Alba Regia. Annales Musei Stephani Regis. – Alba Regia. A Szent István Király Múzeum Évkönyve. 32. 2002 – Szent István Király Múzeum közleményei: C sorozat (2003)

Tanulmányok – Abhandlungen - Demeter Zsófia: The History and the Situation of Serb Minority in the East-Transdanubian Region. p. 51–60.

Alba Regia XXXII, 2003 ZSÓFIA DEMETER THE HISTORY AND THE SITUATION OF SERB MINORITY IN THE EAST-TRANSDANUBIAN REGION The story I am telling you now takes place in the middle of Europe, at the break line of East and West, Byzantine and Roman Christianity. The Turkish conquest in Europe plays a significant role in it. Time has an even more decisive role, which may provide solution as well. The historical record mentioned the present Southern Slav nationalities of Hungary with various names. The most frequent name in our sources is Rác. We can find the names of Rác church, Rác town, Rác Street in many of our towns. The name Növi Pazar is preserved in the Hungarian usage from the old form of Ras, Latin Rasa, Rascia. The castle of Ras was near Növi Pazar, which became the centre of the independent Serbian state organised by Nemanja (1159-1196). Saint Száva attained the organisational independence of the patriarchy of Ipek in the frames of that state. Thus that is the Serbian mother territory: the oldest monasteries can be found there. We can find names of places there which are familiar from recent news: Koszovó, Pristina and Pec (its old name is Ipek). The castle and the river on which banks Növi Pazar lies is called Raska even today. Despite the terminological uncertainty in our usage, it is getting crystallised that the names under the heading of Rác have a common, distinctive feature: they are followers of Pravoslav and Greek Orthodox religion, they or the ancestors arrived in Hungary from the south, from beyond the historic borders and the majority of them spoke Slavic languages. Concerning Székesfehérvár and Fejér County, most of them belonged to the Serb ethnic group; however, they were quite different from an economic and social point of view. The centuries of Rác people settling down in Hungary can be divided into three periods: 1. Serb nations were living even in the medieval Hungarian state, their settlement could be related to the protection of Hungarian borders and the granting of land. The borders of habitations were continuously shifted to north until 1543, in parallel with the Ottoman Turkish conquest in Europe. Not just the united Balkan armies were defeated at Rigómező (Koszovó Polje) in 1389 but the European chivalry as well in the battle of Zsigmond of Luxemburg at Nikápoly (1396). Drawing the conclusion of the defeat, King Zsigmond (1387-1437) deliberately chose the solution against the Turkish danger and in protection of the Christian Europe that he strengthened the southern borders not just militarily but politically in the first place. In order to protect the borders, the Serbian despots got huge properties mainly areas that were sparsely populated because of the Turkish threat. So their Serbian serfs were relocated there from the beginning. In Tata a contract in 1426 confirmed that Serbia was the feoffee of Hungary. Significant number of people arrived in Hungary this way: only along with György Brankovics approximately 80000 people got permission to settle. In parallel with it the number of Franciscan priests, who were able to understand the Slavic language, increased in the southern parts of Hungary. In 1420 the Pope gave permission to build a monastery for them in Ozora. It is important to talk all about these, because the later Rác settlers usually joined the Serbian communities strengthened earlier. 2. The Turkish conquest reached the castle of Szendrő in 1459 and with the fall of this castle the capital of Serbian principality of that time was lost. It gave a decisive impulse to the mass settlement of the Serbs in Hungary. The sources mention two types of Serb populations from this time: those people who escaped from the Turks and those who arrived in Hungary along with the Turks. The sources mention it several times that the Serbs settled in mass with the leadership of their voivode. Several of their noblemen made a fortune in the royal court, and the commoners did the same in the famous Black Army of King Matthias. The Parliament in 1481 and in 1495 also supported the settlement of Serbs doing military service: 57