Nation-Building and Contested Identities: Romanian & Hungarian ...

The Intellectual Horizons of Liberal Nationalism in Hungarythe difficulties arising with the nationalities was based on a “conspiracytheory.” The Viennese government, applying the old method of divide etimpera, consciously provoked the sentiments of the nationalities againstthe Hungarians. However, and here Horváth ran against the opinion ofmany of his fellow-historians, the Viennese government only exploitedthose sentiments, but did not itself initiate or awaken them. The awakeningof the Slav nationalities, as well as of other nationalities in Europe,was the consequence of the turmoil generated by the French revolution.Furthermore, according to Horváth, Russian propaganda was also a fundamentalfactor.Though attributing a paternalistic and protective role to the Hungarians,Horváth tried to account for the complexity of the issue of nationalities:The difficulty in finding a solution arose from the complex nature of thisproblem. Although in Hungary the interest in the national language hadalready awakened in 1790, as a reaction to the centralizing and Germanizingattempts of the Viennese government, this language could notbecome official until the very last years [before the revolution]. Thus, itwas natural that the Hungarians, referring to their 1000 year-old historicalrights, and relying on the constitution, aimed at the strengthening ofthe political nation. … But whereas they referred to historical rights intheir endeavours, those national groups …, which demanded the recognitionof their nationality, based their arguments on natural rights. As ifin a state, where one constitution is valid for every territorial unit, nomatter how many languages are spoken, there could be more than onepolitical nation. Neither of the two parties was ready to compromise inthis matter. 20The Twenty-five years was very successful and became a cult-book.Although officially forbidden for a time, its readers were not prosecuted.The ultimate part of Horváth’s history of Hungary was the monumentalHistory of the Hungarian war of independence in 1848-1849. The topicimposed on him writing political history once again and it proved evenmore difficult than in his previous book, as he discussed an event that wascloser to his times. His friends even wanted to convince him that he shouldrather write his memoirs. In this book, Horváth devoted special attentionto the leading personalities and their conflicting interests, in fact the roleof the individual received more attention than the discussion of the internaland external political circumstances. The failure of the revolution isalso attributed to the selfishness of individuals and the lack of solidarity inthe first instance. Horváth also wrote about his own contribution, referringto himself as “Minister Horváth” in the third person.37