Benda Gyula: A keszthelyi uradalom 1850 előtti hagyatéki és vagyoni összeírásai 1. - Keszthely 1711-1820 (A Néprajzi Múzeum forráskiadványai 1; Budapest, 1988)
Summary
SUMMARY The present volume is the first of a series of source-books launched by the Museum of Ethnography. The series shall carry the title "Documents of the Communities of Market Towns and Villages". The aim of the publication is to make available the documents of peasant communities which are of historic-ethnographic interest. The first volume is a collection of probate inventories of a smaller region (the settlements of an estate), under the title:"The probate inventories of the Estate of Keszthely before 1850. I. Keszthely 1711-1820". The Preface by Tamás Hoffmann evaluates the research collecting and investigating probate inventories conducted by the Museum of Ethnography since 1978 from the perspective of the latest historic-ethnographic projects, he argues that this type of research has been stimulated by the growing interest in daily events and everyday life. The statistical analysis of all the assets, objects of households, included in the inventories and through this the reconstruction of styles of life also help museums in their evaluation of their collections. The comprehensive analysis of the inventories, a new approach to the world of objects may help to a better understanding of the processes of transformation between the traditional and modern in their European context. The Introduction by Gyula Benda presents a brief survey on the town's history, the society of the 18-th and 19-th centuries, and describes probating in the small town and the large estate administering it, as well as on the county level. Finally he gives the characteristic features of the probate inventories and the principles behind the publication of the texts. Keszthely is a small town xu Western Hungary on the north-eastern corner of Lake Balaton. In the 16-th and 17-th centuries its Franciscan monastery served as a fort against Turkish attacks. It was inhabited by free soldiers. The 18-th
