Agrártörténet-írás Debrecenben [Agrarian historiography in Debrecen]

Orosz, István (2024) Agrártörténet-írás Debrecenben [Agrarian historiography in Debrecen]. AGRÁRTÖRTÉNETI SZEMLE, 65 (1). pp. 1-44. ISSN 0002-1105

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Abstract

When examining the antecedents of agricultural historiography in Debrecen before the turn of the 19th–20th centuries we can only consider two academic writers who had an interest in the farming history of Debrecen. One of them was János Balásházy, who was interested in land use in the Great Plain and the system of urban taxation, and the other being Imre Palugyay, who declared that every householder was forced to farm on the outskirts of town to a certain extent. They were followed by Mihály Szüts concentrating on land use in towns, Lajos Zoltai and István Ecsedi on farming in the Hortobágy, while János Sőregi contributed to the examination of mediaeval villages. From the 1940s two outstanding agrarian historians defined the research into the farming history of the town: István Balogh and István Szabó, who also researched agricultural history on a national level, the latter also organizing an agricultural history school at Tisza István University. They were both born in Debrecen and had to fight their way into academia from difficult circumstances. Part of their agricultural history research was connected to Debrecen, in the case of Szabó the smaller, in the case of Balogh the larger part. The essay considers and evaluates the ouevre of both historians and their most important results and achievements. The work of István Szabó primarily had significant impact on his students. He himself apart from his first two followers (András Borossy, György Módy) considered especially those who featured in the volumes edited by him in the 1960s (Gyula Varga, Péter Hársfalvi, Emil Simonffy, József Oláh, István Rácz, István Orosz, Sándor Gyimesi, Lajos Für, later Zoltán Kováts). This essay concentrates on the goals of this group of students, considering how the problems first brought up by István Szabó appeared and got elaborated in the works his followers, also presenting in detail how the members of the school improved on the subject of their tutor. The essay reaches the conclusion that members of the “School of István Szabó” are respected and highly regarded members of Hungarian agrarian historiography and the versatility and achievements of their research contributed to the national and international reputation of Hungarian agrarian historiography. The essay devotes a separate subchapter to the contemporaries of the school (Emil Niederhauser, István Szendrey, György Komoróczy, Péter Gunst, Imre Dankó, József Szabadfalvi, János Bencsik) who worked either at the University or in other institutions of the town, and also achived successes in the same field. It finally draws attention to a new generation of students as the forthcoming agrarian historians of Debrecen.

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