Prohászka László: Polish Monuments - Our Budapest (Budapest, 2001)

be put on the pedestal. There is an inscription around its edge, a quotation from poet János Arany, which reads: “And the river of time, never flowing backwards, swells forward irresistibly”.

Episodes of Musical History

In the early 19th century Poland enriched the world of music with the genius of Frederyk Chopin (1810-49) and Hungary with the genius of Franz Liszt. Almost of the same age, the two artists became close friends in Paris and, by no means surprisingly, influenced each other as musicians. In 1849 Liszt mourned not only the martyrs of his country executed in the retaliation following the failed War of Independence but his deceased Polish friend as well. He wrote a book about Chopin in 1852 and gave a white marble sculpture of the composer’s left hand to the Hungarian National Museum.

A relief of Chopin hung in the small apartment where Franz Liszt, founder of the Music Academy, used to live, in the building on the corner of Andrássy út and Vörösmarty utca in District VI, which was the first home of the Music Academy. Cased in a plain wooden frame, the bronze medal was crafted in 1837 by the famous Swiss coin-maker Antoine Bovy. It can still be seen in its original place, which is now the Liszt Memorial Room. (Friedrich Schauer made a lithograph of Bovy’s piece around 1843, which is kept by the library of the Chopin Society of Warsaw.)

The building of the Pest Vigadó, built to plans by Frigyes Feszi in 1865, a masterful blend of Moorish and Hungarian elements, used to be the scene of concerts by many outstanding contemporary musicians. Liszt himself played here several times, often performing Polonaise pieces composed by Chopin. Yet it was not only musical instruments which conjured up the atmosphere of the Polonaise in the great hall. In 1866 sculptures were placed on the semi-pillars supporting the sidelong walls. The wall on the Danube side was decorated by the sculptural compositions Czardas and Minuet. Polonaise, a work by sculptor Richárd Füredy, was placed opposite them.

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