Szegő Dóra - Szegő György: Synagogues - Our Budapest (Budapest, 2004)
The Lajos utca Synagogue
tions—they had to pay taxes and keep their businesses closed on Christian holidays. Jews mainly coming from Bohemia and Moravia to live on the estates of the Zichy counts in 1712 formed the first modern Jewish community on the territory of Hungary's present-day capital. They leased an out-of-use ale-house (brewery and inn) from the Zichys, together with apartments and shops. The first Jew of Óbuda known by name was Jacob Fleisch, a regular commissioner to the Zichy Palace. The Jewish congregation of Óbuda was allowed to function with the same legitimacy as the town's Christian congregation. Unlike in mediaeval times, there was no segregated Jewish quarter in the 18th and 19th centuries, but Jews lived scattered in various locations of the settlement, even though their houses were usually arranged in the vicinity of their communal buildings. The centre, in what is Lajos utca today, was called Jewish street at the time, just like the Jewish quarter of the Castle area. The first study- and prayer-house of the community on the Wagenmeister estate fell victim to an inheritance dispute between the dowager Mrs Péter Zichy, neé Zsuzsanna Bercsényi, and her foster-son Ferenc Zichy. Countess Bercsényi, who eventually won the dispute and came into possession of Óbuda, permitted the erection of a new prayer-house. Built in the Jewish Square (Judenplatz), south of today’s Óbuda synagogue, the construction was completed in 1732. The congregation was made up of merchants and artisans. Although the majority were travelling pedlars, they would later play an important part in the establishment of Hungary's manufacturing industry, especially its silk and textile factories. The best-known of them were the Goldbergers, whose two- storey blue-dye factory stood on the plot of today's 136 Lajos utca, where a slab in the wall commemorates their name. Made of low-quality materials by inept builders, the condition of the old synagogue soon deteriorated to such an extent that the congregation submitted a request for permission to build a new prayer-house. The new synagogue built on its present-day site (at 163 Lajos utca) in 1769 was designed by Máté Nepauer, the celebrated church-builder of the 18th century. He had built the St. Florian Chapel in Fő utca and the Franciscan Church on Margit körút, a fact indicating that the Óbuda Jews now had equal status with other city burghers. The limestone and marble building had a slightly lengthened but overall centralized ground plan. This pattern, which had emerged in the Polish and Moravian Baroque synagogue architecture of the 16th—17th centuries, is characterised by its barrel vault supported in the middle by the bimah and accentuated by four central pillars. The form was imported by Polish Jews seeking shelter in Hungary from the Hmelnickij pogroms. '7
