Lórév Summary
Lórév
Summary
Summary
South from Budapest, on an island embraced by the Danube, lies Lórév, a Serbian settlement, still the most homogeneous ethnic community fostering its traditions in Hungary after the Peace Treaty of Trianon.
The area, today known as Csepel-island belonged to the abode of the central principality after the Hungarian Settlement, and part of the royal estate in the subsequent centuries. This region gained significance due to its favourable position. The protection offered by this territory made animal husbandry favourable from the very beginning. The name of Csepel-island preserves the name of chieftain Arpad’s Master of the Horse, while in the name of Lórév (Lóré) hides the fact that this was the best crossing point in the neighbrouhood.
The first written relic of the village – in Latin – is known from the times of King Béla IV, in the form of “In portu equorum” from 1259. The location called Loureu was first mentioned in a charter issued by Ladislas IV. (the Kun) in 1276. Throughout the Middle Ages, before the Turkish rule, it was registered as a populated area. This was proven by the Papal register of tithes of 1332–1337, and also by the fact that king Wladislas I took to his resort house next to Lórév to find protection from the devastating plague.
Due to the plague, new settlers were welcomed both on the uninhabited lands, and in the areas abandoned on the royal and private landowners’ estates in the Hungarian Kindgom. As a result of the forging ahead of the Turkish Empire on the Balkans, many of the peoples living there searched for protection, and first temporary, later permanent living space in the areas lying further North. The first such mass immigration took place from the town of Kevi on the lower-Danube and the surrounding villages to Csepel island under the rule of king Sigismund around 1400, and later, before the Turkish invasion to Hungary, another wave of refugees arrived from Serbian areas.
The population of Lórév, lying in the Kovin nahije of the Sandjak of Buda under the rule of the Turkish empire were registered several times in the XVI century. Their properties, and tax liabilities were recorded. There were thirty to forty families between 1546 and 1590.
As a result of the fights and the cruelty of the Islamic empire on the Balkans, the situation of the Serbian population became more severe there. That was the reason why patriach Čarnojević Arzén set off together with forty-thousand families fleeing from the Serbian territories to find recluse within the borders of the Hungarian Kingdom. First they wanted to move to the North temporarily, but when it turned out that after the peace made with the Turks in Karlóca in 1699, the Osmanli could retain their territory lying in the Danube-Tisza triangle, it also became obvious that there was little chance of going back home.
Many of these families arriving with this third Serbian wave, settled in the counties close to the Southern territories, but several thousands found a new home in the vicinity of the capital. One of the groups found a new home in Ráckeve, next to Lórév on the Csepel island, in the cultural and economic centre of the island, in Szigetcsép and Tököl. In addition to the closeness of the capital, another reason for selecting this location was also probably the contact held with the descendants of the earlier Serbian settlers, as there had been Serbs living in the privileged oppidum of Ráckeve on the island also during the Turkish rule, and what was more they could also practise their religion in the Gothic style church they had started to use in 1487.
Several detailed records were made about this area between 1710 and 1728. In the national census ordered in 1728, the names and financial situations of the Lórév population were recorded together with the fact that the land of the village was sandy, “black and hard”, and medium fertile. Farming was pursued in a two-course rotation system. The redundant part of produced grain, and the animals for sale were delivered to the fairs held in Buda and Pest.
The landowner of the island was prince Jenő Savoyai during these years. He was a prominent military leader, sponsor of arts, a caring landlord, who also supported the members of the Serbian and German communities that had found their new home in the abandoned areas to construct their houses within short. After the prince died, the estate in Ráckeve got to the hands of the royal family, and was known as the royal domain of Ráckeve until the end of the second World War.
At the beginning of the XX century, Lórév was a village with a strong national identity, still preserving its traditions. Its population earned their living mainly from agriculture. The 409 inhabitants recorded here in 1786 during the census by Joseph II in 1789 had risen to almost seven-hundred by now. After the peace treaties closing the first World War, in 1924, many from here opted for Serbia, and moved back to their ancient land. In spite of the social and economic changes after the second World War, and although the agricultural co-operative was also formed here, most of the population followed earlier traditions on their household farms, and even enriched their knowledge with the experiences gained from horticulturists of a Bulgarian origin, who moved here in the 1950-ies. Apart from some other economic activities, they have been carrying out a labour-intensive extensive green-house vegetable and fruit production until today.
Those living here carefully foster their family relations with the families that moved back to Serbia earlier. This is the reason why many of the young women find their way back as wives to the land of their ancestors. This process has a negative impact on the development of the village, the number of its population is stagnating.
After the local elections in 1990, the people living in the village tried to keep it within the notarial district of Ráckeve, for not the first time during its history. They consider it as an important duty to identify their economic opportunities. Their every days are interwoven by traditions. They are happy to dance koló, their old dance during their common holidays.
The Serbian church and its iconostas, made in the XVIII century, are a symbol of permanence. The lives of those living here are made more colourful and more substantial not only with the traditions linked to ecclesiastical holidays, but also a series of customs that accompanies human life from birth to death. Using the records of this huge knowledge made in the XX century, in the second part of the book, we may have an overview about the folk arts of the village with the former architectural, border-use, farming and folklore traditions that impacted the everyday lives of the people. A separate chapter was devoted to the few days when the name of the village of Lórév – although against the intention of the local people – was hit by the limelight of Hungarian political life due to Ödön Zichy, who was executed in 1848.
The appendix at the end of the book contains historical records about the people of the village from the Turkish age and the XVIII century, the names recorded in land registers in the 1850-ies, important documents selected from the feudal legal procedures that played an important role in the life of the village, as well as rules and statutes of a historic significance from the XIX and XX centuries.
The history of the village, the everyday life of its population, the way they fostered their traditions in this smallest village of the Csepel-island present a good example of how a small community can preserve its ethnic identity throughout the centuries, and how it is capable of survival even in the XXI century by cherishing a community life and maintaining traditions.
