Prohászka László: Polish Monuments - Our Budapest (Budapest, 2001)

Polish-Hungarian relations look back upon a history which extends over a thousand years. From the Árpád House to the Jagellos, Báthory and General Józef Bem, from the suffering inflicted by the two World Wars to the present, the histories of the two peoples are connected by a myriad threads. Co-operation in science, culture and the arts has a similarly rich tradition.

Poland and Polish history are still present in Budapest today. Walking in the Hungarian capital we may pass a number of statues and monuments which are imbued with Polish history. The Kerepes cemetery is the final resting-place of the Poles who fell in the 1848-49 War of Independence, the cemetery of Rákoskeresztúr of those who were killed during World War 11.

This book is a historical and artistic guide through the past and to the present. Inviting the reader for an imaginary walk through the city, it pinpoints public monuments of Polish interest, describing the reasons for which they were put up and their historical background. The words of the inscriptions on the statues, reliefs and memorial plaques are usually reproduced literally. (For reasons of space the work does not contain an exhaustive list of tombstones or give an overview of the materials of Polish interest held in museums, although exceptions are made in a few cases of unique importance.)

A Shared History

The history of relations between Poland and Hungary has been eventful and varied. Economic and cultural contacts have been of varying intensity but they have been constantly maintained, and the same holds of political relations at the state level. There have been periods in which there was hardly a political contact worth mentioning between the two nations, but these are offset by periods defined by the closest of legal bonds between the two states, which were sometimes even ruled by the same king.

Saint Ladislas, the knight king who was canon5