Szatmári Gizella: Walks in the Castle District - Our Budapest (Budapest, 2001)

siege of 1686, to be rebuilt under Charles III, Maria Theresa and Joseph II—in the 18th century—in Baroque or Louis XVI style.

Walk One

BÉCSI KAPU TÉR—TÁNCSICS MIHÁLY UTCA—HESS ANDRÁS TÉR— FORTUNA UTCA

We enter the burghers’ town—the Castle District, that is—via Bécsi kapu, or Vienna Gate. As popular belief has it, the arcades in the medieval walls of the gate built near what was once an important commercial centre were hung with the legendary warrior Miklós Toldi’s weapons, to the astonishment of ail and sundry. The walls were reduced to little more than rubble during the battles that raged here in 1686. The gate was thereafter partially rebuilt during the reign of Charles III, but in 1896, the year of the Millenary Celebrations, it was pulled down. The present shape dates from 1936.

The square is a memorial site devoted to the memory of Buda’s recapture from the Turks. The visitor is reminded of this even outside, on the castle wall, by Margit Kovács’s small glazed colour plaque (1977), which refers to the name, itself under official protection, of Ostrom utca—Siege Street.

After it was taken with a clever ruse by the Turks, the city was held by the enemy who thwarted the Hapsburg army’s repeated attempts—the first in 1542 and anothThe capture of the Buda Castle (Gyula Benczúr, 1896)

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