Agria 42. (Az Egri Múzeum Évkönyve - Annales Musei Agriensis, 2006)

Berecz Mátyás: Eger városfalai

Mátyás Berecz Eger's Town Walls During the Middle Ages the walls of neither Eger nor its castle had any military significance. The town establishing itself in the valley, beside the stream, did not have any form of defence right up until the mid-16th century. It is only with the Turkish Conquest and the arrival of an immediate military threat that one sees the beginning of large-scale defensive improvements. The town, spread beneath the castle, was given a palisade and a ditch complete with four gateways. Following the siege of 1552 the castle was strengthened, and in the interests of defending both the town and the castle one section of the wooden palisade was replaced by a stone wall. Following 1596 the Turks continued work on the defensive walls, particularly on the bastions, despite the continued existence of the strengthened palisade. Following the Turkish retreat and the Rákóczi War for Freedom the walls lost their defensive importance. Today not much evidence of the town wall remains. Since the end of the 18th century the basic structure of the medieval town and its street layout have survived, with the result that it is possible to trace the outline of most of the defences with little difficulty. Interestingly, although the extents of the plots point to the position of the walls built four hundred years ago, this is the result of some inverse logic as the walls and the gates of the town postdate the street network, having been built around the town as it stood at the time. It is for this reason that the layout of the town determined the position of the walls and gates and not vice versa. 569