The Eighth Tribe, 1977 (4. évfolyam, 1-12. szám)

1977-04-01 / 4. szám

Page 8

THE EIGHTH TRIBE

April, 1977

Empire, it also put an end to the political unity of the Carpathian Basin. The resulting political vacuum in the area permitted several former Avar subjects to arise, and others to extend their control into the lands of the Middle Danube. Thus, it was the fall of the Avar Empire that permitted the rise of the first West Slavic state, the so-called Great Moravian Empire, which gained control over the northwestern section of the Carpathian Basin. This same political vacuum also made it possible for a small Pannon-Slavic (Slovenian) principality to develop under Frankish tutelage in the region of Lake Balaton. And it was also the collapse of Avar power that permitted the Bulgarians to extend their control into the Hungarian Lowlands and Transylvania. (It should perhaps be mentioned here that according to a new hypothesis advanced by Professor Imre Boba, the Hungarian Lowlands were in fact under the control of the Great Moravian Empire. That state, however, was centered not in the northwestern regions of the Carpathian Basin, but on the Southern Morava River, in the vicinity of Belgrade. While accepting the possibility of Boba’s hypothesis, Prof. G. László also sees the likelihood of two separate Moravian states in the ninth century.)

Thus, at the end of the ninth century, when Árpád’s Magyars had arrived, the Carpathian Basin was basically the frontier region of three separate states. One of these, the (northern) Moravian state was already on the decline. Frankish control over Pannonia (Trans-Danubia) was almost nominal. And this was also true for the Lowlands and Transylvania, where Bulgarian (or southern Moravian) control was almost nonexistent. Moreover, most of the region was sparsely inhabited, with the majority of the inhabitants composed of the remnants of various Celtic, Germanic, Sarmatian and Slavic tribes.

What about the Avars? Up to recently, it has generally been assumed that they have disappeared, either through extermination by the Franks, or through assimilation by the Slavs. While this view is still held by many, it has been undermined by recent archeological finds and by the scholarly conclusions of Professor G. László of the University of Budapest, who formulated the theory of the “double conquest.”

Briefly, Professor László’s ingenious hypothesis holds that there were two separate Magyar conquests of the Carpathian Basin, one in 671, and one in 896. This view rhymes well with Magyar national traditions, as reflected by medieval chronicles. But instead of the Hunnic conquest of the early fifth century, László believes that the first Magyar conquest was the invasion of the “Late Avars” of 671. László and several

23

The

T ransylvanian-Hungarian Question

(Elemér Illyés in Pittsburgh) Gregory B. McGregor

Our age is characterized, among others, by a number of developments which are shocking to a person of traditional morality and conservative convictions. Crime, chaos and the decline of personal and public morality appears to be the most significant characteristic of these final decades of the twentieth century. Yet, side by side with these bewildering developments, there are also certain trends which seem to indicate that, nothwithstanding our society’s growing disintegration, our age places an ever increasing emphasis upon the protection of basic human rights. In fact, “human rights” appears to have become one of the most popular and frequently used watchwords of our time. Why? Because basic human rights are still denied to a large segment of humanity.

The violation of human rights, the oppression of the individual or the human collective can take many forms, and it can be directed against a wide spectrum of political, national, religious and ethnic minorities. But the worst kind of oppression is that which combines the “political oppression” of an atheistic totalitarian state with the “national oppression” of a chauvinistic national state. And while this kind of oppression is increasingly rare in the more advanced sections of our world, it still does exist even in the very heart of Europe.

One of the most distasteful examples of such a dual oppression is the case of the Hungarian minority in Roumania, or more specifically, Transylvania. That eastern province of the former Kingdom of Hungary (which was acquired by Roumania after World War I) is now under the iron rule of the neo- Stalinist and chauvinistic regime of Nicolae Ceausescu, who appears to be bent on forcibly denationalizing Roumania’s three and a half million national minorities, including two and a half million Hungarians. Although pursued with vigor and sophistication, this policy appears to be incredible to most of us Americans. The primary reason for our disbelief is the widespread assumption that the so-called “socialist states” of Eastern Europe are dedicated to the principles which they call “proletariat internationalism” and the “Leninist principle of national equality.” They certainly pride themselves of allegedly having eradicated “bourgeois nationalism.” The present government of Hungary does seem to go out of its way to extend complete equality to all of the country’s national minorities, even though they are very few in number. But this does not hold true for Roumania. As a matter of fact, there the whole governmental bureaucracy is involved in the wholesale violation of the above-mentioned principles of the “socialist world.” While outwardly the Roumanian government does pay lipservice to the principle of national equality, it employs all the sophisticated methods of a modern totalitarian state for the eradication of its national minorities.

The specific methods and the frightening results of this policy of forced denationalization are detailed in the thoroughly documented scholarly work by Elemér Illyés: Erdély változása (Transylvania’s Transformation), 2nd ed., Munich: Aurora, 1976. We have also learned about some of these oppressive measures from the author him-