The ruins of Buda-Nyék Royal hunting castle are located in Budapest 2nd district. A small castle was originally built here by Sigismund von Luxemburg Hungarian king and German- Roman emperor in the beginning of the 15th century. The castle was used later by Corvin Mathias Hunyadi, the greatest Hungarian king, who surrounded the castle with a majestic wildlife park in the second half of the 15th century, while his wife Beatrix Aragonese introduced the Renaissance lifestyle and culture in Buda. Hungarian king Ladislav Jagello II. of Polish origin, who married Foix Cadelei Anna from Occitania (France), transformed the Buda-Nyék castle to a Renaissance hunting palace for their wedding in 1502. The style of this complex followed the Medici's Palace in Poggio a Caiano. Because of the exile of Medicis the hunting palace in Buda-Nyék completed 11 years earlier than the paragon in Poggio a Caiano. After the battle at Mohács (1526) the country and the hunting palace were demolished and plundered by the cruel Turkish invadors, therefore King Ferdinand Habsburg the husband of Ladislav's daughter Anna, moved his court from Buda to Prague and at Anna's request he built a palace similar to Buda-Nyék hunting palace. This is Belvedere in Prague. Unfortunately Anna died before the building was completed. The ruins of Buda-Nyék-castle were found and partly excavated in the 20th century. For the European Heritage Days in 2018, Nyék-Kurucles Association arranged a great celebration around the ruins recalling the high days of Buda-Nyék castle with falconry demonstration, Renaissance table- vocals and presenting the history of the castle on molinos.

Story of Buda-Nyék Royal hunting castle/Hungary Introduction This application is prepared by Nyék-Kurucles Egyesület (Nyék-Kurucles Association H-1021 Budapest, Tárogató út 67. Hungary), a local civil association which has participated in the EHD programs for twenty years presenting different cultural values from year to year on the European Cultural Heritage Days. Our local civil association Nyék–Kurucles Egyesület focuses on the architectural, natural and cultural heritage of our area located in Budapest 2nd district between two main streets named Hűvösvölgyi street and Budakeszi street, which were main roads in the Middle Ages going from the Royal Palace of Buda to Vienna and to Poland through Esztergom, the original royal residence town. This area is about 10 km2 hills and valleys covered with forests, historical ruins and new buildings. The story of Buda-Nyék royal hunting castle The operational area of our association represents the Hungarian history from the conquest of Hungarian tribes in Carpathian Basin in the 9th century (one of the tribes was Nyék) to the present time Second World War battles. It was always preferred area for the historical persons - kings and convents - of the Hungarian history. The ruins what this story speaks about were the base walls of a royal hunting castle in the Middle Ages and in the Renaissance in Buda-Nyék. The hunting castle was situated on the slope of a hill over the stream Ördögárok surrounded by forests full of wild animals. A small hunting castle was originally built here by Sigismund von Luxenburg Hungarian king (1387-1437) and German-Roman Emperor (1433-1437). Buda castle was the seat of the king. The story of Buda-Nyék royal hunting castle The operational area of our association represents the Hungarian history from the conquest of Hungarian tribes in Carpathian Basin in the 9th century (one of the tribes was Nyék) to the present time Second World War battles. It was always preferred area for the historical persons - kings and convents - of the Hungarian history. The ruins of Buda-Nyék castle, what this story speaks about were the base walls of a royal hunting castle in the Middle Ages and in the Renaissance. The hunting castle was situated on the slope of a hill over the stream Ördögárok surrounded by forests full of wild animals. A small hunting castle was originally built here by Sigismund von Luxenburg Hungarian king (1387-1437) and German-Roman Emperor (1433-1437). Buda castle was the seat of the king. The story of Buda-Nyék royal hunting castle The operational area of our association represents the Hungarian history from the conquest of Hungarian tribes in Carpathian Basin in the 9th century (one of the tribes was Nyék) to the present time Second World War battles. It was always preferred area for the historical persons - kings and convents - of the Hungarian history. The ruins of Buda-Nyék castle what this story speaks about were the base walls of a royal hunting castle in the Middle Ages and in the Renaissance. The hunting castle was situated on the slope of a hill over the stream Ördögárok surrounded by forests full of wild animals. A small hunting castle was originally built here by Sigismund von Luxenburg Hungarian king (1387-1437) and German-Roman Emperor (1433-1437). Buda castle was the seat of the king. This castle was later used by Corvin Matthias Hunyadi (1458-1490), the greatest Hungarian king. His wife Beatrix Aragonese (Neaples) imported the Renaissance life style and culture from Italy to Hungary. Mathias king was a hunting fun, who established a huge wildlife park around the castle surrounded by stone fence about 15 km long and about two meter high. Presumably Chimenti Camicia was the designer of the wild-life park, because he had worked for many years in the court of Mathias. Famous nobles and majesties visited this park and they were amazed to see its wealth. Bonfini, the well-known history writer mentioned this hunting castle and wild life park in his writings. The Hungarian hunting style was unique originated from the East and was through Hungary mediated to the West. Arrows, spears, horses, special dogs and falcons were the essential participants of the hunting in this time. After hunting the hunters consumed the prey. The Hungarian cuisine, mixed with the Italian, created extreme tasteful dishes. Wildlife parks, similar to the Buda-Nyék one were the privilege only of the richest rulers. The aim of those parks was to breed and sort the most valuable animals, and to settle exotic ones. According to the historical memory, the king’s favourite lion died in Buda-Nyék on the very day of the king’s death in Vienna. Historical background After Mathias king’s death in 1490, his wife Beatrix wished to occupy the throne, but the Hungarian nobles opposed it, and they preferred Jagello Ulászló II./Ladislav Jagiello (1490-1516), the grandson of Sigismund of Luxenburg by his mother. Beatrix didn’t want to accept this decision, and enforced a marriage with Ulászló to remain in the Royal court. The wedding was celebrated in secret at night in the castle of Esztergom. However Ulászló escaped immediately after the ceremony, and never met Beatrix later. The cardinal, who celebrated the ceremony intentionally made a mistake in the text, so giving possibility for the later annulment of the marriage, but Pope Innocentius VIII. didn’t want to do this. Time passed, and Ulászló the king wanted a successor. Finally a political situation made possible to divorce. The Turkish Empire strongly attacked Europe, and the French King (Louis XII) was looking for an ally, which he found in the Hungarian king Ulászló, but Ulászló wanted only to co-operate with him, except after the Pope had annulled his marriage to Beatrix. Pope Alexander VI. (Rodrigo de Borgia) did it in 1500. The aging king asked for the young 17 year old Foix Candelei Anna from Occitania the lady-in-waiting of Anna, queen of Bretagne, to marry her. The young lady loved the king very much, their marriage was really happy, and the Hungarian people were fond of her. The wedding was held in Buda in 1502. For this occasion King Ulászló transformed the Buda-Nyék hunting castle into an exclusive renaissance palace, which consisted of two independent buildings, one for the Royal couple as residence, and another to welcome gests after hunting, which was the amusement palace. While the king and his fiancée were preparing for the wedding, Anna ordered seven huge woven tapestries, which are now in the New York Metropolitan Museum. The 6th one of them portrays Ulászló as getting off his horse and looking at Candelei Anna wearing red dress. On this tapestry the nobles of Hungary, Anna queen of Bretagne, the French king – the arranger of the marriage - with his wife can be seen. The antecedents of the construction of the palace At the end of the Middle Ages the rich people in Italy wanted to exit from the closed thick-walled castles, where the windows in the decorated inner parts were looking out to the patio. People in the Renaissance were striving for the nature and admired the antic world. They built villas far from the towns, on hillsides with wonderful view, and preferred old Roman architectural and sculptural elements. Lorenzo Medici (Lorenzo il Magnifico) was the first who built a real renaissance villa in Poggio a Caiano according to the plan of Giuliano da Sangallo the famous Florence architect. The construction of the villa began in 1485. This two storeys building was surrounded by a vaulted arcade corridor and over that a balustrade railing open terrace running around on the first floor. This villa consists of two long parallel buildings connected at their middle part with a two storeys high hall for receiving guests. Otherwise the building served as residence. Over the entrance a tympanum is resting on antic pillars. Because of the exile of Medici family, the construction of the villa stopped for a while. Before Lorenzo died in 1502, his last wish was to finish the building, which was only one storey high at that time. It was completed only in 1513. Meanwhile the hunting castle in Buda-Nyék according to a modified plan of Sangallo was finished in 1502. Two one storey buildings were erected, one as a residence for the Royal couple and another as amusement palace for guests, almost rectangular to each other. The base size of the amusement palace was almost as long as one of the parallel parts of the Poggio a Caiano villa. Its appearance was very similar to the feature of the unfinished Medici’s palace without tympanum in 1502. The Buda-Nyék castle is really the first follower of the ingenious new architectural concept of Sangallo. The residential building in Buda-Nyék was a one storey building on rectangular base and with a balustrade corridor on the first floor. The limestone/marl building looked toward the mountains and the wildlife park. The two buildings fitted each other in harmony and they framed a Renaissance garden, where the white pillars of the buildings reflected in an oval lake. Afterlife of the castle Ulászló II. and Anna had a daughter Anna and a son Louis. Unfortunately Anna, the mother died three weeks after Louis’s birth. Later young Anna married Ferdinand Habsburg, and Louis, the son, as Louis II. became the next Hungarian king after Ulászló. In 1526 the Turkish Sultan attacked Hungary and Louis II. died at the Mohács battle. Due to complicated contracts Ferdinand Habsburg, Anna’s husband was crowned as the next Hungarian king and Anna the queen. After the battle of Mohács the Turkish troops ravaged Hungary, and whereas they occupied Buda, they looted the Buda-Nyék hunting castle, and the buildings slowly were falling into ruin. However, the impact of the magnificiant building has not gone away. Because of the terrible Turkish invasion, Ferdinand Habsburg, Anna’s husband moved his court to Prague/Czech, but his wife Anna was attached to the scene of her life in Hungary, and she asked her husband to build a palace in Prague just similar to the amusement palace of Buda-Nyék. That’s why Belvedere Palace was built in Prague. This palace is one of the most famous buildings in Prague nowadays, attracting thousands of tourists. The Belvedere Palace became the model of the later Polish Renaissance architecture. What happened to the huge woven tapestries? Elisabeth Habsburg the widow of Louis II. fled them on ship to Burgundy (Habsburg province at that time). The tapestries were seen in Paris last in 1680, but their later history was enigmatic until 1935, when D. J. Rockefeller donated them to the New York Metropolitan Museum, where as high value treasures guarded by jealousy. Fate of the ruins in the 20th century In 1930 Garády Sándor (Alexander Garády) a self-taught archaeologist reading the Bonfini’s writings noticed a mention about Mathias’ hunting palace located 3 miles from Buda Royal palace next to the main road (today Hűvösvölgyi út). Garády measured the distance with the precision of an engineer, and found there a holiday house. The owner of the house allowed digging in the garden, and Garády really found the base walls of the living palace of Ulászló, and later the ruins of the amusement palace. A little further, northwest of the palace complex, he has found the base walls of a gothic small church which was originally a Romanesque style church of Nyék village, and later it was transformed to a gothic chapel for the reigning couple. Garády continued the excavation and collected about 2000 pieces carved stones, some of them with the coat of arms of Ulászló. These stones are now protected in the Budapest Historical Musem. Garády’s excavation was stopped because he was killed by a bombshell in 1944, and his notes remained in manuscripts, nonetheless these are the main source of the palace history till present. The search ceased after the Second World War, and the significant part of the palace garden was built in with dwelling houses. The area of the lake has been filled up. The ruins began to deteriorate again. In 1957 the Hungarian Monument Supervision was established, and the ruins were conserved. Unfortunately the protection wasn’t continued because lack of money. In 1989 work started on a civil initiative to clean up the grassy, shrubby area, where our emerging association took part in the work. This event drew the attention of the official monument protection for the importance of the ruins, and they were conserved again. In 1990 after the great political changes in East Europe the state was busy with the new economic and political situation, and the ruins were neglected again. 2018 the year of the European Heritage coincided with the commemoration year of Mathias king. This was a great occasion to revive the problem of the ruins. Our association, the Nyék-Kurucles Egyesület initiated at the official institutions to deal again with the fate of the ruins, and to make clear its wed-grown area. The most important parts of the ruins became clear. Our association for the European Heritage Days in 2018 organized a real impressive commemoration around the ruins. The history of the palace was presented on big starched molinos. There were presentations on the hunting processes and hunter feasts, a choir sang Renaissance table-vocals and falconer demonstration helped to imagine the hunting in the era of the great kings. This event started a hopeful process. The supervisory body (Várkapitányság Nonprofit Ltd; H-1013 Budapest, Ybl Miklós tér 6.) submitted a tender to the state budget to begin an archaeological excavation for a great reconstruction. Now the area of the ruins is closed to visitors. The long-time aim of our application is to support the archaeological excavation of the ruins, and to help their conservation and reconstruction to be fit for international interest. Author: Dr Veronika Subai leader of the Nyék-Kurucles Egyesület. The data on the palace buildings are from the study of archaeologist Miklós Horler (1923-2010) Ars Hungarica 1986/1 The history of the huge woven tapestries is from descriptive booklet of Diósgyőr castle, which was owned by Foix Candelei Anna, when she was the queen of Hungary

The turn of the 14th-15th centuries was the golden age of the Hungarian kingdom, when the kingdom was among the great powers in Europe. The Hungarian kings were in political and familiar contact with ruling families in Europe, and competed in who had a richer and more artistic royal court. The Buda-Nyék royal hunting castle represents an example of the political and cultural connection through Europe. Despite many fights between the kingdoms, the common European consciousness was strongly reinforced by the fight against Turkish attacks. Historia est magistra vitae.