József Németh

Landmarks in the
History of Hungarian Engineering

  Portrait Gallery of the Technical University 

Technical University of Budapest
Budapest, 1996

In 1995, the television series titled "Landmarks", edited by György Lovas, Eszter Hajdufy, and Ágnes Magyar, published by the Educational Studio of the Hungarian Television, was produced using the material of this booklet.

Revised by Dr. Zénó Terplán regular member of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences 

Edited by Dr. István Gazda Head of the Hungarian Institute of Science History 

Typography by Ildikó Vargha 

Translated by Andrea Szűcs 

Cover photo by János Philip based on the water-colour "Technical University" by Alajos Hauszmann  

Published with the assistance of Visual Creation Limited Partnership, Hungarus Limited Partnership, and the Hungarian Institute of Science History ISSN 1218–1676 ISBN 963 420 472 4

Person in charge of publication: Dr. Péter Bíró, Rector of TUB Dr. József Németh, 1996 Hungarian translation, Andrea Szűcs, 1996 Set by Éva Fröhling Printed by Szüpex Print and Graphics Studio, Budapest

Centuries of technical culture in Hungary

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The engineers presented here, most of them scholarly professors of our University, made their mark in the history of technology by their achievements. They have made their homeland and Alma Mater famous all over the world.

The author has been working at the Technical University of Budapest since 1963, researching and teaching the history of engineering and technical culture in Hungary. He is convinced that it is one of the most beautiful teaching tasks to make future engineers acquainted with the engineers of the past, the technical civilization of bygone centuries.

The portraits taken from one and a half centuries of technology and engineering in Hungary are arranged in chronological order for greater lucidity.

When we trace the steps of former creators, we trace the ways of Europe. Some have drifted far away by history, never forgetting however where they had started from. The memorial statues in the Great Hall and in the park of the University remind us of them.

We would like the past not only to be a memory but an encouragement for tomorrow as well.

In the territory of Hungary, the various peoples living before the Hungarian settlement (896) already had considerable technical culture. The remnants of the late Roman Empire ca n be seen in Aquincum (in District III of Budapest), and various material remains were left to us by the peoples living in this area in the course of the ensuing centuries as well. (These include the Huns' reflex bows and arrows reinforced by bone lamellas, the masterpieces of goldsmith's craft and the siderurgical culture of the Avars).

Setting out from their original homeland in the Ural region, the Hungarians met an infinity of ethnic groups.

The settlement in the Carpathian Basin of the approximately 500,000 conquering Hungarians led by Prince Árpád began in 894. The 10th century is the era of the forays but, at the same time, of the gradual settlement of Hungarians.

During the rules of Prince Géza (972–997) and King Stephen (1000–1038; Saint Stephen) forays came to an end, and the dioceses formed after the adoption of Christianity became the centres of all the areas of culture at the time.

King Stephen founded 10 dioceses with seats in Bihar, Csanád, Eger, Esztergom, Győr, Gyulafehérvár, Kalocsa, Pécs, Vác, and Veszprém. As early as during the rule of Prince Géza, the construction of the first Hungarian Benedictine monastery, named after Saint Martin, was started at Pannonhalma. The royal power and state organization established after the original conquest of Hungarians (895–96) and the coronation of Saint Stephen (25 December, 1000 or 1 January, 1001) assigned an important role to the implantation of technical culture as well.

From the 11th century on, we can find villages separated by the nature of service (ironworker: tributarius ferri; hammersmith: fater; shield-maker: scutifer; goldsmith: aurifater; potter: figulus; carpenter: carpentarius).

In the Latin documents of the time we can find the names of several technical instruments in Hungarian as well (e.g. lever, wooden bridge, high-breast mill, hammer, casting, sluice, etc.). In the 12th century, windmills imported from the Delft region were spread mainly in the Great Hungarian Plain and the Bakony area. Along the Danube, different types of watermills were operated as well. Some of them were presented in the world chronicle by Schedel dating back to 1493. One of the outstanding architectural monuments of this century, the church of Ják (near Szombathely), built in Romanesque style around 1200, can still be seen in its entire splendour.

In the 12th century, there were already three centres of siderurgy in Hungary: in the West of Hungary (Kőszegfalva, Vasvár); in the North of Hungary (Rudabánya); and in the South of Hungary (Pécsvárad).

From the iron produced, farming instruments (sickles, scythes, ploughs) as well as harnesses (bit of bridle, stirrup) and weapons (swords) were fabricated. Iron was even exported. At the market in Danzig (Gdansk), iron from Spain, Sweden, and Hungary were most sought after. (25 tons of herrings were given in return of 12 barrels of Hungarian iron.) Relics of weaving and spinning (Tiszalök) can prove that pedal-operated looms were known. Pottery and glassware making were important branches of industry in Medieval Hungary. In the field of war industry, gun-founders (prixidarius) are to be mentioned. In 1452, the giant cannons of master Urban were used by the Turkish artillery at the siege of Constantinople.

From King Matthias (1458–1490), gun-founders, gold- and silversmiths, and master builders were requested by the Russian Tsar.

In the field of modernizing ore mining and milling, János Thurzó (1437–1508) gained lasting distinction. By using his method, copper could be produced from copper-lead ore in the middle of the 15th century. In mines, lifting devices were applied at more and more places and in 1627, the technique of blasting was already known and utilized. At the beginning of the 18th century, the first atmospheric steam engine was produced in England based on Newcomen's idea. On the Continent, the first "fiery machine" working on this principle was put into operation at Újbánya – near Selmecbánya – in 1722, to be visited even by Montesquieu in 1728.

Máté Kornél Hell and his son, József Hell played a significant role in the development of mine pumps. (Their invention is known by the name of "Selmec pump".) Miksa Hell wrote his name into the history of science as an astronomer. He performed weather measurements even beyond the Arctic Circle, and, among other things, the observatory built in Eger in 1776 can be contributed to him.

Faustus Verancsics (?1551–1617), bishop of Csanád, was also one of the famous engineers in the Middle Ages. He equipped the coach with bogie, and the mill designed by him was operated by a high-breast paddle wheel.

Besides the technological achievements of the Middle Ages in Hungary, we should briefly mention the special literature and the teaching of natural sciences.

The publication of "Deliberatio" (speculations) by Bishop Gellért at the middle of the 11th century contributed to the implantation of natural scientific culture. The Pray codex, written by members of the Benedictine order in the 12th century (preserved in Esztergom), deals with calendar calculations.

In the court of Andrew II (1205–1235) there were several astronomers. A university was founded by King Louis the Great (1342–1382) in Pécs in 1367, and by King Sigismund (1387–1437) in Óbuda in 1395, respectively, where, among other things, astronomy was also taught (György Bisznarói).

In 1467, assisted by King Matthias, János Vitéz (secretary of King Matthias) established the Academia Istropolitana in Pozsony. Regiomontanus, the famous astronomer of the Middle Ages, lived in Matthias's court for a number of years.

The Mathematics coursebook by Georgius de Hungaria was published in Utrecht in 1499. The first Mathematics coursebook in Hungarian was published in 1577, with the title 'Debrecen Arithmetics', containing the first four rules of arithmetic.

The method of J. Gutenberg (cca. 1400–1468) modernizing printing was soon to be utilized in Hungary as well. In 1473, András Hess published Chronica Hungarorum in Buda.

Maps, at the level of the given age, can be traced back to the 15th century. A cleric named Lázár, secretary of Tamás Bakócz (1442–1521), archbishop of Esztergom, prepared a map of Hungary. One of the outstanding cartographers of the 16th century was János Zsámboki /Sambucus/ (1531–1584). An almost new era was opened up in this field by the work of Sámuel Mikoviny (1700–1750).

The University in Nagyszombat (presently Trnava, Slovakia) was founded in 1635 by archbishop Péter Pázmány in order to train teachers of mathematics, soon to be expanded by faculties of divinity, law, and humanities, and later by a faculty of medicine. (This was the predecessor of today's Eötvös Loránd University of Sciences.) The scholarly career of János András Segner (1704–1777) started from the Reformed College of Debrecen; he became a professor of Physics and Mathematics as well as Astronomy at the universities of Jena, Göttingen, and Halle. He invented the precursor of the turbine (Segner-wheel), by which he operated mills as well. One of the craters of the Moon was named after him.

In 1763, the so-called Collegium Oeconomicum was established at Szenc, near Pozsony, and in the same year, the school of mining in Selmecbánya, turned into the College of Mining in 1770. (This institution was the predecessor of the Technical University of Miskolc.)

Still in the same century, on 30 August, 1782, King Joseph II signed the deed of foundation of the Institutum Geometrico-Hydrotechnicum (Institute of Engineering), thus starting university-level engineer training in Hungary. (The Institute of Engineering was the predecessor of the Technical University of Budapest.)

Mainly surveying engineers were trained here. The students included István Vedres (1765–1830), later the engineer-in-chief of Szeged; József Beszédes (1787–1852), implementing innumerable plans of river basin arrangement; and Pál Vásárhelyi (1795–1846), regulator of the rivers Tisza and Lower Danube among other things.

It became more and more of a pressing necessity to establish an engineer training centre besides the Institute of Engineering which would train approppriate experts for industry. The School of Industry was inaugurated on 1 November, 1846.

Count István Széchenyi (1791–1860) played an important part in the engineer training of the age as well as in the industrialization of Hungary.

In the 20s of the 19th century, during the so-called Reform Period, such factories were founded which assumed a significant role in the technical development not only of Hungary and Europe, but in a few cases in that of the whole world.

In 1836, the Shipyard of the First Danube Steamship Company (Óbuda) was established; in 1840, the Valero Silk Factory; in 1841, the Pest Cylinder Mill; and in 1842, the Röck Machine Works. Ábrahám Ganz established his factory in 1845, making it recognized by the chill casting of railway car wheels; after that, roller mills (grinding rolls of mills) were produced; then in 1880, being one of the first in the world, the electrical section was established, where the transformer was created by Miksa Déri, Ottó Titusz Bláthy, and Károly Zipernowsky in 1885.

Since 1871, after the Austro-Hungarian reconciliation of 1867, the Technical University of Budapest has functioned as an independent organization, with its first Rector, József Sztoczek (1819–1890) who lectured on technical physics.

The University assumed a decisive role not only in engineer training, but in the industrial policies of the time as well.

All the engineers but one (Ottó Titusz Bláthy) presented in the following chapters were scholarly professors in different periods at our University. Besides being offered an introduction to their career and achievements, we can cast a glance into nearly 150 years of the history of our University and of Hungarian technical culture.