A Short History of Kartal

Kartal is a big village which lies on the north-eastern part of Pest county, at about 40 km- from Budapest. It has a population of about 6000 people. It’s location, on the border of two Hugarian regions, the Northern Middle Hills and the Great Plane is its advantage too.

The advantages of the place were discovered by the people of Neolithic age too-as the recent archeological researches shows-but the history of the village begins with the Árpád’s conquest of Hungary.Árpád was the real leader of the Hungarians which lived in two headed principality. He was not only a leader but sacre, divineKurszan Kündü, and the ancestor of the Kurszan-Kartal clan. The name of clan has been preserved int he village’s name. The name itself is of Turkish origin and it means eagle. It was mentions for the first time in Middle Aged written resourses as „Kurthol” in 1263.

In the Árpád age, Kartal was an important settlement, center of the clan with a church. Later the members of the Kartal clan became members of the smaller nobility and because of that the importance of the settlement diminished and it didn’t reach the status of a fortified town.

The devastation of the 1241 Mongol invasion was easily survived by the settlement, but the effects of the Turkish expansion were mortal. Kartal became part of the Turkish Empire after the conquest of Buda in 1541. In the next half century was an inhabited area, but the inhuman regime of the Islamic power-for example the tribute of young children leaded to the decay of the village. During the 15 years war which was held in order to expel the Turks, the remaining population took refuge. So Kartal was an uninhabited abandoned area for two centuries.

Our village’s new age begin in 1784. The owner of that time, prince Grassalkovich Antal brought new inhabitants from Northern Hungary which were catholic Hungarians and Slovakians. Surnames like Bereczki, Karácsondi, Söregi still preserves the origin of the new settlers. Other surnames like Deák, Gergely, Lados, Kalcsó, Urbán presume the settlement of whole families. Prince Grassalkovich made a good job because the hard-working and deeply religious settlers and their descendents leaded the village to a dynamic and prosper development. The proofs of these facts are the increase of the population. At the beginning of the 19th century there were only a few inhabitants but in 1900, 1810 people lived here. Only in another 100 years the number of was 5711 and nowadays we are about 6000. It must be mentioned that in the 1980s the number of the new born babies was much bigger that in the other parts of the country.

The increase of the population brought the institutional need. In 1858a congregational school was established and in 1865 a church is built and dedicated to Árpádházi St. Erzsébet. The fast increment of the population went hand in hand with the broking up of the peasant fields. In the 20th century there were two noble families possessed 2/3 of the fields, and the other 1/3 was owned by the farmers. Those who didn’t possess fields worked as agricultural workers, but at the beginning of the 20th century people started to travel for work. They worked in factories and building industry, so a new generation of workers developed.

The storms of the 20th century were present in Kartal too. During the I World War 400 men joined the army of the Monarchy and 30 died a heroic death.

In 1919 during the Hungarian Soviet Republic they “communalized” the fields. Between the two Word Wars electricity is brought to the village and a district medical office was established.

The II World War brought big loses to the village. Not only those who fought in battle died, but the villagers too. The village was one of the elements of the German defending lines and when the Soviets conquered the place, after three weeks of siege, almost all the houses suffered damages. The population suffered of losses and of atrocities from both the German and the Soviet soldiers.

After 1945 the society went through deep changes. In 1945 the fields bigger than 100acres were divided between the villagers and the little farms are settled. But in 1948 the communists started the nationalization of the fields and some people gave up because of the fees and got work in plants around. In 1956 the fees were abolished, but people didn’t get back to agriculture. Those who worked on the fields were employed by the state Agricultural Enterprise and the Cooperatives. The others worked for factories in Budapest, Gödöllő or Iklad. After 1990s the unemployment was high and the cooperative changed.

Nowadays most of the adult population works as enterprisers in different industries as woodwork, metalwork or services like shops, repairing hairdressers, beauticians. People still travel for work to multinational companies. Agriculture give work to some families and for older generations.

Our village is receptive. In the last twenty years the number of inhabitants grows with those who choose our village as their new home. Our aim is to achieve the rank of a town.

László Bognár