Pilgrims of the “Fatherland”: Emblems and Religious Rituals in the Construction of an Inter‐Patriotic Space between Hungary and Transylvania

Abstract

The paper deals with the emblems and rituals that help creating the symbolic space of a “home” or “fatherland” which transcends the borders of nation‐states and generate cultural intimacy between people living in different countries and under different political regimes. After a glance at some symbolic condensations of Hungarian‐ness, with special regard to the territorial marking and the dead, it focuses on the recent transformations of an annual pilgrimage in Transylvania into ritual staging of Hungarian “homeland” across borders and regardless of religious affiliations. Remaining for centuries the religious feast of the local Szekel population, a minority Magyar‐speaking Catholic group, after 1989 the pilgrimage of Csiksomlyo/Şumuleu, in today’s Romania, developed into a powerful manifestation of Hungarian patriotism. Set in a multi‐linguistic and multi‐religious area, this pilgrimage provides a sophisticated ritual framework and the symbolic tools to negotiate the various groups’ belonging to, and their hierarchic ordering in, the cultural construct of “the fatherland”.

Keywords:

• Csango
• Csiksomlyo Pilgrimage
• Fatherland
• Home
• Szekel
• Szekler
• Transylvania

Acknowledgements

The text is the substantially revised and enlarged version of “Les itinéraires de la patrie: De la construction de l’espace interpatriotique en Hongrie contemporaine” in: J. Hainard et R. Kaehr (sous la dir.), Dire les autres. Réflexions et pratiques ethnologiques. Textes offerts à Pierre, Centlivres, Lausanne : Payot ‘Sciences Humaines’, 1997, pp. 177–194. I want to thank Galia Valtchinova and Patrick Menget for their useful remarks and careful work on the text.

Notes

[1] After the founding theoretical works of Gellner (1983), Anderson (1983) and Hobsbawm and Ranger (1983), others insisted more on a constructivist analysis of the national symbols relying on historical documents and on the iconography as much as on field observations. See, for example, Löfgren (1989) and Hofer (1994).

[2] See, among others, Centlivres (1988, 1992) for Afghanistan, J. Galinier (private communication) for Mexico, Losonczy (1997b) and Zempléni (1996 for Hungary, and Losonczy (1997a) for Colombia.

[3] For the relevance of this distinction, see Losonczy & Zempléni, (1991).

[4] By “popular patriotic items” I mean the set of markers which, at a given time, are used to assert or evoke the sense of belonging or of a shared cultural intimacy. These markers, whether institutionalized or not, are practiced and used by various social groups, even informal or transitory ones, without explicit reference to official nationhood.

[5] Unitarian Protestantism is a branch of anti‐Trinitarian Protestantism, originating from England during the late‐eighteenth century which rapidly spread among Magyar speakers of Transylvania, noticeably the Szekel region. Its congregations in Transylvania have strong ties of community and solidarity.

[6] Here “occupation” denotes the resentment of part of the Hungarian population to the Catholic value system enforced by the Habsburg regime, in particular after the defeat of 1849. Catholic piety, feasts (and therefore saints), religious behaviour were promoted by all means. Even after the Habsburg Empire officially became the Dual Monarchy (1867) by associating the Hungarian Crown to the Habsburgs, reluctance to Catholicism remained in many areas of Transylvania.

[7] Here “inter‐patriotic space” denotes the loci that two (or more) competing patriotisms claim, at one and the same time, to be the “heart” of the respective “fatherland” or the “cradle” of the nations. These loci are often socially and politically remote, such as Karelia (for Finland) and Kosovo (for Albania), but may also be inland cities, sometimes central, such as Kiev. Studying the inter‐patriotic spaces helps to understand the nature of patriotism in the respective countries better than the static approach through isolated or centrally promoted symbols of patriotism. For us, “inter‐patriotism” illuminates the status of emblems circulating between two “fatherlands” and hence cumulates multiple and contradictory interpretations and ritual usages

[8] Though such claims have often been made in the inter‐war period, today it is not likely that a political group or movement in Hungary or in Transylvania enjoying some audience on the public scene would lay claims for the real “restitution” of the latter to the Hungary. It is sufficient to remember the mitigated welcome given to Transylvanians wishing to settle in the country in the early nineties, a period of “crisis”, by the Hungarian population and local authorities. There is a split between the sociology of the real country and the symbolic construction of the “imagined community”.

[9] The history and an account of the present‐day pilgrimage will be found in the remarkable work of Mohay (1996) and of Tanczos (1991).

[10] The following analysis relies on field work carried out together with professor Tamas Mohay (University of Budapest) and Patrick Plattet, and owes much to discussions with them.

[11] Similar symbolic marking seems to have also been undertaken in Transylvania by Orthodox Romanians: these deserve Romanian patriotism. An example of the latter is the “awakening” of ancient Orthodox shrines in the North of Transylvania discussed by Manolescu (1995: 436–448).

[12] Cursillo is a Catholic charismatic movement first launched in Argentina, which spread in Latin America, then in Europe (Spain, England). It reached Transylvania in the nineties. It is characterized by tightly held communities and active proselytism.

[13] In Hungary, the figure of Saint Stephen, the first Hungarian Christian king who evangelized his people, as well as King Stephen’s Holy Arm (a relic), are central to several feasts and rituals which reassert the legitimacy of Hungary, the nation and its territory (see Hann [1990]). These core rituals of Magyar‐ness are, however, distinct from the Virgin complex on at least two counts. First, unlike the Holy Virgin, Saint Stephen does not belong to the figures of recourse in popular cults of the saints. Second, its ritual mobilization points to a vision of Hungary as a nation and a state, not as a haza (home‐country). Besides, the Saint Stephen complex emphasizes centralism and refers to the kingdom rather than to its borderlands.

[14] This anthem, though not official, can be found in most recent touristic publications in Hungarian.