There are enormous efforts in the world to conserve and protect the world heritage sites both natural and cultural. Most WH sites are managed by special agencies, like churches, towns and cities major’s offices, special protection heritage bodies etc. Only a few among the world heritage sites are small rural villages, where the local population still inhabits the protected places. These protected rural architectural ensembles are considered as places of living heritage. Not only tourism and globalization but the everyday life of local people with their interests has an impact on the protected values while their life is also part of the world heritage. One can raise the question? How to protect these sites, if the everyday life of local people is directly or indirectly incorporated into the heritage? What are the roles for the local population, (normally the real inheritors of the cultural and architectural heritage) the authorities, monument protection and other bodies involved in the protection?
Hollókő was awarded the title in 1987, 1 year after the Budapest Cultural Forum and under the Helsinki process and détente. The village has gone through three overall phases of transformation and adaptation during the XX. century. Originally they represented a poor peasant local society. These agricultural self-sufficient communities first had been turned
towards industry and then to tourism.
The symbolic path of development had started with a closed agricultural community and ended up with service oriented or ‘forced to be open to tourism’ community. The village has been transformed from a ‘place of living from agriculture’ to a ‘place of lifestyle for tourism’. The pressure of modernisation on the lives of local
people meant continuous
disempowerment, a long history of outside control and intervention, outward-migration of young people, loss of workplaces etc.
1 DEVELOPMENT STAGES OF HOLLÓKŐ IN THE 20TH AND 21ST CENTURY
Hollókő is a small, rural village in North-East Hungary. Hollókő’s architectural heritage consists of an old village with 55 protected houses, a church, and the ruined castle above the village. The village was rebuilt after the 1909 fire and represents traditional Hungarian (Palóc) rural architecture from the late 1800’s. Protection of the village’s architectural and cultural heritage began at the beginning of the 1960’s and the old part of Hollókő, the vernacular architectural ensemble, was inscribed to the WH list in 1987.
1 THE MAIN TRANSFORMATION PHASES OF HOLLÓKŐ
By the data of the 1900 census, Hollókő was a small village with 440 inhabitants. 94 p.c. of the earners dealt with agriculture, majority of them were small scale landowners, tenants, agricultural labourers, servants and their family members. Those who had 10-20 cadastral yoke (slightly more than half hectar, 5755m2) land were considered as rich. There was still a blacksmith, 4 pub owners, 4 home servants and two public employees.
After the World War 1, a demographic transition resulted in a significant increase in the size of the population.
The lack of land and the difficulties of daily life pushed local men to nearby coal mines from the thirties onward.
This transformation from agriculture to industry among men and the population increase resulted the first significant change in the life of the village between the thirties and the fifties. The miners’ wages above the average inspired the younger generation to leave the small houses in the old village where three generations lived together and built a new village above the old one. It is symbolic that the territory was called the “Holy Land”.
The second big change in the village was the agricultural collectivization. The families in Hollókő as well as in other villages had to take their lands, animals, and means of production to the common cooperative farm. This new organisational form of agriculture moved women from the traditional household chores.
The third big change started at the beginning of the seventies and during the following two decades 40 % of the population left the village mainly the young generation born after the WWII. The factors of the population loss among others were the closing down of coalmines, the machine and chemical use in agriculture, the favourable conditions in towns nearby to get employment and apartments, the attractions of modern life, the lack of infrastructure and drinking water in the village.
The monument protection interventions had started in the old part of the village and local people did not foresee that it could bring them any benefit in the future. They were happy to sell the abandoned small houses for monument protection purposes. By the end of the eighties after three decades of monument protection interventions there were 55 protected houses and the church in the old village and this folk architectural ensemble was inscribed to the Unesco World Heritage list as the first living village.
The political changes at the beginning of the nineties also resulted a new stage in the life of the local community. Local people could establish their own self-government, which reclaimed the nationalized houses for its own ownership. Half of the nationalized houses had been returned while the other half remained in the property of the county council. During the nineties the outmigration and population loss continued. The village became a popular tourist site, mainly entrepreneurs from outside started providing services for tourists. This period is characterised by constant lack of resources and attempts for applying funds from ministries with very little success. The former umbrella organisation (Development Committee for Hollókő) of the seventies and eighties, which was able to designate funds for monument protection was abolished by the first major and in the new political system a small village even with WH title was not able to gain enough funds from the government.
In 1998 a young new leadership came and tried to change the position of the village. Instead of begging from ministries they started successfully applying from the EU pre-accession funds and later the Structural Funds. Due to these funds a relative richness in available resources could be obtained and the leaders of Hollókő were able to win significant amount of money for protection and development. The previous begging from ministries ceased to exist. In most cases their application under the WH label was supported. In this period they were able to maintain their primary school and kindergarten which attracted young couples to stay or move back to the village so the population loss did not continue in the first decade of 2000.
Nevertheless the ‘abundance’ of available financial resources did not bring a strategic thinking and a systematic management by the local decision makers. Instead, a ‘chasing for money approach’ for different purposes existed. Hectic and non-consequent local policy and lack of local expertise in managing big projects resulted several failures, poor planning and management.
Due to UNESCO requirements a strategic management plan was approved by the village and also by the authorities in 2005 but since its approval only few measures have been implemented. The strategic objectives to revitalize the old village and bring new employment for young people were not fulfilled at all. The regional monument protection authority does not have appropriate capacity to actively participate in the management of the old village.
1.2 DIFFERENT PARADIGMS OF MONUMENT PROTECTION INTERVENTIONS
Heritage protection and tourism development under state socialism was the task of state agencies. State intervention (state money) was not allowed to support private ownership in Hungary. On behalf of the state, the Tourist Office of the County Council bought up the houses in the old village for conservation by the Monument Protection Authority.
In Hollókő two protection plans (Mendele 1968; Komjáthy 1981), had been prepared and implemented during the main protection and conservation period from the sixties to the end of the eighties. The conservation process focused only on the objects and forms, attention was paid only to the old houses and buildings. The aim was to protect the built and natural environment and not the whole of the local society. It was envisaged, that artists, craftsmen, urban intelligentsia, who were allowed to buy up the protected houses could be the appropriate social group to protect and maintain the local heritage. Local people, as the real successors of the heritage, in the eyes of outside experts seemed spoiled ‘by modern life’ who did not appreciate the heritage of their parents and grandparents. Local people have not been considered as possible guardians of that heritage but as persons who are not interested in the protection and do not understand why it is necessary to conserve the old houses.
The nomination to the WH in the context of the Helsinki process in the second part of the eighties was more a political act as a community empowerment. The UNESCO WH Committee by the proposal of ICOMOS recorded the following outstanding universal values for Hollókő:
“Hollókő is not a museum village”… but a “living community with agriculture”… which “…guarentees its success to its preservation.”
Another argument was that Holloko is “…an exceptional and extraordinary example of preserving a traditional village on its original site.” In this framework the renewed narrow strips of land parcels of family gardening opposite to the old village and the “ecological balance in the forests” had been restored, “paying much attention to the authenticity of the site.” Finally the values of Hollókő represent the “the traditional forms of country life all over Central Europe, which life practically vanished in the 20th century…”.
25 years later this famous living community wrestles with serious problems. The protected old village which used to have more than 400 inhabitants now have about 20-30 old people living in it meanwhile it became a tourism venue. The majority of local people
are retired and live in the new village as a backstage to the old village.
The agricultural activity is almost disappeared, the strip cultivation on the opposite hillside of the old village is abandoned, the pasture with trees became a forest because grazing ceased to exist long time ago. The values and traditions are under the threat of modern life. The excursion type of tourism which has been evolved during the decades is not very favourable for the community. The WH village is able to gain significant amount of money for protection, however it seems that it is a never ending story with increasing cost spiral, meanwhile the old village is gradually abandoning.
A Study guide for exploring the case of the Living World Heritage Site, Hollókő
5Hollókő was inscribed to the WH list in 1987. In the world politics it was the period of detente and glasznyoszt but the Berlin wall as the symbol of divided Europe was standing still.
The 30 years of monument protection and conservation work in Hollókő was concluded in the WH title. Fifty years later and after 25 years of holding this privileged title the village faces new challenges. The need for permanent preservation on one hand and the demand and competition for tourists on the other. Third and very important factor is that the WH site is a living village, a vulnerable small community.
In order to fully understand the concerns and threats to the WH village I would recommend the following study guide to get acquinted with different aspects of management. I suggest to use the management plan as a reading document and I will designate some chapters which are necessary to understand the changes and transformation of Hollókő. I recommend two paths for studying these conflicts. One path is the Unesco World
Heritage in general, the values, regulation on the UNESCO website. The other path is the story of Hollókő, which can be followed through the chapters of the management plan.
The reason of recent concern is the firm intention of the local and county government to touristically develop the village. It is planned to double the number of visitors and create new attractions.
These intentions do not care too much about the original ideas of the first planners and also those values which are the base of the WH title. Hollókő has arrived to a kind of crossroad.
Suggested Readings for Reflection:
Heritage Site Management Plan - Table of Contents Excerpts from the Management Plan:
The local community The last 100 years of Hollókő
Interventions to protect monuments in Hollókő and plans Recommendation by ICOMOS
Hollókő scenarios - images of the future?
The strategic goals of Hollókő Annex 1: Bibliography
World Heritage Center: STATE of CONSERVATION of WORLD HERITAGE PROPERTIES in EUROPE: HUNGARY -Old Village of Hollókő and its Surroundings