RECENT ASPECTS OF THE DEVELOPMENT OF THE HUNGARIAN SETTLEMENT NETWORK

RECENT ASPECTS OF THE DEVELOPMENT OF THE HUNGARIAN SETTLEMENT NETWORK

WITHIN THE EUROPEAN STRUCTURE

After Settlement History and Theory Investigations hy Dr. Jeno I1Iajor

R. NYITR.4..Y Department of Town Planning, Technical University of Budapest, H-1521

Received: November 10. 1989 Presented by: Prof. Dr. Tam~ls }!egyesi

Ahstract

Due to investigations by Dr. J cno Major on settlement history and theory, main trends of Hungarian urbanization and settlement network development offer an insight into the de- velopment of European settlement network. His partly archival - research results underly- ing settlement science methodology are without precedence. It is attempted to fit development aspects of the Hungarian settlement network to the new regional structures of the to-be Unit- ed States of Europe. A survey is given of the rapid urbanization process in Hungary after the Mongol invasion, of periods of mediaeval urbanization surges, as well as of the settlement net- work of industrializing-capitalizing Hungary.

Inter-war settlement development, and urbanization surge after World War II point to he intensity of relations between town aud country.

Dr. Jeno Major has published his study on thc bcginnings of thc dcyelop- mcnt of Hungarian towns and settlement net,\'ork* with the intcntion to soon report on his latest findings. His available manuscripts probabilize this intention. But his unforesecn decease interrupted the puhlication of his recognitions from the examination of 11th-12th-century markets and "mar- ketplaces" .

His theoretical statements on these factors to he determinant permit to disclose regions of settlement groups functionally coherent with the market- places, as well as their structural features. A unique conception has been to transfer effects of production processes, beliefs, habits and market functions on the fahric of settlement groups. His ideas on the later destiny of these mar- ketplaces disclose mediaeval Hungarian urhanization; relations hetween vil- lages deyeloped from marketplaces; marketplaces and oppidums; peculiarities of marketplaces developed into towns.

Also grounds of the rapid dcyclopment of Hungarian urhanization after the Mongol invasion have heen cleared. Thus, the historical continuity can be

,. Periodica Polytechnica, Arch. No. 1-2 (Vo!. 32) 1988.

222 R. SYITIUY

trackcd by means of his mental legacy, of an actualness cvident from that at present, perspectives of the Hungarian settlement network can be realistically approximated as to fit European regional structures, settlement fabric. The underlying research approach hy

J

Hc could not kecp his promise to continue. made to readers of the Perio- diea. His mental legacy is known to comprise outstanding achievements of four decades fo fundamental research on settlement history and settlement geog- raphy. Being an authority in his specialfield, hewas rather humhle and modest.

His untimely decease prevented him from collecting his ceuvre, of universal European significance hy laying the foundations of the methodology of set- tlement history research.

Essentials of the Development of Hungarian Urhanization and Settlement Network [12]

Five surges of urbanization in Hungary may he distinguished.

The first urhan settlements arose about the estahlishment of the Hun- garian Kingdom.

The Hungarian name for a town, "varos" - meaning a fortified place - might arise at that time, denoting royal seats and centres of royal estates - counties. And although according to European concepts of that age, part arc hardly a kind of a town, and most of them never will he, others have become dynamic members of the Hungarian settlement net·work.

Social-economical conditions of marked medieval urhanization arose in the second half of the 13th century (after the Mongol invasion) when several settlements were granted urhan privileges hy kings. This second surge affected deeper layers of population, and he side royal towns, landlords' privileged towns, so-called oppidums developed. Towns evicted agriculture, villages were abandoned by cTafts, Teflecting the scheme of devdopment of feudal society. This surge of urbanization decayed in the 15th centmy, namely under the influence of West-European, mainly South-German mhanization, po·wer relations were rearranged. Positive tendencies hecame invigorated hy Western export, trade roads, offer and demand in Emopean markets. A peculiar horough development took place, resulting in a to"wn network in the Great Hungarian Plain - Dehrecen, Szeged, Kecskemet - mainly trade road-side settlements.

This mediaeval surge of mhanization smoothed hy the end of the 15th centmy, after Tmkish wars in the 16th and 17th centuries, ending political unity of this country, so mhanization underwent a period of depression. The third - peculiar - smge of mbanization consisted in a colonial-feudal re-

DEVELOP_lIK'iT OF TIlE }JUSCARIAS SETTLEJIEST ,YETTFORK 223 construction. W ordly nobility hardly participated in town huilding, except towns - Sopron, Pozsony - near the royal scat. Mainly palaces have been huilt in the countryside, of them some have become national centres of litera- ture, arts, music. By means of constitutional authorities created to delimit royal power, nohility contrihuted to create county seats. Meanwhile the con- solidating bourgeoisie fights for autonomy. Clerical nohility follows foreign cxamples of baroque town planning and of building cathedrals, episcopal pal- aces, prebendal homes, seminaries,'well-equipped ecclesiastic secondary and high schools, all these constituting significant urban complexes, town districts.

Industrializing Austrian provinces encourage Hungarians to cereal culti- vation, hoosting centres of agriculture and of transport, and the cereal boom is responsihle for the rapid growth of agrarian towns (horoughs) fast outgrowing by population the industrial-husiness towns.

The fomth surge is launched hy mid-19th ccntury capitalism. Urhan administrative, cultmal and husiness functions are multiplying, still enhanced hy the abolition of feudalism, hy the hringing up of intellectual capitalists as the leading stratum, hy the deyelopment of rail-way network and of up-to-date transports. The manufactming industry re-ranks cities. Boroughs in the Great Hungarian Plain are again overtaken hy other towns, while concentration and ups,,-ing of development factors of what is to hecome Budapest are over- whelming.

The fifth urbanization surge started after W orlel War H, essentially due to widening and intensification of connections hetween towns and the coun- tryside, and to industrialization. It is featured by planned management of town development resources, and extension of the urhan network hy creating new towns for increasing industrial production.

Inter-War Settlement Development in Hungary [15]

This study relies on data of the 1930 census, concerning thc 8.7 million in- hahitants of this country distributed between 3419 communities averaging 2540.

This favourahle average conceals the extremities of the order of magnitude of our settlements. Settlements' populations were of the following distribution:

The settlement are clearly of a rather heterogeneous order of magnitude hinting to serious circumstances. Rather than to be uniformly distrihuted throughout the country, settlements of different population numhers are in different regions due to historical deyelopment and to natmal features. The actual settlement network is essentially similar. In particular, as Lajos Tirring systematized it, 1.353.513 inhahitants or Upper Transdanubia were distri- huted among 865 settlements averaging 1565, much below the national average.

An enhanced frittering away was found in South-Transdanubia with 1.331.183

Table 1.

Variation of orders of Illup;nitude of seuknwnts from J 9] 0 to ] (H 1

YenI' 5--10 tholl!;nnds 10-20 thol1~ntllb 20--<)()

I 2 I 1

50--100 thow-lllIHl .... 100 --1;)0 thOllSilllIl"

I I

~~-.--.~----".-_.-

1910 ^~. 27A 17 252.1 2B B60.0 ;, _:l:\1.O lIB.:]

1920 :3 19.:\ In ^{272.9 26 !H2.B 6} :\<1.9.6 2 12(,.B

1930 :3 2:U 16 21!.B.2 25 791.9 9 56().7 2 2;' :l.:l

191\·1 2 IB.5 13 195.0 2!l BB:1.0 9 ^{(,1.1 .} .'1 :\ :172.1 - 11umber of tOWllS in each catep;ory

2 - POpullltioll (thousands) of the tOWIl in lhllt eatcp;ory

Number of

Se Ulcmen ts IllhahitanlS Average

B"low 500

7;'0 257 l).Brl·

:3¹B

5tll-- 1000

95:\

69¹j. H(H 729

Table 2

Size catep;ories and populations of a<lllliuistrativc units in 19:\0*

10tl1- 2000

B57 1 203 B50 l ,,·05

~t)01-.

:lOOO

:3:lO B02 !ltI·(l 2 rJ.:l:l

:1001 5000

25:3

1)()2 91:\

:1 B06

5001--- ]0000

lid l 0720:19 66;'<)

I!I000~

20000

66 B71 628

1:1206

,n

99S 9^rj.B ,\0 1 HO

", ... 1 million 2

HBO.<) 929.7 10()(;.2 1165.0

50000-- 100000

9 56of. 9B9 62777

;'6 S(i 56 56

OV('1'

100000

:1

12;'72¹1.() 1.19 ono

'I'olal

2/J.(i9.7 2;;·1.1.1 2B9/1·.6 :12-1.7.0

Tulul

:1¹1.15 B 6B:\ 72() 25¹1.;\

* Data I'dying ou atlllliuistrativc unit IHlrtlJllcters. The syst'ml of administrative units relics ⁰¹¹ principles in laws issued ill the IB70s, somewhat deviatillp; from I'eal sctt.lement couditiolls. lIere 6B3 settlements had a lolal

or

Hence, in these regiolls, settlement: units lells than thc national average prevaile,!.

~

:=c

~

::5 ...,

'"

"'

DEVELOP.HEST OF THE IiU;YGARIA.Y SETTLEJIEST SETTlORK 225 inhabitants in 1137 settlements, averaging 1171. The mountainous region in North Hungary had a settlement structure similar to that in North Trans- danubia.

1.015.752 inhabitants of the Upper Tisza region formed a mere 330 settlements, averaging 3078, thus concentration exceeded the national average.

A higher average was between the Danuhe and the Tisza, with 1.260 inhah- itants of 145 settlements averaging 8691.

The highest ,,~as the concentration in the Budapest region, clearly defining Budapest conglomeration.

Geographically, Budapest used to be ranged with the Great Hungarian Plain (GHP), irrealistically increasing the role of the GHP in urhanization.

In fact, the Budapest region is situated at the rim of the GHP, where toes of the Transdanubian and the Northern Mountains join. This situation points to the role of urhanizing forces or all the country - rather than of the GHP alone - in the arise and development of this conglomeration.

Regionally seen the interwar urhanization in Hungary, numher and population of tow-ns had a distrihution among the mentioned territories sueh as:

Table 3

Xumber and population of towns

1910 1920 1930 IY·ll De\"elopment

rate 1910-19-!1 (1910 = lOO)

Transdanubia 17 371 17 395 17 436 17 493 132.8

Northern part 7 163 7 173 7 181 7 237 145.,1

GHP 26 903 26 8·16 26 1008 26 1061 117.4

Budapest 1 881 1 930 1 1006 1 1165 123.2

Bp region 5 152 5 198 5 262 5 291 191.4

Total 56 24·70 56 2542 56 2893 56 3247 131.5

1 = number of towns 2 = population (thousands)

Urhanization in regional units was not uniform. Differentiation affected the order of magnitude of towns. With the exception of the Budapest region, development was not hy the multiplication of towns hut hy population in- crease.

In final account, the Great Hungarian Plain, preponderant since the late 18th century, was overtaken hy Transdanuhian and northern towns, and mainly, hy the Budapest conglomeration.

This regression of the Great Hungarian Plain was due to two important phenomena of economic history. In the second half of the 19th century, "ithin the economical system of Europe and the Austro-Hungarian Monarchy, the

226 R. NYITRAY

Great Hungarian Plain concentrated on cereal cultivation, becoming prepon- derant in Hungarian agriculture. The Hungarian industrial development lagged, and also within the manufacturing industry, food industry prevailed.

Aspects of Settlement History Common hetween Hungary and Europe

It can be concluded - relying on the scientific actIVIty of Dr. Jeno Major - that in this country, settlement science started in late 19th century, strictly related to the systematic German school of history, rather than to he an autonomous science with peculiar demands. It fitted into frames of devel- oped sciences, acquiring principles, methods, nevertheless forced to discuss the coherent prohlematics of settlements disunited rather than synthesized.

Geography, history, administration and construction pointed to new aspects of settlement relations - differentiated in themselves - giving birth to a relatively self-contained settlement science. A further link in this chain of reactions was the development of branches such as settlement geography settlement history, settlement sociology, settlement management, settlement aesthetics, settlement development, settlement hygieny, etc.

Shortage of space prevents enumeration of relevant achievements, but one of the greatest merits of Dr. Jeno Major in the wide research domain of settlement history should be pointed out.

A central problem of urban history research is the development of Hun- garian bourgeoisie. Within the Hungarian historiography, urban historiog- raphy got at times repressed. This deficiency was replaced hy foreign - main- ly German - historiography applying results of West-European histography on Hungary. There is rich evidence that mediaeval Transdanubian and Transyl- vanian towns are successors of Roman towns, a fact recognized by Dr. Jeno Major, performing archival, pragmatic research for the sake of disclosures at fundamental research niveau. His peculiar means, methods induced archaeo- logists to scrutinize the problems of survival of Roman towns.

His excellent mediaeval urban historiographic research relied on those of Elemer l\'liijusz and Peter Vaczy. He maintained the historical continuity, and was a protagonist of the school of settlement history stating research not to he autotelic, but an important auxiliary knowledge of the science of the history of Hungarian people(s). It is expected to learn the settlement process of regions, territories, counties, presenting the effects of organization by central power and by feudal estates to analyze regional relations of local phenomena.

Research had to clear how much these early settlement processes resulted from spontaneous or purposeful economical, authoritarian or military actions.

This is how the actual recognhion of a typically Hungarian settlement history, fitting Europe's reginal structures, has come about.

DEVELOPJfEilT OF THE HUiI'GARIAY SETTLEJIE,\T lYETJrORK 227 References

Quoted from among publications of Dr. Jeno MAJOR in the review "Telepiilestudomanyi Ki:iz- lemenyek" issued by the Department of Town Planning, Technical University of Budapest.

1. Some Aspects of the Research Concerned with Village-Building Traditions. '" Telepiilcstudo- manyi Ki:izlemenyek. No. n. 1959.

2. The Initial Stages of th~ Development of Various Types of Plots in Hungary. * Tclepiiles- tudomanyi Ki:izlemenyek, No. 12, 1960.

3. Some Features of Morphology Peculiarities of Hungarian Villages. '" Telepiilestudomanyi Ki:izlemenyek, No. 17, 1965.

4. The Supply Belts of Hungarian Towns.* Telepiilestudomunyi Kozlemenyek. No. 2. 1952.

5. Fundamental Problems of Regional Planning." Co-authors: Dr. Sandor Fiirst. Aladur S6s.

Telepiilestudomanyi Kozle'inenyek, Dec. 1953. '

6. Contribution to the book: "~ronumellts of Sopron and its Region". * Telepiilestudomanyi Ki:izlemcnvek. Dec. 1953.

7. Tasks of Settiem~nt Science in Village Building. * Co-author: Dr. Istyan Vallo. Telepiiles- tudomanyi Ki:izlemcnyek. No. 6. 195't,

B. Aim and Purport of Village Studies.'" Telepiilestudomanyi Klizlemenyek. No. 6. 195,L 9. On the Problem of the :1Iediaeval Hungarian Townscape.* Telepiilestudomanyi Kiizlcme-

nyek, No. 6. 1954.

10. Settlement-Sciences Inquiry into a Village on the Danube.'" Co-author: Zsigmonel Lahoda.

Telepiilestudomanyi Ki:izlemcnyek, No. B. 1956.

11. Some Aspects of the Development of Hungarian Agricultural Settlements.'" Co-author:

Dr. Kalman Farago. Telepiilcstudomanyi Ki:izlemenyek. No. 9. 1957.

12. On the Hungarian Town Network.'" Telepiilestudomanyi Kozlemenyek. No. 16. 1964..

13. Beginnings of the Development of Hungarian Towns and Town ='ietwork." Telepiilestudo- manyi Kozlemcnvek. No. 18. 1966.

H. Feature~ of Hungarian 'Town Fabrics and their Development. * Co-author: Dr. Kalman Farago. Telepiilestudomanyi Ki:izlemenyek, Ko. 23. 1971.

15. Notes on the History of Hungarian Urban DeVelopment between the two \Yorld Wars."

Telepiilestuelomanyi Kozlemenyek. Ko. 24. 1974.

16. Problems of Settlement Network, Connected with Inhabited Outskirts Investigations.'"

Telepiilestudomanyi Kozlemcnyek, No. H. 1962.

17. Historical Evolution of Miskolctapolca as Shown by the Functional Changes of its Area."

Telepiilestudomanyi Ki:izlemenyek, No. 27. 1978.

lB. Early History and Development of the Hungarian ~Iedium-Size Towns up to \Yorlel \Var I. * Ki:izlekedcstudomal1yi Kozlemenyek, l'\o. 28. 1979.

Dr. R6ka NYITRAY H-1521, Budapest

* In Hungarian