Szablyár Péter: Step by step - Our Budapest (Budapest, 2010)

The chief field-guard's tower - with a stairway to the skies

■ The area's vineyards were guarded trom here

The chief field-guard’s tower - with a stairway to the skies

On the Ó-hegy (Old Hill) of Kőbánya at the Harmat utca roundabout a curious building catches the eye. The nearby bus stop is called Csősztorony - Chief Field-Guard's Tower. It is this strange-looking building that can be seen on the flag flown on the Kőbánya Town Hall and in the coat-of-arms of Kőbánya, too. According to the plaque on it, the tower was designed by a member of the third generation of architects in his family, Ferenc Brein (1818-79), whose best-known building is the Pekáry House in Király utca. His associate Lőrinc Zofahl’s name is missing from the plaque, even though it was he who made the first drafts of the building. (Of his buildings only the Röszler-Muráty House at József nádor tér and the Rottenbiller House in Váci utca can now be seen.)

The wines made in the vineyards on the slopes of Kőbánya, so popular for centuries, had been stored for centuries in the expansive network of caves left by abandoned quarries. To prevent the increasing thefts in the graperies, the town magistrate invited competitive designs for a watchtower and a field-guard’s residence in 1843, which Zofahl won. Brein supervised the construction. After the devastating phylloxera epidemic and the growth of the capital, viniculture was phased out and the tower lost its original purpose. The peculiar structure is the combination of a gable60