Culture of Hungary

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

The culture of Hungary is rich and varied, from the twin cities of Buda and Pest on the Danube, to the Great Plain bordering Ukraine. Today's Hungary was formerly (until 1918) part of the Austro-Hungarian empire. Hungary has great folk traditions, producing embroideries, pottery, decorated buildings, and carvings. Hungarian music ranges from the rhapsodies of Franz Liszt to Roma and folk music.

Hungary is well known for its water sports, e.g. swimming, canoeing, and water polo (despite its lack of large bodies of water and the fact that it is one of Europe's few landlocked countries). Many important mathematicians such as János Bolyai, Paul Erdős and John von Neumann were Hungarian. Hungarians are proud of their inventions such as the match, ballpoint pen, electronic railway engine, BASIC programming language and the theoretical background of the hydrogen bomb (independently of its questionable result).

Hungary has a great literature, with many poets and writers, although not many are well known abroad due to the limited prevalence of the Hungarian language as a Finno-Ugric language. Some noted authors include Sándor Márai and Imre Kertész, who have been gaining acclaim in recent decades. János Kodolányi was more known in the middle of the twentieth century in Italy and Finland. Sándor Márai has a growing popularity nowadays in Europe. Imre Kertész won the Nobel Prize in Literature in 2002. Péter Esterházy is known and popular in Austria and Germany ,and Magda Szabó has become well-known in Europe recently as well.

Hungarian cuisine includes many pork and beef dishes, particularly goulash (a beef soup – gulya means a herd of cows, gulyás is like 'cowboy'), or a stew known in Hungarian as pörkölt. Dishes are often flavoured with paprika. Hungary also produces wine, including Tokaji from Tokaj.

[edit] See also

• List of Hungarians
• List of Hungarian rulers
• List of Hungarian writers
• List of Hungarian painters
• List of Hungarian architects
• List of Hungarian sculptors
• Renaissance architecture in Eastern Europe
• Hungarian literature
• Music of Hungary
• Hungarian cuisine
• Hungarian animals
• Common Hungarian surnames
• Eastern name order used in Hungarian personal names
• Magyar Cserkészszövetség
• Architecture of Hungary

[edit] External links

• Culture of Hungary (Film, Fine arts, Folklore, Literature, Music, Press and Theatre) summarized at the administrative website of Hungary
• Some Hungarian proverbs reflecting the history and culture of the county