January 22: the Day of Hungarian Culture

On the occasion of the Day of Hungarian Culture and the 200th anniversary of the birth of the Hungarian national anthem, a ceremony was held on Sunday in the Upper House of Hungarian Parliament and in several municipalities, including some in the territory of historic Hungary.

The Day of Hungarian Culture has been celebrated on January 22 since 1989, to commemorate the day in 1823 when Ferenc Kölcsey, as part of a larger manuscript package, date-marked and cleared the manuscript of the Hymn in Cseke.

The commemoration of the anniversary is an opportunity to pay more attention to the Hungarians’ millennial traditions, their roots, to strengthen national consciousness, to display and pass on the material and spiritual values that remind the people of their past.

At the state commemoration, one hundred children from the current area of Hungary and one hundred children from areas that also used to be Hungary recited the national poem in the Hungarian Parliament together with the head of state.

The prime minister attended a ceremony in the birthplace of the anthem, Szatmárcseke, but there were also commemorations in Veszprém, now one of Europe's cultural capitals as well as Nagyvárad (Oradea) and Székelyudvarhely (Odorheiu Secuiesc) in Romania, Nagymegyer (Veľký Meder) in Slovakia and Zenta (Senta) in Serbia.