Buza Péter: Spring and Fountains - Our Budapest (Budapest, 1994)

country’s reconstruction after the Mongol invasion and who was thus to be known as the second founder of Hungary. The spring was given its name, which appears shortened to Béla Well, in 1847 when every stretch of land and remarkable geographical feature in the region was given a new name on a festive occasion initiated by Gábor Döbrentei and his friends. Before that, the spring had simply been known as Királykát; it was called Királ bunár bairi, which also means King’s Well, even in Turkish times. This can only be seen as a reference to the well-known fact that the water welling forth from this spring located about two hundred metres above Várhegy [Castle Hill] was taken by the force of gravity to the royal seat in Buda through a pipeline whose existence is well proved as early as King Mátyás Corvinus’ time. (The spring is also mentioned, in the early phase of its history, as Corvinus Spring.) The spring was fully and properly built up, which included the re-erection of a small well-house in 1777 as part of the above- mentioned pipe renewal project. What made the latter urgent at the time was the sudden growth of the city’s population when the University was moved from Nagyszombat to Buda.

The only decoration on the small building is a plaque fixed to the wall to commemorate its “baptism” in 1847. The inscription reveals the identity of the person who erected the plaque:

BÉLA KIRÁLY KÜTA Állíttatá e jelkövet KOlCS PÁL H. ÜGYVÉD 1847-beli junius 12. napján emlékéül, melyen sz.k.

BUDA ns. fővárosa e kegyes és magyar néven kihirdetteté

(King Béla's Well. This plaque was placed here by the lawyer Pál Koics on 12 June 1847 to commemorate the naming of the well by the municipality of the capital Buda with its sacred and Hungarian designation).

Városkút [Town Well], a twin spring of the above, is accessible via Béla király út. This one has several names, too. The Turkish called it Kászim pasha’s spring. After it was destroyed during the siege it had to be rediscovered (surgeon-major Everling Eberhardt, who happened to be in the vicinity in 1688, must be given the credit for doing so). It was sometimes called Doktor-kút [Doctor's Well], and sometimes Orvos-kút [Surgeon’s Well], Döbrentei gave it a “more Hungarian” name: Nádor-kűt [Palatine Well], since Palatine Joseph had supposedly had water brought from here (among other places).

There is no doubt that this spring was connected to the

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