Výlet do minulosti maďarského národa?
An Excursion into Hungarian National Past?

The Slovak Oeuvre of Jozef Viktorin and the Castle Ruins of Viseg-rad

Summary/Abstract: The Castle of Visegrad is one of the best known and most popular places of memory of Hungarian national past. It is far less known, howewer, that the exploration of the ruins at Visegrad and their transformation into a Hungarian place of memory was initiated and completed by Jozef Viktorin, who in 1848 was locked up in prison for half a year by the Hungarian authorities on charges of Panslavism, is known in Slovak scholarship for his Slovak national zeal, and moreover, is regarded as one of the most talented promoter of Slovak litarature in this time. What exactly Viktorin had in mind when, as an engaged champion of Slovak nationalism, he set about the creation of what soon became one of the most important places of Hungarian historical memory, cannot be reconstructed, of course. What seems certain, however, is that the possible answer should be looked for in a conceptional framework constituted by the ancient Slav past of Visegrad, the symbolic and hidden layers of Slovak-Hungarian compromise, Viktorin´s trust in Hungarian liberalism, and by the idea of an life spent in a constitutional fatherland.

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