EDUCATION
The Magyarisation policy of the Hungarian Government, although, as we
have seen, it prevailed in the realms of representation and justice,
attained its full development in the educational system of the
country. All Magyar claims to consideration before the tribunal of the
democratic nations are vitiated by the briefest consideration of their
reactionary attitude towards public instruction. In order that this may
be fully realised, it will be necessary to devote a whole chapter to
the subject of the condition of education in Hungary before the War.
It will be demonstrated later that even since the establishment of the
Hungarian Republic the treatment of the non-Magyar minorities has been
regarded in the same tyrannical manner.
It is, of course, impossible to treat so large a subject adequately in
so small a compass. I have only attempted to give a brief sketch of the
results that accrued; the reader who desires to pursue the subject in
greater detail may be referred to Dr. Seton-Watson’s _Racial Problems
in Hungary_, in which the question is treated in great detail.
According to the official Hungarian statistics for the school year
1908-1909 there were 16,496 elementary schools in Hungary, with 31,817
teachers. Of this number there were only 467 Slovak schools, with 672
teachers. Nevertheless, by the education law of 1906, these schools
were transferred into establishments for Magyarisation purposes. In
the same way the secondary schools and all the technical schools were
entirely Magyar, and from the year 1874 onwards it was impossible for
the Slovak student to obtain higher education in his native language.
The universities, of course, were also purely Magyar, not only in
language, but in spirit and organisation. Slovak pupils at Hungarian
secondary schools were not even allowed to speak Slovak among one
another, to read Slovak books or newspapers. During the whole of
their school career they were compelled to conceal their national
sentiments, and those who failed to do so were in danger of expulsion
or even judicial persecution. The school authorities made a special
point of emphasising all the elements of Magyar culture and Magyar
history, while everything with Slovak associations was either ignored
or made the subject of derision or belittlement. It is, therefore, not
surprising that during the period of their studies the young Slovaks
were largely deprived of their national consciousness and, with the
exception of a very small percentage, became Magyarised. For the period
of 1913-1914 the number of secondary schools in Hungary was 229, with
3,640 teachers and 77,636 pupils. Of these, 64,118 are described as
Magyars and only 1,620 as Slovaks. The proportion of pupils of other
non-Magyar nationalities was correspondingly small. But when one
remembers the convenient habit of Magyar enumerators of designating
as Magyars all those upon whom the process of Magyarisation had been
carried out, it is safe to estimate the minimum number of students of
Slovak nationality as not less than four thousand. This would make the
number of Magyarised students originally of Slovak nationality about
2,380, a not improbable figure.
It may be objected that the comparative ease with which the process
of Magyarisation succeeded was a proof of its justification, that if
education prevailed upon the Slovaks to abandon their nationality so
rapidly it was because the Magyar culture displayed to the awakened
mind of the Slovak its superiority to the ideals in which he had
been brought up. But, as a matter of fact, the very reverse is the
case. The more highly the Slovaks were educated, the more clearly
they could see that Magyar culture and civilisation owed whatever it
possessed to outside and borrowed influences, among which their own
were predominant. The true reason for the success of Magyarisation in
secondary schools is to be found in the fact that unless the student
consented to be Magyarised, outwardly, at all events, his education
was a waste of time. As shown below, employment by the State or in the
professions was practically closed to him. This was impressed upon him
from the first, and he was faced with the alternatives of accepting the
imposition of Magyar nationality upon his own or abandoning all hope of
remunerative employment.
If it be considered that the process of Magyarisation, which increased
in intensity as the student rose to the higher classes of the schools,
was carried out with meticulous thoroughness, it is fair to assume that
the actual number of Magyarised pupils was higher than that mentioned
above. At all events, the number of students with Slovak as their
native language at the Hungarian universities in the year 1913-1914 was
only 106, and it is therefore obvious that only a small percentage of
the Slovak pupils who passed through the ordeal of the Magyarisation
machinery succeeded in preserving their nationality. And this, be it
remembered, in spite of the sonorous preamble to the law of 1868: “The
State is bound to ensure that citizens living together in considerable
numbers, of whatever nationality, shall be able to obtain instruction
in the neighbourhood in their mother-tongue, up to the point where the
higher academic (i.e. university) education begins.”
The training colleges for teachers were entirely Magyarised. There were
a few institutions upon whose curriculum the Slovak language figured
as a subject of instruction, two hours a week being devoted to it on
the so-called “direct” method. But nowhere was the Slovak language
cultivated in a scientific manner, and the educational authorities,
whose task it was to reorganise the schools in Slovakia after the
majority of the teachers had departed for their native land at the end
of the year 1918, were faced with extreme difficulties in the direction
of finding teachers with any experience of their profession who were
capable of imparting instruction in Slovak.
The statistics of these secondary schools and training colleges are
interesting. In 1908-1909 there were in Hungary:--
139 Magyar classical schools.
7 German classical schools.
4 Rumanian classical schools.
1 Serbian classical school.
0 Slovak classical schools.
During the same period there were:--
30 Magyar modern schools.
2 German modern schools.
0 Slovak modern schools.
The figures for training colleges for teachers were:--
59 Magyar.
5 Rumanian.
4 German.
1 Serbian.
0 Slovak.
All the special technical schools in Hungary were Magyar.
About 1860 the Slovaks had established three classical schools with the
help of funds which they had collected, but the Hungarian Government
did not tolerate them for long. After a successful activity which
lasted for twelve years, the Slovak classical school at Volca Revuca
was suppressed by the Government in 1874. In the following year the
same fate befell the Slovak classical school at Turocz St. Marton,
which had been in existence for eight years, and that of Klaster pod
Zniovem, which had been in existence for six years. The funds and the
premises of these establishments were confiscated by the Government,
and the teachers were discharged without compensation and without
pension. The Slovaks then abandoned the idea of founding secondary
schools. When, in 1910, the Evangelical clergyman Lichner began to
collect funds to establish a Slovak classical school he was fined by
the political authorities, and the sum which had already been collected
was confiscated.
As has already been mentioned, Slovak pupils in the secondary schools
who ventured to pursue Slovak studies in their spare time rendered
themselves liable to expulsion. The following table, which covers a
period of ten years, gives the number of Slovak pupils expelled from
free schools for having privately devoted themselves to the study of
Slovak language and literature.
-----+------------------------------+------------+-------------
Year.| Type of School. | Locality. |No. expelled.
-----+------------------------------+------------+-------------
1881 |Normal school |Lucenec | 7
1882 |Normal school |Presov | 7
1882 |Girls’ high school |Bratislava | 5
1882 |Academy of law |Bratislava | 2
1882 |Classical school |Rim. Sobota | 1
1885 |Academy of Protestant Theology|Bratislava | 3
1885 |Academy of law |Bratislava | 5
1885 |Classical school |Bratislava | 4
1885 |Catholic seminary |Ostirhom | 2
1886 |Classical school |Levoca | 11
1887 |Central Catholic seminary |Budapest | 2
-----+------------------------------+------------+-------------
According to the census of 1910, the Slovaks constituted 11·9 per
cent. of the total population of Hungary. The extent to which they
participated in higher education is shown by the following figures:--
Per cent.
The training colleges for teachers contained 4·8 Slovaks
The classical and modern secondary schools 2·6 ”
The girls’ higher secondary schools 0·9 ”
The universities 0·9 ”
It is natural that under these circumstances the educated classes
contained few avowed Slovaks. Moreover, the conditions which had to be
fulfilled by applicants for posts under the Government were such that
it was extremely difficult for Slovaks to obtain such posts. In 1887,
for example, the Government issued a regulation in accordance with
which even the foresters and their assistants in the State forests had
to understand Magyar. In any case the sentiments of the Magyars towards
the non-Magyar nationalities was almost sufficient to preclude the
appointment of a Slovak to a vacancy in the public services. Hungarian
official statistics afford abundant proof of this. The following
figures relating to Government officials denote the conditions
obtaining in the year 1910.
Judges and official lawyers in Slovakia: 461 Magyars, 0 Slovak. In the
whole of Hungary: 2,601 Magyars, 1 Slovak (in the Budapest district).
Law court and prison officials in Slovakia: 805 Magyars, 10 Slovaks. In
the whole of Hungary 4,756 Magyars, 16 Slovaks.
Elementary teachers in Slovakia: 4,257 Magyars, 345 Slovak. In the
whole of Hungary: 18,480 Magyars, 404 Slovaks.
Higher elementary teachers in Slovakia: 226 Magyars, 0 Slovak. In the
whole of Hungary: 1,268 Magyars, 2 Slovaks.
Elementary and higher elementary women teachers in Slovakia: 199
Magyars, 1 Slovak. In the whole of Hungary: 1,336 Magyars, 1 Slovak.
Secondary school teachers in Slovakia: 638 Magyars, 10 Slovaks. In the
whole of Hungary: 3,518 Magyars, 23 Slovaks.
Medical officers in Slovakia: 713 Magyars, 26 Slovaks. In the whole of
Hungary: 4,914 Magyars, 35 Slovaks.
These figures are only typical. At this time, it must be explained, 70
per cent. of the inhabitants of Slovakia spoke Slovak and scarcely 25
per cent. understood Magyar.[16]
From the moment when the Compromise put the Magyars in control of
the internal policy of Hungary, they set to work to use the means of
education as the principal machinery in their factories for Magyarising
the “subject nations.” Their first attempt was clumsy, because it was
too brutal. They organised what was to all intents and purposes a
press-gang for the collection of poor children, whom they clothed in a
distinctive uniform, numbered and transported to farms in the Alföld,
the central district of Hungary, where they would be subjected to a
healthful Magyar atmosphere. There they were often ill-treated; some
of them escaped and contrived to reach their homes, clothed in rags
and dying of hunger. Their parents, who had been deceived by lying
promises, naturally kept them at home. In 1874, 400 children were
transported in this way; in 1892 the number had fallen to 174, and in
1900 only 24 could be collected. The experiment was then abandoned.
It was, however, unnecessary to transport a whole people. A more
subtle means of Magyarisation was discovered. Let the children of the
non-Magyar nationalities be subjected to the process of Magyarisation
throughout the period of their education, so that these nationalities
would in due course die a natural death. In the national schools the
non-Magyar pupils were given a thorny path to tread. Life was made a
burden to them if they remained faithful to their national ideals,
while, on the other hand, they were pampered and extolled if they
allowed themselves to be converted to the true Magyar faith. In order
to escape these temptations the Slovaks succeeded in establishing three
secondary schools at their own expense. Their fate has already been
recounted. An inquiry was opened in 1874 into the state of the school
at Revuca. The inspector, a fierce Magyarist, reported that “the Slav,
and consequently anti-Magyar, tendencies discernible preclude all hope
that results favourable and useful to the State can accrue from the
teaching,” and the school was immediately closed.
Trefort, the Minister of Education, had his appetite aroused by this
success. He sent another commission to inspect the establishment at
Klaster pod Zniovem, which was unable to discover any grounds for
objection. A second commission was equally unsuccessful. At last the
Minister discovered that the buildings were old, and did not conform to
modern sanitary requirements. The managers of the school explained that
they were just about to move into new quarters. But the educational
authorities were not to be baulked so easily. They inspected the new
premises and reported that the walls were not dry enough to allow of
the occupation of the buildings. In the middle of term, 200 pupils were
sent home and the school was closed. That of Turocz soon followed suit.
Since that time every request of the Churches or the communes for the
erection of new Slovak secondary schools remained unanswered, despite
the sentiment expressed in the law of 1868.
As regards primary education, the public establishments, that is to
say those kept up by the State, were exclusively Magyar. In 1868 there
were, in round figures, in northern Hungary 6,000 Magyar schools,
and 6,500 non-Magyar. In 1896 there were 9,700 Magyar against 4,100
Slovak. The county of Zemplin contained 295 Magyar schools for 141,000
pupils, and 20 Slovak schools for 107,000 pupils. This meant that every
year thousands of children were deprived of education altogether, or
compelled to enter schools where it was impossible for them to learn
anything, instruction being carried out in a tongue unknown to them,
and where the sole object of their teachers was to humiliate them.
Besides the schools maintained by Government funds, the law allowed
private individuals, communes or Churches, to maintain private schools
at their own expense. The Magyars did not dare to suppress these
openly in the non-Magyar districts, but effectual means were taken to
make the continuation of their existence extremely difficult, and
to use them for the purposes of Magyarisation. In order to obtain
a teacher’s certificate it was necessary that the applicant should
possess a good knowledge of the Magyar tongue; the private schools were
subjected to the inspectors of the national schools, who exercised
discretionary powers; it was ordered that Magyar should be taught in
all schools without exception, and the number of hours during the
week, in which such instruction should take place, was fixed by the
Minister of Education. In 1902 these hours were fixed at from eighteen
to twenty-four per week; at the end of four school years the pupils
were expected to be able to speak and write Magyar correctly, and the
teachers were held responsible for their progress.
This law was so absurd that, despite the zeal with which it was
enforced, the results produced by it were negligible. The census of
1890 established the fact that 46 per cent. of the population did
not understand a word of Magyar; the progress made in the preceding
decade had been negligible. The Jingoes were seriously alarmed. They
attributed their ill-success to the obstinacy of the teachers in the
denominational schools, and they turned their attention to endeavours
to abolish these schools. A law of 1893 fixed a minimum salary for the
teachers in the denominational schools, and as the parishes as a rule
were too poor to pay the salaries fixed by this law, the State offered
to pay a contribution in such cases. But this contribution was to be
very dearly bought. In return for it the State claimed the right of
supervision of the school. Once the subsidy was accepted, the State
had the power to remove schoolmasters of whom it did not approve.
Further, in all subsidised schools Magyar was to be the language in
which teaching was carried out, and for ever after they were to be in
exactly the same position as State schools.
In 1900 the Hungarian Government issued a report upon the conditions
of education in the country. (_L’enseignement en Hongrie._ Ministère
Royale des Cultes et de l’Instruction Publique. Budapest, 1900.)
According to this report, “primary education is one of the most
powerful means of consolidation of the Hungarian State.... This is
the reason why State elementary schools are found principally in the
poorest communes and in the districts where the population is mixed
and employs a foreign tongue (de langue étrangère). The Hungarian race
demands protection when it finds itself, as is often the case, enclosed
within a solid block of people speaking a foreign tongue.... _The
schools guarantee to the Hungarians the increase of their power and
extend the race towards the frontier._”
In 1904 a fresh law was passed giving the country officials the power
to control the schoolmasters; to suspend or even to prosecute those
whose teaching of Magyar did not produce the results demanded by law.
In the training colleges for teachers, instruction was given only in
Magyar, and as the students came from the higher elementary schools,
which, as we have seen, were also Magyarised, they frequently found
themselves unable, when they became qualified teachers, to make
themselves understood by their pupils. In view of the inconvenience of
this state of affairs, it was ordained in 1908 that Slovak might be
taught in the training colleges for two hours per week.
The process of Magyarisation, so painstakingly evolved for half
a century, received its final form by the Education Act of Count
Apponyi, in 1907. Wekerle, then President of the Council, declared that
“_nowhere are people speaking an alien tongue so liberally dealt with
as in Hungary_.” Apponyi himself introduced his Act with a flourish of
trumpets. “A Minister of Education would commit a crime against the
State, and against those of its citizens who speak another language, if
he deprived them of the chance of learning, besides their own tongue,
the Magyar language; this would be to isolate them artificially and,
in fact, to exclude them from political life, in which Magyar is the
dominant factor. I repeat, in this kingdom the Magyars are supreme, but
in that lies no menace to the other nationalities.”
The Magyars are past masters in the art of camouflage, and the
administration of the law of 1907 is a striking commentary on the
generous phrases of its framers. According to it, all teachers,
irrespective of the nature of their schools, are Government officials,
with a minimum salary fixed by statute. Private associations too poor
to pay this minimum are compelled to give up their schools or to
accept a subsidy. But even more onerous conditions are attached to
the acceptance of this subsidy than before. The teachers in schools
where it is granted must be able to read, write and teach in Magyar;
the hours to be devoted to the teaching of Magyar are to be fixed
by the Minister of Education; the official primers must be used in
the school. If the subsidy granted is over 200 crowns, the Minister
has the right to refuse to ratify the choice of teachers, and if the
alternative candidate is not acceptable to him, he may nominate his own
without further delay. Whenever he may deem it necessary in the public
interest, the Minister may order a judicial inquiry into the conduct
of any teacher who neglects the teaching of Magyar to his pupils,
professes sentiments hostile to the State, which, being interpreted,
means showing any sympathy for non-Magyar ideals, or who excites
animosity towards the upper classes. If the finding of the court of
inquiry is unfavourable, the choice of a new teacher must be approved
by the Minister. Should the offence be repeated, the school is to be
closed and replaced by a national school.
In non-Magyar schools, whether subsidised or not, Magyar must be taught
under conditions to be prescribed by the Minister. Wherever Magyar
has once been introduced as the language in which teaching is carried
out, it can never be replaced by any other language. In all higher
elementary schools instruction must be carried out in Magyar. The
school inspectors may recommend to the Minister those teachers whose
conduct merits reward.
The Royal Arms are to be placed above every school, and the Hungarian
flag is to be hoisted on ceremonial occasions; no other emblems are
to be allowed. The class-rooms are to be decorated with pictures
displaying the exploits of Magyar heroes. Pictures which would tend to
the encouragement of ideas hostile to the State are to be removed (for
example, portraits of St. Cyril or St. Methodius, the traditional Slav
saints, or of prominent Czech writers). All written matter used in the
schools is to be in Magyar, even to the copy-books. And in upholding
this law Count Andrassy had the face to say, in May 1908: “_It is not
true that the language of the Germans, the Rumanians, indeed of any
nationality is threatened; it is not true that the Government engages
in Magyarisation._”[17]
In 1907 three prominent Czech[18] wrote a letter to Björnson, which
was subsequently published by him in the periodical _März_, of Munich.
This letter so aptly described the conditions in Hungary at the time,
that an extract from it is worth reproducing.
“Perhaps you will ask, where are the natural protectors of this
country? Where are the clergy, the schoolmasters, the intellectuals of
this people (the Slovaks)?
“The clergy? The Catholic and Protestant dignitaries, if they are of
Slovak origin, are renegades who, in the name of the Gospel, pursue,
like bloodhounds, their own nation. In that they are assisted by
the other members of the clergy, and only a small number of priests
faithful to the Slovak cause exist in miserable little parishes,
surrounded by spies.
“The professors? There are none, for the three secondary schools which
the Slovaks established some years ago at their own expense have been
closed, as has the Slovak national museum, founded at the cost of great
sacrifices.
“The schoolmasters? Poor, persecuted men, living in terror of unjust
denunciation. The political autonomy of the Slovaks no longer exists;
their miserable religious autonomy is violated. The Education Law,
which has recently been passed by the two Houses of the Hungarian
Parliament, will destroy the last vestiges of national autonomy as soon
as it is passed. The 700,000 Slovak Protestants are not even allowed to
maintain denominational schools at their own expense unless they permit
Magyar to be the language of instruction for 24 hours per week. On the
other hand, there are on Slovak soil 33 classical schools, 6 modern
schools, 16 colleges for teachers, 4 academies of law, 14 theological
institutes, 143 technical schools, all Magyar!
“There are besides, according to the provisions of a law of 1891,
infant schools set up in each commune, to which children between the
ages of three and six are obliged to go to learn Magyar.
“Czech and Slovak books are taken from school children and burnt.
Pupils who have been discovered reading such books at home, or who have
had their photographs taken in groups, or who have even signed their
names in Slovak, are expelled. An example of this last offence occurred
a few days ago.
“All these things are done in the name of the Magyar State, which sees
in Panslavism the Mene, Tekel, Upharsin written on the wall.
“When, in June 1901, the Slovak deputy Juriga appealed for at least one
secondary school for his nation, another deputy, amid the applause of
the whole Chamber, answered him: ‘_You shall have no secondary school,
but a rope!_’ Count Apponyi, the Minister of Education, in replying to
the speech of the Slovak deputy Bella in January the same year, said,
‘_I shall make teaching impossible to those schoolmasters who refuse
to make their pupils into good Magyars. The principle that in this
country the Magyar alone is master, holds good for every citizen of the
State._’ The Chamber applauded these words.
“We should have to compile bulky volumes if we tried to describe
how Hungarian history is falsified in the school primers; how the
schools, the Churches, the State in all its functions, shamelessly
lend themselves to the most violent Magyarism; how the activity of
the Magyar societies produces an almost pathological passion.... The
Rumanians, the Ruthenians, the Serbs, even the Germans, but above all
the Slovaks, are the victims of the Magyar fury. A whole series of
Government Slovak newspapers exists, whose only aim is to ridicule and
slander the Slovaks in their own language, and on the other hand to
extol Magyar civilisation.
“Slovak orphans are taken from their native districts and sent into
Magyar areas to be educated as good Hungarian patriots; in reality in
order to become the slaves of their Magyar protectors and often to
perish in their exile.
“Place names which have existed for over a thousand years have been
Magyarised by law throughout the whole State; thousands and thousands
of Magyar names have been made up for this purpose. Nevertheless, the
Magyars, although they have been absolute masters in their country
since 1867, have, according to the published statistics, more than 50
per cent. of illiterates in their own ranks.
“The Magyars use every means to transform their agricultural State
into an industrial one, but in spite of their efforts, they find it
impossible to put an end to the terrible pauperism of the population.
So miserable are the conditions that more than 200,000 citizens,
including 40,000 Magyars, leave Hungary for America every year.
“This terrible gamble must necessarily end in disaster. Who are the
instigators, the tyrants in this matter; who are the actors in this
terrible drama?
“The aristocracy, deeply in debt, ruined morally and physically, to
which the State is obliged to give employment lest it die of hunger;
the financial speculators, mainly Jews, who surpass in Magyar Jingoism
their Christian competitors, pure-blooded Magyars or renegades.
“But Europe, except in the persons of a very few who are in touch with
the situation in Hungary, knows nothing of all this, for the Magyar
comedy of liberty is brilliantly played.
“Wherever the fruits of civilisation are displayed, the Magyar heroes
are to be found. They are to be met at international meetings for the
furtherance of liberty, at scientific assemblies, rattling their spurs,
full of enthusiasm for liberty and fraternity.
“They send telegrams to the Boers, address indignant manifestoes
against Russian autocracy, plead for the liberation of India. Yet at
the same time they take care to except themselves and their peoples
from their programme.
“The idea of the Magyar State, which has become the staple of these
swindlers, pervades the market. It prevails not only in the salons of
the Magyar Tories, but also in the Courts of Law, in all the official
institutions of Hungary, in all the pulpits of the Churches, in the
money markets of Vienna and Budapest. It must always be maintained at
a high rate of exchange, for a lowering of its value would immediately
bring down the house of cards built by the imperialistic folly of the
Magyars. It is necessary to the existence of thousands of people who,
if it collapsed, would be without the means of subsistence. That is why
this tragi-comedy is played with such earnestness.”
The reference in this letter to the Magyarisation of place names
requires some explanation. In 1897 a law was passed for the
Magyarisation of all place names in Hungary. The old historic names
were banished from the map, and their places taken by unknown and in
many cases fabricated and barbaric substitutes. All post office and
railway notices and tickets employed these new names and were drawn up
in Magyar, even in the localities where this tongue was unknown to the
large majority of the people.
Nor was this form of Magyarisation confined only to place names. Every
inducement was offered to Hungarian subjects to change their Slav,
Rumanian or other names into a Magyar form. The fee for registration
of change of name was reduced to tenpence, and pressure was employed to
compel as many citizens as possible to avail themselves of the facility.
Two examples of this pressure are extracted from the Appendix of Dr.
Seton-Watson’s _Racial Problems in Hungary_.
“In 1881 the various forestry departments of Hungary received the
following circular from Headquarters:--
“... Hence it is easy to justify the endeavour of leading circles,
that, hand in hand with the development of Magyar literature and with
the declaration of patriotic feeling, the officials of the forestry
department should crown with a list of names of good Magyar sound the
building whose foundation has cost so much self-sacrifice, trouble and
activity. But it is regrettable that, despite the evidence of this
good feeling, there should be hardly a body in all Hungary in which
we meet with so many foreign-sounding names as among the forestry
officials. Both in order to restore this balance, and also as your
benevolent superior, who is convinced that under equal conditions the
Magyarisation of your names does involve some advantage for you, I
consider it to be my duty, in order to further your best interests, to
urge and encourage you to a general movement. But I also enjoin you to
endeavour to plant a similar spirit among the subordinate foresters.
The formalities for the Magyarisation of names have now been made so
easy that it is merely necessary to hand in to the vice-sheriff of
the county a petition bearing a one-crown stamp, accompanied by the
baptismal certificates of the children and employment papers. In the
latter, the places of birth and abode, position and moral character are
to be filled in.”
On January 25, 1898, a private circular was addressed by Orban Sipos,
the School Inspector of Bihar County, to all schoolmasters under him:
“I call your attention to the fact that by permission of the Minister
of Education your colleague, Nicholas Radovich, teacher at the State
school of Kozepes, has changed his name to ‘Keti’; Aug. Bruckenthal,
teacher at the State school of Haimagi, to ‘Bihari’; and finally,
John Modora, teacher at the State school of Olosig, to ‘Tinodi.’ I
therefore request you in your correspondence with them in future
to use Magyarised names. In this connection I express the hope and
expectation, that these patriotic examples, which affect neither
religious conviction nor the interests of the mother tongue, but are
merely a proof of a patriotic sentiment above all question, will be
speedily followed by the teachers who do not as yet possess names
of a Magyar sound; for otherwise I should, to my great regret, be
forced to the conviction that the teachers in question have not the
necessary will and courage to offer unequivocal proofs of their
loyal devotion to the Magyar Fatherland, or they would prove that
they subordinate this lofty aim to other trivial considerations.
While urging you to further the patriotic movement to which I have
referred, I remain, with regards,
“ORBAN SIPOS,
“Royal Inspector of Schools.”
With these telling examples of official Magyarisation before us, we
may now proceed to investigate the influence of the War upon the
peoples who, in 1914, found themselves under the dominion of the Crown
of St. Stephen. In the space at my disposal I have been unable to do
more than give the barest outline of what Magyar rule meant to those
subjected to it. But even this outline should suffice to explain how it
was that the great catastrophe found the subject races of Hungary, the
Slovaks, Rumanians and Slavs, burning to throw off the Magyar yoke and,
either of themselves or by union to some already established nation
akin to them, to seek the political and social freedom so long denied
them.
FOOTNOTES:
[16] Compare page 152.
[17] See also Professor Ernest Denis, _Les Slovaques_, Paris, Librarie
Delagrave.
[18] They were Lederer, a prominent lawyer, Heydrek, the poet, and
Kalal, a well-known writer.