Budapest
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.
- See Budapest (band) for the British musical group
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| City nickname: "Pearl or Queen of the Danube" | |||||
| Location | |||||
 Location of Budapest in Hungary |
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| Government | |||||
| Country County |
Hungary none |
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| Mayor | Gábor Demszky (SZDSZ) | ||||
| Physical characteristics | |||||
| Area Land Water |
525,16 km² n/a km² n/a km² |
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| Population Total (2005) Density |
1,695,000 3570/km² |
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| Latitude | 47°28′19″ N | ||||
| Longitude | 19°03′01″ E | ||||
| Time zone Summer (DST) |
CET (UTC+1) CEST (UTC+2) |
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| Official website: www.budapest.hu | |||||
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Budapest (pronounced ['budɒˌpɛʃt]) is the capital city of Hungary and the country's principal political, industrial, commercial and transportation centre. It has more than 1.7 million inhabitants, down from a mid-1980s peak of 2.07 million. Budapest became a single city occupying both banks of the river Danube with the amalgamation in 1873 of right-bank Buda (Ofen in German) and Óbuda (Old Buda or Alt-Ofen) together with Pest on the left (east) bank. It is the sixth largest city in the European Union.
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History
Budapest's recorded history begins with the Roman town of Aquincum, founded around 89 AD on the site of an earlier Celtic settlement near what was to become Óbuda, and from 106 until the end of the 4th century the capital of the province of lower Pannonia. Aquincum was the base camp of Legio II Adiutrix. The area of Campona (today's Nagytétény) belongs to Buda as well. Today's Pest became the site of Contra Aquincum (or Trans Aquincum), a smaller sentry point. The word Pest (or Peshta) originates from Bulgarian language, because at the time of the reign of the Bulgarian khan Krum, the town was under Bulgarian dominion.
The area was occupied around the year 900 by the Magyars, the ancestors of today's ethnic Hungarians, who a century later founded the Kingdom of Hungary. Already a place of some significance, Pest recovered rapidly from its destruction by Mongol invaders in 1241, but it was Buda, the seat of a royal castle since 1247, which in 1361 became the capital of Hungary.
The Ottoman Empire's conquest of most of Hungary in the 16th century interrupted the cities' growth: Buda and Pest fell to the invaders in 1541. While Buda remained the seat of a Turkish pasha, and administrative center of a whole vilayet, Pest was largely derelict by the time of their recapture in 1686 by Austria's Habsburg rulers, who since 1526 had been Kings of Hungary despite their loss of most of the country.
It was Pest, a bustling commercial town, which enjoyed the faster growth rate in the 18th and 19th century and contributed the overwhelming majority of the cities' combined growth in the 19th. By 1800 its population was larger than that of Buda and Óbuda combined. The population of Pest grew twentyfold in the following century to 600,000, while that of Buda and Óbuda quintupled.
The fusion of the three cities under a single administration, first enacted by the Hungarian revolutionary government in 1849 but revoked on the subsequent restoration of Habsburg authority, was finally effected by the autonomous Hungarian royal government established under the Austro-Hungarian Ausgleich ("Compromise") of 1867; see Austria-Hungary. The total population of the unified capital grew nearly sevenfold in 1840–1900 to 730,000.
During the 20th century, most population growth occurred in the suburbs, with Újpest more than doubling between 1890–1910 and Kispest more than quintupling in 1900–1920, as much of the country's industry came to be concentrated in the city. The country's human losses during World War I and the subsequent loss of more than two thirds of the former kingdom's territory (1920) dealt only a temporary blow, leaving Budapest as the capital of a smaller but now sovereign state. By 1930 the city proper contained a million inhabitants, with a further 400,000 in the suburbs.
Around a third of Budapest's 250,000 Jewish inhabitants died through Nazi genocide during the World War II German occupation in 1944, most having passed through the Budapest ghetto. On January 1, 1950, the area of Budapest was significantly expanded: new districts were formed from the neighbouring cities and towns (see Great-Budapest). From the severe damage during the Soviet siege in 1944, the city recovered in the 1950s and 1960s, becoming to some extent a showcase for the more pragmatic policies pursued by the country's communist government (1947–1989) from the 1960s. Since the 1980s, the capital has shared with the country as a whole in increased emigration coupled with natural population decrease.
Demographic history
- 1800: 54,200 inhabitants
- 1830: 102,700
- 1850: 178,000
- 1880: 370,800
- 1900: 733,400
- 1925: 957,800
- 1990: 2,016,100
- 2003: 1,719,343
Districts of Budapest
Budapest's districts are numbered basically clockwise, in widening circles, and are organized similarly to the arrondissements in Metropolitan Paris.
District I is a small area in central Buda (the western side), including the historic Castle. District II is in Buda again, in the northwest, and District III stretches along in the northernmost part of Buda.
To reach District IV, we must cross the Danube to find it in Pest (the eastern side), also at north. With District V, we begin another circle: it is located in the absolute centre of Pest. Districts VI, VII, VIII and IX are the neighbouring areas to the east, going southwards, one after the other.
District X is another, more external circle also in Pest, while we must jump to the Buda side again to find Districts XI and XII, going northwards. No more districts remaining in Buda in this circle, we must turn our steps to Pest again to find Districts XIII, XIV, XV, XVI, XVII, XVIII, XIX and XX (mostly external city parts), almost regularly in a semi-circle, going southwards again.
District XXI is the extension of the above route over a branch of the Danube, the northern tip of a long island (Csepel-sziget) south from Budapest. District XXII is still on the same route in southwest Buda, and finally District XXIII is again in southernmost Pest, irregular only because it was added afterwards to the capital.
Each district can be associated with one or more city parts named after former towns within Budapest. The districts in red are in Buda, those in blue in Pest, and the one in yellow is an island between them. (Note: two further islands are parts of District III and District XIII.)
Transport
Airport
Budapest Ferihegy International Airport, which has 3 different passenger terminals: Ferihegy 1, Ferihegy 2/A and Ferihegy 2/B. The airport is located to the east of the centre in the XVIII. district in Pestszentlőrinc.
Roads
Budapest is the most important Hungarian road terminus; all the major highways end there. Budapest is also a major railway terminus.
Railway
Hungarian main-line railways are operated by MÁV. There are three main railway termini in Budapest, Keleti (eastern), Nyugati (western), and Déli (southern), operating both domestic and international rail services. Budapest was one of the main stops of the Orient Express until 2001, when the service was cut back to Paris-Vienna.
There is also a suburban rail service in and around Budapest, operated under the name HÉV.
Subway
Main articles: Budapest Metro, List of Budapest metro stations.
The Budapest Subway system is the second oldest subway in Europe (after the London Underground). The original subway line is now the M1 or Yellow line. It was fully restored to its original condition, for a historical ride. Two other lines, the M2 (red) and M3 (blue), were built later and serve other parts of the city, and a fourth line is currently under construction.
Waterways
The river Danube flows through Budapest on its way to the Black Sea. The river is easily navigable and so Budapest has historically been a major commercial port (at Csepel).
Important figures
- Franz Xaver von Zach 1754 born in Pest, astronomer
- Ignaz Semmelweis born 1818 in Buda, physician
- Árpád Doppler born in 1857 in Budapest, composer
- George de Hevesy born in 1885 in Budapest, Nobel Prize winner in chemistry (1943)
- Georg Lukács born in 1885 in Budapest, philosopher
- Fritz Reiner born in 1888 in Budapest, conductor
- Albert von Szent-Györgyi Nagyrapolt born in 1893 in Budapest, Nobel Prize winner biologist, first isolated and described the vitamin C
- Karl Mannheim in 1893 in Budapest, philosopher
- George Szell in 1897 in Budapest, conductor
- Leó Szilárd born in 1898 in Budapest, developed the nuclear bomb
- Béla Bartók lived from 1899 to 1940 in Budapest, composer
- László József Bíró born in 1899, developed the biro
- Ferenc Puskás born in 1927 in Budapest, soccer player
- Imre Kertész born in 1929 in Budapest, author, Nobel Prize 2002
- George Soros (Soros György) born in 1930 in Budapest
- Ernő Rubik born in 1944 in Budapest, developed Rubik's Cube
- Péter Esterházy born in 1950 in Budapest, author
- Zoltán Kocsis born in 1952 in Budapest, pianist
- Zoltán Kodály lived and died 1967 in Budapest, composer
See also
External links
- Satellite photo map from Google Maps
- Make your travel plan in Budapest!
- Budapest panoramas in 360 degree
- Budapest & Hungary's aerial photos
- Budapest: short tour, picture gallery, history overview
- Digital Photoarchive of Metropolitan Ervin Szabó Library Budapest Collection
- Budapest sights collected on one page
- Budapest (Hungary for Visitors)
- Budapest pages
- Information about Budapest (in English)
- Worldguide by LonelyPlanet.com (in English)
- Photos of Budapest
- The Nomad: Budapest (photos)
- Budapest Photo Gallery: Buildings and Statues of Budapest (subtitles in Hungarian)
- Budapest portal (in English)
- Metropolitan Ervin Szabó Library Budapest Collection
- Budapest Districts
- Budapest travel guide at Wikitravel
- Budapest Transport plc public transport in Budapest (also in English)
- Budapest's World Heritage sites & map
- The Budapest Pages (lots of hints)
- The Jewish Community of Budapest
