Szegő Dóra - Szegő György: Synagogues - Our Budapest (Budapest, 2004)
Beginnings in Pest: the Former Orczy House and the Synagogues of the Association
Damaged during the 1944 siege of Budapest, the synagogue was ordered demolished by the authorities. The Jewish cemetery next to the Szarvas (today Batthyány) utca military graveyard lying outside the lower city wall had earlier been cleared away, a casualty of urban development. Beginnings in Pest: the Former Orczy House and the Synagogues of the Association For a century after the Turks were driven out of the country, Jews were banned by law from Pest as well as Buda. They were not allowed to sojourn temporarily in the city or even to cross it in transit. The first concession was made in 1755 when a decree permitted transit and attendance of fairs. In the 1760s Jews were already allowed to stay in the city for a determined, and short, period of time as keepers of temporary restaurants. There were, however, Jewish residents of Pest as early as that in the legal capacity of comoran& ("those who stay temporarily") with a residence permit valid for an unspecified period of time. What brought a significant breakthrough was the decree granting freedom of worship issued by Joseph II as mentioned above. This curtailed the right of municipalities to prevent Jews from settling, as yet in the capacity of lease-holders only, in the cities. The first Jews of Pest mostly came from Óbuda and Újlak, attracted by the markets. The weekly fairs on Tuesday and Saturday had been open to everybody by a decree passed in Buda back in 1689. (Jews were de facto excluded from fairs held on Saturday, their Sabbath.) Leopold II permitted another three weekly fairs in 1689 on the Mondays of the weeks when St. Medardus' Day, St. John's Day and St. Leopold's Day were celebrated. These were more favourable for Jewish merchants, and the more advantageous position of the Pest Market on the bank of the Danube—the Quay Market (at today's Roosevelt tér) and the Market Square (Erzsébet tér)—eclipsed the Buda Fair. Jewish merchants initially settled the outlying district of Terézváros (Theresa Town), outside the city walls. Compared to those who commuted from distant locations toiling their way through heavy traffic to the markets, the position of the local Jewry was highly advantageous. That was how the integration of Hungary’s Jews into the bourgeois society of Pest began, even though they were not allowed to buy property here until 1840. An additional reason motivating their settlement in Terézváros was the fact that there had been Jews living since earlier times around the building of Charles Barracks (the House of Invalids), a structure erected from plans by Anton Erhard 22
