You wrote:
>
>I recently graduated from Indiana University with a master's in East
>European Studies concentrating on Hungarian Politics and History.  I
also
>studied Hungarian language and would like to locate someone in the
Colorado
>Springs, CO area who would like to help me continue my study of
Hungarian.
>Any referrals on this would be greatly appreciated.
>
>Brad Gutierrez
>
Hi,

You might talk to Dave Schmitz ) from
Colorado after September 10.

Jon Rand

To all:
Do anybody knows where can I get software for the hungarian ABC ?


Thanks  Gabor.

Honourable Vajk - wellcome to the fuss!

You wrote (i.a.):

.
>so I am unfamiliar with what started this fuss.  If someone has the
>original, I would like to have a copy.

I started the fuss and you seem to have the original.

>There appears to be a singularly narrow focus in the discussion so far.
... the focus seems to be on
>the Turks.

Yes, that is true but bear in mind that <Turk> in this discussion stands for
<Turkic> and thus for a very large and divers group of people. These Turks
were the principal inhabitants of the Euro-Asian steppes and thus do merit
our singular attention.

With regards to your questions (1 to 4), I hope that the following may help
us to advance:

>1) There was at one time a postulate that the Magyars and Uighurs were
>   related in some way.

The Uighurs of Central China (currently) are a Turkic people if I am not
mistaken. And you are right these postulates are singularly resilient.

Nobody to my knowledge would seriously dispute the possibility of contact
between ancient Ugric and Uighur people but there are good arguments for not
pursuing this line enquiry:

a. All people who have lived for a considerable time in the steppes exhibit
striking similarities and most of these are (or can easily assumed to be) the
result of adaptation to the same environment.

b. If there was a contact, it must have been in a period far before the time
leading to the Carpathian settlement by the Magyars. So even the purpose of
speculation is entirely speculative.

>2) There was at one time not so long ago a thesis that the language of
>   the future Magyars was the parent stock for the entire Finno-Ugric
>   language group. Has anything come of this thesis?

That is new to me. It is my impression that linguists in Hungary and
elsewhere consider Finnish more archaic. I don't think there are candidates
among spoken Finno-Ugric languages for parent stock status.

>3) It is said that while under the Huns the Magyars took part in the Hun
>   invasion of Europe, and that some Magyars remained behind when the others
>   retreated whence they came.  This might explain the presence of Magyar
>   language, or at least some vocabulary or Magyar language structure, in
>   the Carpathian basin prior to the arrival of the Magyars in the late
>   9th century.
>

Dr. Makkay Janos (he) thinks along similar lines. It is not essential to his
argument how exactly the Magyars arrived in the C. basin although clearly one
would be delighted to know. His principal thrust is simply to demonstrate
that they were there when Arpad arrived.

Incidentally it is the (survival of the) Hungarian grammar which is the root
of all this fuss. The present day vocabulary alone would not suffice to claim
Ugric descendance.

>4) As to some group other than the Magyars being the leaders in the
Conquest,
>   it is said that the Kabars led the march physically, in keeping with
>   common practice.  Also, during the Byzantine/Bulgarian fiasco, it is
>   said that a rather large force was trapped behind enemy lines and took
>   up residence in Byzantium, where they maintained a separate identity for
>   quite some time.  Further, if I remember correctly, it was during this
>   time, between leaving the Khazars and entering the Carpathian Basin,
>   that some Magyars returned to "Magna Hungarica" (I'm a bit fuzzy on
>   the chronology of that last).  So it appears that while the Magyar
>   confederacy was gaining new confederates, much of the original group
>   was moving off, giving the body that crossed the Carpathians a slim
>   majority of Magyars.  And so far in this discussion (that has reached
>   the Magyar mailing list), no mention of the Szekely has been seen.

You raise many issues there. My impression is that the entire chronology of
Magna Hungaria > Levedia > Etelkoz (and the Khazar/Magyar coexistence in
Levedia, or Etelkoz, or both) has been constructed to a great extent around
the alleged "Magyar conquest under Arpad". In the case of a Magyar arrival
before Arpad, this chronology (for which there is not a shred of evidence)
becomes entirely speculative.

The Kabars' role too (you seem to refer to Emperor Constantine) is
exclusively related to Arpad's invading army and not to the Magyars per se.

The Szekely question is so complicated that I was hoping to avoid it. I am
not quite sure to be honest whether it can help to unravel things or just
makes matters more complex.

>Just some things to think about.  It is unlikely, I think, that the
situation
>is as simple as what has so far been presented.  But I'm afraid that my
>ignorance is too great to throw much light on the subject.  I ask questions
>that have not so far been asked, and hope that the questions will lead to
>better answers.

That very much sums up my stake in this discussion. In particular, I confess
to ignorance too. Ignorance to which I had been condemned by the type of
education that I had to "enjoy" in Hungary and which continues along the same
ideological lines today.

-------------------------------------
Name: tiha von ghyczy
E-mail: 
Date: 08/21/95
Charlottesville, Va.
-------------------------------------

> Temakor: Hungarian names in English ( 15 sor )
Can somebody suggest me whether I should stick with the Hungarian way to
write Hungarians' names or not in my (english) thesis?

> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

Actually it gets even more confusing since some hungarians have family names
which are usually thought of as "kereszt nevek" i.e. "baptismal names" or as
the english would say "first names".  In effect, unless the author actually
indicates which is which, there is no way that the reader can tell which
convention is being used.  I'm not sure it really matters unless there is a
possibility of confusion with another individual who has the same two names in
reverse.  Otherwise all you want to achieve is to identify the person, in
which case while I am accustomed to saying Kossuth Lajos, I would have no
trouble knowing who Lajos Kossutj would be....  but, to further add to the
confusion, many hungarians use a double last name consisting of a Location
name, a Family Name, and a baptismal name. In this case individuals who want
to appear more westernized will drop one of the names and just go with a
"first name" and a "last name".  But I have seen both the location name and
the family name used as the last name....  Like I said, as long as all you are
trying to do is to identify an individual, it probably doesn't matter.

Can somebody suggest me whether I should stick with the Hungarian way to
write Hungarians' names or not in my (english) thesis?

> --------------------------------------------------------------------------

Actually it gets even more confusing since some hungarians have family names
which are usually thought of as "kereszt nevek" i.e. "baptismal names" or as
the english would say "first names".  In effect, unless the author actually
indicates which is which, there is no way that the reader can tell which
convention is being used.  I'm not sure it really matters unless there is a
possibility of confusion with another individual who has the same two names in
reverse.  Otherwise all you want to achieve is to identify the person, in
which case while I am accustomed to saying Kossuth Lajos, I would have no
trouble knowing who Lajos Kossuth would be....  but, to further add to the
confusion, many hungarians use a double last name consisting of a Location
name, a Family Name, and a baptismal name. In this case individuals who want
to appear more westernized will drop one of the names and just go with a
"first name" and a "last name".  But I have seen both the location name and
the family name used as the last name....  Like I said, as long as all you are
trying to do is to identify an individual, it probably doesn't matter.

Andraas Kornai writes:

>I grant that understanding the current myth is important in
>understanding the present.  At the same time I completely reject the
>idea that to understand something you have to understand its history
>(the point has been argued in same detail in Popper's "The Poverty of
>Historicism"),...

Popper is not a historian, and his excursion into the philosophy of history
suffers from the usual flaws of dilletantism.*  Popper's book _The Poverty
of Historicism_ is probably the best example in our day of what is known as
a 'straw man argument'.  Popper tells us what he thinks Historicism is,
gives us his example of 'historicists', then proceeds to refute the
arguments he himself created.  He does not address any of the arguments of
actual historicists, such as Ranke, Dilthey, or Troelch,** and his
arguments are based on premises that are not generally accepted, and are
derived from his own differences in nuance with the logical/empirical
positivism of the Vienna Circle with respect to the usefulness of induction
in science.  Popper, maintains, following Hume, that induction can never
lead to 'proof', because no matter how often an event might recurr, the
probability that it will recurr again is not affected.  While this may be
true as it stands, he, himself, realises that the physical sciences then
also need some ground for being justified if they are to retain authority;
hence the 'line of demarcation' and 'the principle of falsification' -
somewhat dubious formulations, the logical equavalents of definitions of
'heresy' in theology.

> and I see no reason to make an exception to myths.  The
>man-made conceptual systems I'm most familiar with are languages, and
>certainly their history explains nothing about the way they are today.

Are you saying that the turkic root words in Hungarian, or the latin root
words in English tell us nothing about the way those languages are, nor
about the history of the people concerned?  I suppose the architecture of
Washington D.C. could be what it is if Athens and Rome had never been
built.  Following this view of reality, capitalism has nothing to do with
the Protestant Ethic and the Christian notion of redemption has nothing to
do with the Sumerian and Babylonian custom of accepting the punishment of a
person's slave in lieu of his/her own punishment.

For better or worse, myths have a great deal to do with the way people
organise their affairs, and hence the structure of societies.  What leads
to confusion, is our unfortunate tendency, (which, I suspect, is derived
from the Mesopotamian dualism and absolutism  which penetrates all our
thought,)   to fall victim to the 'all or nothing' fallacy.  The question
is not, "do myths or 'history'  have an effect on current affairs?"  (that
is not deniable), but , conceedeng that whatever that effect may be, it is
not mechanical and straightforward.  Once we have understood that point, we
need to discern empirically, how interest (both in the political/economic
sense and in the cognitive sense), activity (Work, Play, Conflict ,
Competition, and Cooperation)  and externalities (the environment and the
'economy') interact to produce the results we _experience_.  I think this
is a long range problem, and certainly not resolveable by us in this forum.
 The revelant disciplines: history, political economy, semantics,
hermeneutics, sociology, anthropology, psychology, linguistics,
communication theory, cognitive science, and who knows what else, will need
to undergo a paradigm shift greater then the Copernican Revolution itself,
so that they achieve the level of integration or coherence of mathematics,
physics, and chemistry.

In the meantime, we have to deal with our  problems today.  These problems
constitute the constellation of considerations that will be the object of
study of the historians of the future, _if_ the future happens to have
humans in it.   It is a current fact, that certain people in particular
areas, feel like they are being treated 'unjustly'.  However they may
define the term 'justice', they definitely experience 'injustice' as a
problem to be corrected.  What means they will use to try and achieve their
ends is certainly not predictable given the current level of knowledge, but
one way to view history is that it consists of peoples' striving for
whatever they considered to be just.  What constitutes actual justice, on
the other hand, is debateable, as we saw when our Roumanian friend invaded
our deliberations.  What is more, no amount of reasoning, or 'facts', will
persuade a Hungarian that he or she  should restrict his/her 'hungarianess'
to the private sphere any more then a Nootka will be persuaded by reasoning
to restrict his/her 'nootkaness' to the private sphere and neither will be
persuaded that either actually existing (-ed) socialism or actually
existing capitalism will lead to the 'promised land'.  Reasoning will be
even less effective if it is obviously hipocritical and is perceived as a
mask for cultural or physical genocide.

In short, we need to tread carefully!  The 'end' is closer then we think!



*  Actually, I am being too hard on Popper.  If one puts the book in
historical context, and views it as a response to the political situation
in the world at the time  he wrote it, (in the aftermath of the Great War,
the threat of Anarchy and the rise of Totalitarianism in Europe), it is a
perfectly understandeable response.

** For a good overview of Historicim, see Karl Mannheim  "Historicism", in
_Essays on the Sociology of Knowledge_.


Best regards,

Laborfalvi Benke Tibor                         Tibor Benke
6198 Kathleen Avenue, apt. 117              Graduate Student (MA program)

Burnaby, B.C., Canada                            Department of Sociology
(604) 434-0822                                      and Anthropology
                                        Simon Fraser University

Democritus was right: change is constant!
Democritus was wrong: Change is variable!

Greetings from a recent first time visitor to Hungary.

Can anyone tell me something about Gergely Mountain in the
Zemplin area and about the family Gyorgy and Boldogkovaralja.
Please excuse my ignorance of your history, but as others in
your group have said, Hungarian history in English is not very
available in the States.

Thanks  

Also I would appreciate subscription information for your group.

s

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