Mályusz Elemér
Elemér Mályusz

Summary/Abstract: Elemér Mályusz (1898-1989) was born into an old, Lutheran family with intellectual, bourgeois and noble roots. As a representative of the Protestant and pro-independence approach, Mályusz criticised Gyula Szekfű’s Catholic-Habsburgian interpretation of Hungarian history. Mályusz therefore turned his attention not to the culture of the elites but to the everyday life of the society, especially the middle classes. With his broad knowledge from the Middle Ages up to 1848, he was able to draw colorful tableaus of the data-poor Hungarian Middle Ages. However, his anti-Communist and anti-Semitic prejudices and his abrasive nature caused him many issues. In the 1930s he adapted the German Volkstumskunde to Hungary, but criticised German imperialism. After 1945, he was temporary sidelined, but returned to the forefront of historical scholarship, to become one of the most influential Hungarian medievalists of the second half of the 20th century.

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