That was its major attraction, rather than the scultpural composition itself, even though the great number of figures placed atop a tall concrete cliff made the fountain look like a veritable crowd scene. At the top there was a bevy of ladies including some nymphs and the

Kimg Mátyás hunting - possibly the most impressive fountain in the Castle District

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