Körmöczi Katalin szerk.: Historical Exhibition of the Hungarian National Museum 3 - From the End of the Turkish Wars to the Millennium - The history of Hungary in the 18th and 19th centuries (Budapest, 2001)
ROOM 15. Education, Science and Culture at the End of the 19th Century (Katalin Körmöczi - Eszter Aczél - Annamária T. Németh - Edit Haider)
Their age-old yoke the people still do bear, And the fine dreams of their devotees vanish into air. Thanks to the 19th-century cult of the artist fostered in the National Museum, mementos of outstanding figures in literary, theatre and musical life can be shown, commemorating their art and their creative lives. Next to the portraits of Ferenc Liszt and Ferenc Erkel (Fig. 64), there is an uncensored placard from 1868 for Erkel's opera "György Dózsa" and for the premier of his opera "Bánk bán". Notable is the cimbalom, signed "Franz Tischinant, vormals Hackhofer, Instrumentmacher Pesth Jahr, 1861 Gewölb Untere Donauzeile in Nemeshegyischen Hause No. 1". The cimbalom, an instrument of Asian origin, is first mentioned in Hungary in the 15th century, and from the 18th century onwards was regularly used by gypsy ensembles. Similarly to the tárogató, the cimbalom became a symbol of independence in the second half of the 19th century. It was first used in a full-scale orchestra instrument by Ferenc Erkel in "Bánk bán". CULTS AT THE END OF THE CENTURY The mandolin of Mme Jókai, née Róza Laborfalvy; the conductor's batons of Ferenc Liszt and Pongrác Kacsóh, table decorations, a ceremonial feather and a medal are themes which belong together with regard both to form and to theory. Cults at the end of the century manifested themselves in different ways: laurel wreaths; JózsefSzentpétery, goldsmith of National Romanticism; Romantic Hungarian historical painting; and cults linked to persons - to Kossuth, to Queen Elizabeth and to Francis Joseph. They reflected the taste and tmnking of the age, Romantic national consciousness and Historicism, using a variety of means recalling the eclectic past. In recalling this past, the age was not lacking in theatrical manifestations of national self-esteem that were somewhat deceptive. The prints, commemorative kerchiefs and the elaborately ornamented graves of Batthyány, Kossuth and the Arad Martyrs fostered the memory of 1848, while the cults of "Our Father Kossuth " and "Francis Joe " coexisted alongside each other. Of the cultic objects, special mention should be made of Queen Elizabeth's silk bodice, preserved as a relic, in which she was stabbed to death in Geneva on September 10, 1898. The queen's tragic end only increased the sympathy which had earlier existed for her person, which was the object of a national cult and national feelings stemming from the contradictory relationship between the Hungarians and Francis Joseph. The material housed in the glass cabinet presenting silver wreaths has more than just ideological content. It is closely connected with Historicism, which spanned the whole century, and which essentially represented not only the official art of the century, but also its view of history. Prize money and prizes of other kinds were the means by which the leading strata of society, patrons of the arts, associations and the cultural administration, could support the creation of art works. Besides winning prizes, artists could count on the homage of the public, since on their jubilees as artists they were acclaimed with wreaths made of silver or of gold. As incontrovertible proof of the historycreating relic cult even at the end of the
