A műemlékek sokszínűsége (A 28. Egri Nyári Egyetem előadásai 1998 Eger, 1998)

Előadások / Presentations - GERŐ Győző: Turkish architecture in Hungary

several steps and the adjoining small rooms are in the central space. The dome is held by pointed arches on eight stocky wall pillars without capital. The dome is also broken by several lines of concentrically situated hexagonal openings. These make the only interior decoration. The most beautiful interior of the Buda Thermal baths can be seen in Rudas bath, the Turkish green column bath, at the northern foot of Gellert Hill. Although a significant part of the bath had been ruined and even World War II did not spare it, the dome hall where the octagonal water pool with five steps is situated, stands still in its original beauty. The dome is held by pointed arched stone bends resting on eight simple pillars without any decoration. There were significantly more Turkish steam baths (hamam) than thermal baths. They were ruined or destroyed without exception. Today we know about and partly reconstruct them during excavations and on the basis of explored remains. One such bath is Memi pasha's bath built in the third quarter of the 16th century. Its groundplan is rectangular, the vestibule and the hot room (lacdarium) are square shaped, which were originally covered by a dome. The two rooms were connected by a narrow lukewarm room, the tepidarium. During excavations the air pipes of the heating system under the stone floor and the wall pillars holding the stone flooring came to light, so much so that on that basis the interior system of rooms above could be worked out. The vestibule was in especially good condition. There was a fountain in the middle, and sitting benches were built by the side walls. A walled heating recess or a fireplace provided the heating. The original stone covering of the floor remained in relatively good condition. There was an opportunity for partial restoration of the vestibule on the basis of the explored remains and the other rooms by using wide scale analogies. Valide Sultan's bath in Eger is the other Turkish steam bath which we have also managed to explore completely. Valuable and significant parts of the walls were preserved. The bath must have been built in the last years of the 16th or at the very beginning of the 17th century. Its groundplan and especially its structural construction is very similar to the aforementioned Memi pasha's bath. Its vestibule is a nearly regular square, which is connected with a narrow tepidarium to the nine divisional space of the hot room with four chambers in the corners. The rooms of the heating system joined the hot room. The depilatorium and the toilets opened from the tepidarium. The vestibule of Turkish baths was identical in both bath types, the hamam and ilidjan. Thus the exploration of the two baths enables us to deduce that the vestibules of thermal baths were like, The vestibule of the Valide sultan's bath preserved many original details, at least in traces. A fountain stood in the middle of the room here, too. Sitting benches were built along the walls. A fireplace heated the vestibule. The walls of the vestibule, which was originally covered with a dome, are standing up to two metres. The star shaped hararat, or sicaklik as the Turks call it, with chambers in four corners was covered with small cupolas. The walls of some of the corner chambers stand up to the height of horseshoe shaped pendentives marking the beginning of the cupola. The short summary also shows how varied in its monuments and how significant and interesting in its architectural and ornamental forms was the heritage left to us by the Muslim way of life from the period of Turkish rule in Hungary. Ill