III.

HISTORY
A Legend from the "Chronicon Pictum Vindobenense"
about the Coming of the Hungarians in Transylvania

by Alexandru Madgearu

X h e study of the narrative sources referrin g to the H ungarian conqu est of

Transylvania must rely on a real criticism, because various historians used these sources
in a wrong way, which has had as a result the creation of a halflegendary history (or,
of a "mytho-history", if we are following the expression of Dennis Deletant1). This is
the case of some Romanian writings, like Stefan Pascu's Voievodatul Transilvaniei,
or like the first volume of the M ilitary History of the Romanian People (published in
1984)2. But, there are also some Hungarian studies marked by the same lack of criticism
that is proper to the tendentious historiography of both countries.
This lack of criticism led to the evolvement of a theory that dates in 896 the first
coming of the Hungarians in Transylvania. This point of view, maintained by Gyrgy
Gyrffy3 and Istvn Bona4, is based on a passage from the C hronicon Pictum
V indobonense, w hich was resum ed also by Chronicon Posoniense, C hronicon
M onacense, Chronicon Henrici de M geln. I. Bna is thinking that these XlVth
Century chronicles are keeping the tradition written down in the lost primary Gesta
of the Xlth Century. This tradition says that the Hungarian duke Almos entered with
his people in Transylvania, befoj' the conquest of Pannonia and that Almos was killed
here, in Erdelw, in the same country where Hungarians built up seven earth fortresses
for their families:
Exinde montes descenderunt per tres menses et deveniunt in cinfinium regni Hungarie,
scilicet in Erdelio invitis gentibus memoratis. lbique terreis castris septem preparatis pro uxoribus
et rebus suis conservandis alicjuamdiu permanserunt. Quapropter Teutonici partem illam ab
illo die Simburg, id est septem castra vocaverunt. (...) Almus in patria Erdelw occisus est, non
enim potuit in Pannoniam introire. In Erdelw igitur quieverunt et pecora sua recreaverunt5.
We agree with I. Bona6, when he observes that the explanation of the name
Siebenbrgen is a later addition in the text. Gy. Gyrffy is instead very confident in
the trustworthyness of the tradition about the seven fortresses; he supposes that the
Hungarians reused the ruins of the Roman cities7.
This theory is not a recent one. It was sustained also by Henrik Marczali, Blint
Homan and Alfred Domanovszky8. It is however surprising that this legend was used
without any criticism by historians like Gy. Gyrffy and I. Bona. In other circumstances,
they were very exigent as concerns the traditions written down in the Anonymus
Gesta Hungarcrum 9
We think that the legend transmitted by the Chronicon Pictum Vindobonense
could be considered a doubtful one, because it was not written down also in the elder
sources, like the Anonymus G esta or the Simon of Keza's Gesta. The legend presented
above could be only a later and confused version of another tradition.
The elder gesta written in XHIth Century are giving detailed relations about the
duke Almos and about the way followed by his people, from Scythia to Pannonia.
The way crossed by north of Carpathians and not by Transylvania. This version
mentioned also in the Chronicon Pictum Vindobonense, in contradiction10 with that
one contained in the legend of Almos.

__L ?
63

According to the Anonymous Gesta, Almos conceded to Arpad his leadership

after the conquest of the fortress Ung11. The trustworthyness of this information is out
of our subject. We should note only that this tradition explains why the another legend
says that Almos was killed in Transylvania: it was made a misunderstanding between
Erdeuelu (Transylvania) and Er d o - the name of the woody region of Ung12.
This explanation is convincing but not sufficient. We shall see that there is another
passage that could clarify how evolved the legend about the killing of Almos in
Transylvania.
The work of Simon of Keza was composed after the Anonymous Gesta and before
the XlVth Century's chronicles. The latter used it as a source. The moment of the
conquest of the fortress Ung was related by Simon of Keza in a different way. He says
that Hungarians founded a fortress near the river Hung: ... et deinde in fluvio Hung
vocato, ubi castrum fundavere resederunt. A quo, quidam fluvio Hungari a gentibus occidentis
sunt vocati13. The ethnology of the name Hungari is wrong. The real origin of the name
is from Qnoguri14.
O n the other hand, the building of a fortress in that moment is an anachronism
that could be understood if we think that the author wrote into an age of very intensive
building activity.
We see therefore how the original tradition written down by the Anonymous
Magister was distorted even by Simon of Keza.
The passage from the Gesta of Simon of Keza quoted above follows with these
words: Cumque et alia sex castra post hunc fundassent aliquamdiu in illis partibus permansere.
Therefore, according to Simon of Keza, Hungarians built up seven fortresses in the
region of river Hung (these six and the first one mentioned above).
Our opinion is that later chroniclers understood this reference to the seven
fortresses as an allusion at the geographical name Septem Castra. The German name
of Transylvania, Siebenbrgen, became usual in XlVth Century and it was translated
in Latin sources as Septem Castra or Septem Urbium15.
This confusion between the building of seven fortresses and the name Septem
Castra led to the creation of the legend about the coming of Almos in Transylvania.This
legend evolved in the bookish milieu. It had no propagandistic or symbolic purposes,
because medieval political ideas about the possesion of a territory were based on the
right given by the conquest and not on historical arguments.
Another passage from the work of Simon of Keza shows again how later chroniclers
distorted elder sources. Simon of Keza wrote about the victory against Zvatoplug
that: ...Hunc quidem Hungari de fluvio Hung variis muneribus allectum... The same passage
was resumed by Chronicon Pictum, but with an addition: ...Hungari de Erdelw et de
fluvio Hung...16
Our point of view about the origin and the significance of the legend discussed
above is not a new one. It was expressed in another way also by C.A. Macartney17. In
his study about the supposed Almos' grave, Nndor Fettich showed too that the item
patria Erdelw from Chronican Pictum could not be identified with Transylvania and
that the legend about the kfljmg of Almos in Transylvania is mistaken18.
W e can conclude that the theory that dates around 896 the first arrival of
Hungarians in Transylvania could not be founded on the legend written down in
Chronicon Pictum. On the other hand, this theory is contradicted by the results of the
arcbjeological researches, w hich are proving that Hungarians did not com e in
Transylvania crossing by the Eastern Carpathians. The oldest Hungarian graves and
objects were discovered only in Western Transylvania, at Cluj-Napoca, Alba Iulia and
Deva, and are missing in Eastern and South-Eastern Transylvania19.
Despite all evidence, Istvn Fodor and Gyrgy Gyrffy claimed that Hungarians
conquered the whole Transylvania in 894-895 (and until 900 the whole Carpathian
Basin)20. This point of view, which is not only tendentious but also oversimple, is
contradicted by the well grounded researches that are founded on the study of all the
earliest Hungarian archaeological materials. The extensive study published in 1985 by

Attila Kiss21proves that Hungarians conquered primarily only the Hungarian Puszta.
We did not wish to discuss here the study of Attila Kiss, but we want to point out its
importance for the archaeology of medieval Transylvania.
The real significance of the legend written down in Chronicon Pictum shows
that Hungarian medieval chronicles must be interpreted with great carefulness.
N O TES
1. D. Deletant, Ethno-History or Mytho-History? The Case of the Chrqf/:ler Anonymus, in
Idem, Studies in Romanian History, Bucharest, 1991, p. 332-335.
2. See the critical point of view about these books expressed by Radu Popa. Remarques et
complments concernant l'histoire de la Roumanie autour de l'An Mil, im R R H ,33,1994,
1-2, p. 123-157 (Romanian version in SCIVA , 1991, 3-4, p. 154-188) and the reply of t.
Olteanu, Din nou despre istoria Romniei din jurul anului O Mie, in SCIVA, 4 4 ,1 9 9 3 ,4 ,
p. 375-385.
3. Gy. Gyrffy, Landnahme, Ansiedlung und Streifzge der Ungarn, in "Acta Historica
Academiae Scientiarum Hungaricae", 31,1985, 3-4, p. 239-240, 244.
4. I. Bona, in Histoire de la Transylvanie, sous la direction de B. Kpeczi, Budapest, 1992,
p.118,120.
5. Scriptores Rerum Hungaricarum (SRH), ed. E. Szentptery, Budapest, 1 9 3 7 ,1,p. 286. The
passages were resumed by the later chronicles: Chronicon Pasoniense (SRH, II, p. 32);
Chronicon Monacense (SRH, II,p. 61); Chronicon Henrici de Mgeln (SRH, II,p. 128).
6 . 1. Bona, op.cit., p. 120.
7. Gy. Gyrffy, op.cit, p. 240.
8. See the quotations in Aurel Decei, Relaii romno-orientale, Bucureti, 1978, p. 60 and in C.
A. Macartney, Studies on the Earliest Hungarian Sources, III, Budapest, 1940, p. 39.
9. See, for instance, Gy.Gyrffy, Form ation d'Etats au IXe sicle suivant les "G esta
Hungarorum" des Notaire Anonyme, in Nouvelles tudes historiques, I, Budapest, 1965,.
p. 27-53 and I. Bna, op.cit., p. 114-116.
10. See V. Spinei, Migraia ungurilor n spaiul carpato-dunrean si contactele lor cu ungurii
n secolele IX-X, in "Arheologia Moldovei", 13,1990, p. 120.
11. Chapter XIII (SRH, I, p. 52)
12. This is the opinion of: Gh. Popa-Lisseanu, Introducere n Izvoarele Istoriei Romnilor, XI.
Cronica pictat de la Viena, Bucureti, 1937, p. XXXI-XXXII; V. Spinei, op. cit., p. 121; M.
Dogaru, Le role de la montagne dans la perptuation du peuple roumain, dans Ia formation
de sa pense et de son art militaire au Moyen Age, in the volume La guerre et la montagne
dans l'histoire des Roumains, Bucarest, 1991, p. 86-87; Idem, De la Esculeu la Alba Iulia.
Un mileniu de istorie romneasc n cronistica si istoriografia ungaro-german, Bucureti,
1993, p. 25,33.
13. SRH, I,p. 165.
14. H. Grgoire, Le nom et l'origine des Hongrois, "Zeitschrift der deutschen morgenlndischen
Gesellschaft", 91,1937,3, p. 630-642; I. Boba, Nomads, Northmen and Slavs. Eastern Europe
in Ninth Century, The Hague-Wiesbaden, 1967, p. 74-75.
15. About the etimology of Siebenbrgen, see Th.Ngler, Aezarea sailor n Transilvania2,
Bucureti, 1992, p. 197-203.
16. Simon of Keza: SRH, I,p. 163; Chr. Pictum: SRH, I, p. 281. Ses also Chr. Posoniense (SRH, II,
p. 30) and Chr. Henrici de Mgeln (SRH,II, p. 127).
17. C. A. Macartney, op.cit., p. 39-41.
18. V. Budinsky-Kricka, N. Fettich, Das altungarische Frstengrab von Zemplin, Bratislava,
1973, p. 126,128,130.
19. See especially: A. Kiss, Studien zur Archologie der Ungarn im 10. und 11. Jh., in Die
Bayern und ihre N achbarn, II ("D en ksch riften der sterreichischen Akadem ie der
Wissenschaften. Philosophisch-Historische Klasse", 180), Wien, 1985, p. 217-379; K. Horedt,
Siebenbrgen im F r h m ittelalter, B on n , 1986, p. 84-105; M. Sch u lze-D rrlam m ,
U ntersuchungen ziji H erkunft der U ngarn und zum Beginn ihrer Landnahm e im
Karpatenbecken, in~"jahrbuch des Rmisch-Germanisches Zentralmuseums", Mainz, 35,
1988, 2, p. 373-477.
20. I. Fodor, Zur Problem atik der Ankunft der Ungarn im K arpatenbecken und ihrer
fortlaufenden Besiedlung, in the volume Interaktionen des mitteleuropischen Slawen
und andere Ethnika im 6.-10. Jh., Nitra, 1984, p. 97; Gy. Gyrffy, Landnahme..., p. 244.
21. A. Kiss, op.cit., especially p. 234-235,239-240.