Tokaj [antikvár]

Bodrogköz, Heg)> alj a, Hegykőthe Tokaj Hills The changing light which falls on these four neighbouring régions in the north-east of Hungary is, above all, the light of history-even of prehistory. The volcanic glass of the hills around Tokaj, the obsidian which occurs nowhere else this side of the Mediterranean, has drawn people here since the Middle Stone Age, and served as a basis for a primeval division of labour. The inhabitants of the many tiny ancient settlements of the hilly region became tool-makers, masters in the gathering and chipping of obsidian, sellers of obsidian blades. The ancient European population who inhabited this area at the end of the Neolithic Age, and who, according to the anthropologist, were related to the mysterious Breton, the ancient Swiss Rhaeto-Romanic and an extinct primitive Sicilian people, in part stayed on here, and are said to be the ancestors of the people of Bodrogköz. The intruding Slavs of the migration period and the Magyars from the time of the Concjuest-or perhaps the Kabars of Turkic extraction who joined them?-intermingled with this ancient population. Nevertheless, nowadays the purest Hungárián is spoken in Bodrogköz, the reasons for which I won't attempt to unravel now. What were the last one thousand years like here? If we say "relatively calm", we are forgetting the frequent marching armies, the destruction caused by famines and epidemics. On the other hand, no crusaders marched this way, while in the 13th century the rivers and forests offered defence against the tempestuous charge of the Mongols who had advanced this far from the Asian plains. The i6th to iyth-century Ottoman conquest, which took over the southern and central part of Hungary for 150 years, did not extend this far. Only the lower end of Hegyalja was from time to time looted by the Turks who took little heed of the Prophet Mohamed's prohibition on drinking wine. For centuries there has been no war with the Poles or the Russians on the nearby frontiers. This region, however, was a firetrap, a smouldering ember easily in fiam ed in the national freedom fights, especially in the struggle lead by Imre Thököly and his adopted son Ferenc Rákóczi II against the Austrian conquerors who took the place of the Turks at the end of the iyth and the beginning of the i8th century. There were two main reasons for this national is m. First, the best part of the huge estates of the Rákóczi family lay in this area; second, Protestantism, having gained a firm foothold here, was more of an advocate and fighter for national interests than Hungárián Catholicism, which was linked to Rome via Vienna. Ifellfli