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HUNGARIAN NATIONAL MUSEUM | « Indietro

HUNGARIAN NATIONAL MUSEUM

In 1802, Count Ferenc Széchényi offered his rich collection to the nation to establish the Hungarian National Museum. That is why, Hungary respects this year as the foundation of the Hungarian National Museum. Those days, the collection comprised 11884 prints, 1156 manuscripts, 142 books, maps and copperplates. The collection first was placed in the Pauline monastery in Pest. The Diet of 1807 nationalized the institute and called upon the nation to donate to the new Museum. One of the most important of the donations was Julia Festetich mineral collection, which formed the base of the later Natural History Museum. Beside the donations, purchasing was the way to enrich the collection. The Hungarian Diet of 1832-36 bought Miklós Jankovich's valuable collection.

The above-mentioned Diet allocated the necessary amount of money towards the new, independent building of the Museum. Mihály Pollack, the eminent character of the contemporary classicist architecture, was commissioned to design the building. The construction works began in 1837 and finished ten years later. Rafael Monti prepared the sculptures of the tympanum. In the middle, a female personification of Pannonia is enthroned holding laurel wreaths in her hands. To her right, there are geniuses of art art and scholarship, to her left, she is surrounded by the allegoric figures of history and fame. The figure in the right corner represent the river Drava, the other one in the left symbolise the Danube. Since 1875, the walls and ceilings of the have been decorated by allegoric monumental wall-paintings by Károly Lotz és Mór Than.

History and present days
In the second half of the 19th century, outstanding scholars worked within the walls of the Museum, such as Ágoston Kubinyi, Flóris Rómer, József Hampel and Ferenc Pulszky.
The developing collections grew over the walls of the institute. Besides, the development of the international museology pointed to forming specialized museums. Therefore, in 1872, the Museum of Applied arts, in 1896, the Museum of Fine Arts were founded from some collection of the Hungarian National Museum. In 1926 and 1927 the museum went under a full reconstruction. According to the plans of Jenő Lechner, new storage rooms were opened in the attic, to solve the stocking problems.
In 1949, a new act concerning the Hungarian museums came in effect. As stated by that act, the Ethnographic and the Natural History Museum had to separate from the Hungarian National Museum and to create the independent National Széchenyi Library. In the 1960s some distinguished monuments and buildings got under the direction of the Hungarian National Museum as affiliated institutes such as King Mathias Museum in Visegrád, Rákóczi Museum in Sárospatak and Kosuth Museum in Monok. In 1985, the Castle Museum in Esztergom joined the affiliated museums.

The Museum Garden
The garden was designed to establish an aesthetic environment around the Museum. To raise the necessary fund, concerts were held in the museum with famous conductors such as Ferenc Liszt and Ferenc Erkel. During the past 150 years several monuments were erected to the memory of eminent personalities of literature and history. The first statue was raised to Dániel Berzsenyi's memory, a year later Ferenc Kazinczy's was finished. During the years, Károly Kisfaludy's, Sándor Kisfaludy's, the founder Count Ferenc Széchényi's, the scholar Ottó Herman's statues were set up. Alessandro Monti and Giuseppe Garibaldi, two foreign military leader of the Hungarian Revolution, also have statues in the Garden. The most significant monument, János Arany's statue has been decorating the Garden since 1893. The Garden still plays an active role in the city's cultural life: it is the venue of the

What to visit

Museum
Archaeological Department
The Historical repository
Historical Photo Collection
Coins Collection
Hungarian Historical Gallery Central Database and Informatics Department
Central Library Department of protection of works of art and instauration

Museum work
Museums of our day strive to wholly introduce science, history, and arts, their main goal being the service of the public. The museum today is not only a temple of science and arts, but a vital organ of education, which teaches and entertains at the same time. However, it is not easy to keep its status as a scientific workshop at the same time, so that its important tasks related to research and protecting relics would not suffer neglect.

For more information visit http://www.hnm.hu/

sources: www.wideweb.hu and www.welcometohungary.net

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