Timeless Nation

In the "Etelkoz" settlement area (modern Bessarabia) the seven Onogur-Magyar tribes (Nyeck, Megyer, Kurtgyarmat, Tarjan, Jeno, Ker, Keszi) and the Khabar tribe established a firm federation under a hereditary ruler. In a covenant called the "Blood Treaty" the tribal chiefs, representing the nation, codified their national constitution. They elected Arpad, the chief of the largest tribe (Megyer), and his descendants as their hereditary rulers. They also agreed that the land obtained by common effort should be shared justly by all members of the nation. Thus, shortly before their exodus from the Etelkoz area (895-896 AD), the Hungarians laid the foundation of a progressive liberal constitution. The elected sovereign was to rule by the will of the nation (not by the "Grace of God"), and land was to be held by the individuals as their rightful property, not in fief from their lord: thus they rejected the medieval principle of feudalism.

The leaders of the nation became interested in the powerstruggles of the Byzantine and Western (German) Empires and allied themselves with one and the other on various occasions. As allies of the German emperor, Arnuif they were instrumental in the destruction of the short-lived "Moravian Empire" of Svatopluk (892-894). During these campaigns they had ample opportunity to reconnoiter the Carpathian Basin, which their legends had already indicated as their inheritance from Attila. The constant harassment of their eastern neighbors, the Pechenegs made them realize how unprotected their Etelkoz homeland was. So they decided to settle behind the Carpathians.

The movement of the entire nation was planned and directed by Prince Arpad and took place in 895-896 in the form of a gigantic pincer movement: the bulk passed through the North-Eastern Carpathians and a smaller contingent entered Transylvania from the south.

Hungarian historians call this operation "Honfoglalas" ("Occupation of the Homeland), or simply "Bejovetel" (Entry). This was truly no "conquest". Even imaginative medieval chroniclers fail to make much of the occasional skirmishes that took place during this rather peaceful resettlement operation. One cannot help admiring Arpad’s sense of timing: the area was, at this period, truly a "power vacuum" without an effective central state structure.

Most of the population of the central area consisted of Avar-Magyars and other closely related races which greeted the Hungarians as their brothers. The southern areas were still nominally part of the Bulgarian empire, already crumbling under Byzantine attacks. The northern mountains were settled by Slavonic tribes, e.g. Slovaks. After the collapse of Svatopluk’s empire, these scattered settlers (themselves rather recent arrivals: see Chapter 1), were left to fend for themselves. They surrendered to the Hungarians, or rather accepted the status of allies and vassals. They were allowed to keep their own feudal social structure, national and cultural identity and religious freedom – and the Slovaks did survive eleven centuries of Hungarian "domination".

During the tenth century, Arpad and his successors reorganized their heterogeneous nation. The latest arrivals provided the nation’s leaders, while their tribal members represented the pastoral occupations and animal husbandry. The "old settlers", such as the Avar-Magyars and related groups, retained their role as. agriculturists. The non-Magyar elements found their role and position in the nation’s social structure according to their skills, feudal status and property. The land was divided among the tribes and each free member of the nation was given land to own, not in fief.

With the task of reorganization completed, the power of the paramount ruler (Prince) declined, though Arpad (895-907) and his successors, Solt (907-?) and Taksony (?-972), were recognized as the supreme authority, but the semi4nde-pendent tribal chiefs became practically absolute rulers of their segment of the nation. They carried on independent internal, religious, external and military policies and concluded alliances with their neighbors or fought them independently. Thus the chief of the "Keszi" tribe (settled in Transylvania), who held the second highest hereditary office of the "Gyula", maintained independent relations with Byzantium and accepted Christianity long before the conversion of the western tribes.

This leads us to the examination of the so-called raids. The Hungarians, though not exactly new arrivals, were still considered outsiders, even intruders, by their powerful neighbors, the Germans and the Byzantians. The fact that the Hungarians retained their pagan religion was considered a further offence by their neighbors. So the Hungarians decided to assert their rights in the settlement area they had chosen. For more than 70 years they fought deterrent, preventive campaigns against both empires. By these campaigns they aimed to obtain a "position of strength" from which to negotiate with their hostile neighbors on equal terms. They were "battles to prevent wars - and as such they compare rather favorably with the so-called "wars to end all wars" of the XXth century. They secured, of course, tributes and taxes from the defeated princes, the proceeds of which went to communal property, but the principal aim could not possibly have been plunder and looting, for then they would not have attacked their most powerful neighbors.

The outcome of these campaigns was, of course, not always favorable to the Hungarians. Great victories turned into disastrous defeats, especially when diplomatic intrigues (the Hungarians’ main weakness) changed alliances unexpectedly. The details of the campaigns are too numerous to mention here. Some leaders achieved remarkable feats of generalship. The best known of them, "horka" (general) Bulcsu, led a seven months’ campaign in 954 through Germany, Holland, France and Italy (3,000 miles), defeating every western army he met. In the following year, the same Bulcsu, with another chieftain, Lehel was defeated in Bavaria, at the Lech River by the emperor Otto who had, in the meantime, managed to turn the Hungarians’ former allies against them.

Toward the end of the century, Prince GEZA (GEYSA) (972-997) began to strengthen his authority as the hereditary leader of the nation. He married the daughter of the Gyula, the second most powerful chief, then proceeded to assert his authority over the other tribal chiefs by putting an end to the campaigns and concluding a peace treaty with the Emperor, Otto I, the victor of Lech, on equal terms. With deep understanding of the process of power consolidation in Europe, he decided to claim his nation’s place as a member of the western Christian civilization. As he had already noticed the signs of decline in the Byzantian Empire, he asked for western missionaries, had his entire family baptized and encouraged the Hungarians to convert to Christianism. His only son and heir, Vajk (baptized Stephen or "Istvan"), married the sister of the future emperor of Germany, Gisela (the granddaughter of the conqueror of Lechfeld)

The "show of strength" of the preventive campaigns had paid off. No longer despised "outsiders’; the Hungarians were ready to join the European community as equal partners.

Timeless Nation