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*[http://www.magyarorszag.hu/angol/ Hungarian Government Portal] – Main (governmental) portal
*[http://www.magyarorszag.hu/angol/ Hungarian Government Portal] – Main (governmental) portal
*[http://www.visitors.hu/budapest_en.html Hungary for visitors]
*[http://www.visitors.hu/budapest_en.html Hungary for visitors]
*[http://www.marta.hu/ M.Á.R.T.I. Publishing Ltd.] Publishing of MÁRTA Catalogue Hungarian, English, German and Russian languaged public illustrating with color photos. This book mostly presents hungarian products and manufacturers.
*[http://www.meh.hu/english Prime Minister of Hungary] – Official Prime Ministerial site
*[http://www.meh.hu/english Prime Minister of Hungary] – Official Prime Ministerial site
*[http://www.lonelyplanet.com/destinations/europe/hungary/index.htm Worldguide of Hungary by LonelyPlanet.com]
*[http://www.lonelyplanet.com/destinations/europe/hungary/index.htm Worldguide of Hungary by LonelyPlanet.com]

Revision as of 12:09, 18 July 2005

The Republic of Hungary (Magyar Köztársaság listenⓘ) or Hungary (Magyarország listenⓘ) is a landlocked country in Central Europe, bordered by Austria, Slovakia, Ukraine, Romania, Serbia, Croatia and Slovenia. It is known locally as the Country of the Magyars.

Magyar Köztársaság
Motto: (none current)
historical: Regnum Mariae Patrona Hungariae
Anthem: Himnusz (Isten, áldd meg a magyart)
Location of Hungary
Capital
and largest city
Budapest
Official languagesHungarian
GovernmentDemocratic republic
Foundation
• Water (%)
0.74%
Population
• January 2005 estimate
10,006,835 (82nd)
• 2001 census
10,198,315
GDP (PPP)2005 estimate
• Total
$162,289 million (49th)
• Per capita
$16,627 (43th)
CurrencyForint (HUF)
Time zoneUTC+1 (CET)
• Summer (DST)
UTC+2 (CEST)
Calling code36
ISO 3166 codeHU
Internet TLD.hu

History

Main article: History of Hungary

In the time of the Roman Empire, the Romans called the region Pannonia (west from the Danube river). After the Rome fell the Migration Period brought on many invaders. First came the Huns, who built up a powerful empire under Attila. The name “Hungary” is influenced by the name of the Hun people, although it probably comes from the name of a later, 7th century state called Onogur. After the Hunnish rule faded, Germanic tribes Lombards and Gepids ruled in Pannonia for about 100 years, during which the Slavic tribes also began migrating south. In the 560s, these were supplanted by the Avars who would maintain their supremacy of the land for over two centuries. The Franks under Charlemagne from the west and the Bulgars from the southeast finally managed to overthrow the Avars in the early 9th century. Soon after, the Franks retreated, and the Slavonic kingdom of Great Moravia and the Balaton Principality controlled much of Pannonia until the end of the century. Finally, the Magyars migrated to Hungary in the late 9th century.

Tradition holds that the Country of the Magyars (Hungary) was founded by Árpád, who led the Magyars into the Pannonian plains after 895. The Kingdom of Hungary was established in 1000 by King St. Stephen I. Initially the history of Hungary was developed in a triangle with that of Poland and Bohemia, with the many liaisons with Popes and Emperors of the Holy Roman Empire. Hungary was partially demolished with a great loss of life in 1241–1242 by Mongol (Tatar) armies of Batu Khan.

Gradually Hungary under the rule of the dynasty of the Árpáds turned into a large, independent kingdom which formed a distinct Central European culture with ties to greater West European civilisation. Matthias Corvinus ruled Hungary from 1458 to 1490. He strengthened Hungary and its government. Under his rule, Hungary (notably the northern parts, some of which are in Slovakia today) became an important artistic and cultural center of Europe during the Renaissance. Hungarian culture influenced others, for example the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth. Together with Polish and Czech lands, Hungary formed the Visegrád group of countries. Today an alliance of the same name exists again with the Czech Republic, Slovakia and Poland.

Hungarian independence ended with the Ottoman conquest at the beginning of the 16th century; the parts of Hungary that were not conquered by the Ottomans were annexed by Austria (the rulers of which were Hungarian kings at the same time) in the West, and became the independent Principality of Transylvania in the East, where thus Hungarian statedom was preserved. After 150 years, Austria and her Christian allies retook also the territory of today's Hungary by the end of the 17th century from the Ottoman Empire.

After the final defeat of the Turkish, struggle began between the Hungarian nation and the Habsburg kings for the protection of noblemens' rights (thus guarding the autonomy of Hungary). The fight against Austrian absolutism resulted in the unsuccessful popular freedom fight led by a Transylvanian nobleman, Ferenc II Rákóczi, between 1704 and 1711. The revolution and war of 1848–1849 eliminated serfdom and secured civil rights. The Austrians were finally able to prevail only with Russian help.

Thanks to the victories against Austria by the French-Italian coalition (the Battle of Solferino, 1859) and Prussia (Battle of Königgratz, 1866), Hungary would eventually, in 1867, manage to become an autonomous part of the Austro-Hungarian Empire (see Ausgleich), until the Empire's collapse following World War I. Hungary separated from Austria on October 31, 1918.

In March 1919 the communists took the power, and in April, Béla Kun proclaimed the Hungarian Soviet Republic. This government proved to be short lived; the Romanian army invaded, the communist forces were defeated and the Soviet Republic was toppled on August 6, 1919. Rightist military forces, led by the former Austro-Hungarian Admiral Miklós Horthy, entered Budapest in the wake of the Romanian army's departure and filled the vacuum of state power. In January 1920, elections were held for a unicameral assembly, and Admiral Horthy was subsequently elected Regent, thereby preserving Hungary formally as a kingdom, although there were no more Kings of Hungary (yet the former Habsburg king tried to return to power twice after this system has been founded). In June, the Treaty of Trianon was signed, fixing Hungary's borders. Compared with the pre-war Kingdom, the size and population of this new Hungary were reduced by about two-thirds. Miklós Horthy ruled with autocratic powers for most of the interwar period. Hungarian politics and culture of the era was saturated with irredentism and revisionism (the resurrection of pre-Trianon sized Hungary by whatever means it takes).

Horthy made an alliance with Nazi Germany in the 1930s, in the hope of revising the territorial losses that had followed World War I. Hungary was rewarded by Germany with historical Hungarian territories belonging to Czechoslovakia, Yugoslavia and Romania, and took an active part in World War II. However, in October 1944, Hitler replaced Horthy with the Hungarian Nazi collaborator Ferenc Szálasi and his Arrow Cross Party in order to avert Hungary's defection to the Allied side, which were constantly on schedule since the Allied invasion of Italy. During the Holocaust more than 400,000 Hungarian Jews and several tens of thousands of Roma perished.

Following the fall of Nazi Germany, Hungary became part of the Soviet area of influence and was appropriated into a communist state following a short period of democracy in 1946–1947. After 1948 Communist leader Mátyás Rákosi established a Stalinist rule in the country, which was barely bearable for the war-torn country. This led to the 1956 Hungarian Revolution/revolt and announced withdrawal from the Warsaw Pact which were met with military intervention by the Soviet Union. From the 1960's on to the late 1980's Hungary enjoyed a distinguished status of "the happiest barrack" within the Eastern bloc, under the rule of late controversial communist leader János Kádár, who exercised autocratic rule during this period. In the late 1980s, Hungary led the movement to dissolve the Warsaw Pact and shifted toward multiparty democracy and a market-oriented economy. Following the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991, Hungary developed closer ties with Western Europe, joined NATO in 1999 and joined the European Union on May 1, 2004.

See Also: Kingdom of Hungary, Hungary before the Magyars

Politics

Main article: Politics of Hungary

The President of the Republic, elected by the parliament every 5 years, has a largely ceremonial role, but powers also include appointing the prime minister. The prime minister selects cabinet ministers and has the exclusive right to dismiss them. Each cabinet nominee appears before one or more parliamentary committees in consultative open hearings and must be formally approved by the president.

The unicameral, 386-member National Assembly (the Országgyűlés) is the highest organ of state authority and initiates and approves legislation sponsored by the prime minister. National parliamentary elections are held every 4 years (the last was in April 2002). A 15-member Constitutional Court has power to challenge legislation on grounds of unconstitutionality.

Administrative divisions

Main article: Counties of Hungary

Hungary is subdivided administratively into 19 counties, in addition to which there is one capital city (főváros): Budapest. There are also 22 so-called urban counties (singular megyei jogú város), These are:

Urban countiesCounties (County Capital)

See also: List of historic counties of Hungary

Geography

Map of Hungary

Main article: Geography of Hungary

Hungary's landscape consists mostly of the flat to rolling plains of the Carpathian Basin, with hills and lower mountains to the north along the Slovakian border (highest point: the Kékes at 1,014 m). Hungary is divided in two by its main waterway, the Danube (Duna); other large rivers include the Tisza and Dráva, while the western half contains Lake Balaton, a major body of water. The largest thermal lake in the world, Lake Hévíz (Hévíz Spa), is located in Hungary. The second largest lake in the Carpathian Basin (and probably the largest artificial lake in Europe) is Lake Theiss (Tisza-tó).

Climate

Hungary has continental climate, with cold, cloudy, humid winters and warm to hot summers. Average annual temperature is 9.7°C. Temperature extremes are app. 35°C in the summer and −29°C in the winter. Average temperature in the summer is 27–32°C, and in the winter it is 0 to −15 °C. The average yearly rainfall is approximately 600 mm. A small, southern region of the country near Pécs enjoys a mediterranean climate.

The relative isolation of the Carpathian Basin makes it susceptible to droughts and the effects of global warming are already felt. According to popular opinion, and many scientists in the latest decades the country became drier, as droughts are quite common; and summers became hotter, winters became milder. Because of these reasons snow has become much more rare in the area than before. Popular opinion also states that the four-season system became a two-season system as spring and autumn are getting shorter and shorter, even vanishing some years.

Economy

Main article: Economy of Hungary

Hungary continues to demonstrate moderate-to-strong economic growth as one of the newest members of the European Union (since 2004). The private sector accounts for over 80% of GDP. Foreign ownership of and investment in Hungarian firms is widespread, with cumulative foreign direct investment totaling more than US$23 billion since 1989. Hungarian sovereign debt was upgraded in 2000 to the second-highest rating among all the Central European transition economies. Inflation and unemployment – both priority concerns in 2001 – have declined substantially, however the suicide rate remains stubbornly high. Economic reform measures such as health care reform, tax reform, and local government financing have not yet been addressed by the present government.

Demographics

Main article: Demographics of Hungary

For some 95% of the population, mostly Hungarians, the mother tongue is Hungarian, a Finno Ugric language unrelated to any neighbouring language. Several ethnic minorities exist: Roma (2%), Germans (1.2%), Romanians (0.8%), Slovaks (0.4%), Croats (0.2%), Serbs (0.2%) and Ukrainians (0.1%).

The largest religion in Hungary is Catholicism – Roman and Greek – (approx two thirds of the population), with a Calvinist minority (around 20%) and Lutherans (5%). However, these are book values, as the Hungarian population is not particularly religious; at most 25% practise their faith. Most of the country's Jews (1%) live in Budapest.

Several large Hungarian minorities exist across the border in neighbouring countries, notably in Ukraine (in Transcarpathia), Slovakia, Romania (in Transylvania), Serbia (in Vojvodina) and a smaller ones in Austria (in Burgenland), Croatia and Slovenia.

Culture

Main article: Culture of Hungary

Miscellaneous topics

General info

Pictures

History

Culture

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