Lukács László (szerk.): Märkte und Warenaustausch im Pannonischen Raum - István Király Múzeum közelményei. A. sorozat 28. (Székesfehérvár, 1988)
Attila Paládi-Kovács: The Ethnography of the Markets and the Exchange of Goods in Central Transdanubia
THE ETHNOGRAPHY OF THE MARKETS AND THE EXCHANGE OF GOODS IN CENTRAL TRANSDANOBIA /The opening speech of the exhibition organized in the King Stephen Museum on the occasion of the conference/ Attila Paládi-Kovács, Budapest This exhibition portrays peasant trade, the world of markets and fairs in Central rransdan'ubia . Most of the material dates from the 19th and 20th cen turies. On the adjective "central" I have to remark that neither Hungarian Transdanubia nor the ancient province of Pannonia had a geographical centre, an "energy focus", which would have attracted the rest of the region-with an equal force. This fact is reflected in the history of urban development and traditional trade, too. The exhibition documents mainly the internal trade, the exchange of goods based on the specializations of the different localities and smaller areas of production. Nevertheless I intend to discuss external relations now. During the more than four centuries of Roman rule the province of Pannonia had trading relations mainly with Northern Italy and the Rhine region. The Pannonian import list included primarily manufactured goods, glass and bronz articles, terra sigillata and textiles. The import of wine was also significant, especially before vine-growing became common in the southern parts of the province. It is well documented by the exhibition that wine was one of the main export goods from Transdanubia in modern times. Pannonian wine was selling well par ticularly in the Styrian and Karinthian regions, once Noricum. The wine-dealers of the cities of Pozsony, Nagyszombat and Komárom transported Transdanubian white vines, especially "móri ezerjó" - a kind of vine produced in the neighbourhood of the village Mór - as far as the Slovakian and Moravian mountains. In the time of the Monarchy there was a vine-house selling vine from Mór even in Vienna. At that time most of the vine turned out in Mór, Somló and the other famous vine-growing localities was bought up already by Austrian, German and Czech vine;-dealers. In the 18th and 19th centuries the people in Transdanubia marketed mainly agricultural goods: chiefly livestock besides vine. The export of beef-cattle has an especially rich history. There are a great many sources from the 14th century up to the 17th century telling about the development of beefcattle exports. It had three main directions: 1. Italy, 2. Vienna and the South-German towns and 3. Bohemia and Moravia as well as Silesia. The Hungarian cattle-dealers and drovers were driving big, fattened oxen to the mar kets of Regensburg, Augsburg and Nurenberg in herds just like those of Venice or Breslau in size. The-scale of the trade is indicated by the fact that over one hundred thousand cattle a year were driven through the custom stations in the west. At the height of the livestock trade this figure was nearly two hundred thousand. The export of horses and sheep was also continuous and from the 18th century on there was an increase in the export of swine. 133
