At first glance location means real estate, real property, and location determines it's value. Location of the country of your birth determines your place in the world, your importance to others.
We all learn from early childhood that the country of our birth is great, superior in every way. Some go on believing that truth for the rest of their lives. The rest of us learn from experience that it is not quite true. We learn that no matter how beloved, how heroic, however brave, it is not perfect, it never was. We also learn that it's importance in the scheme of things is very much determined by LOCATION.
The country of my birth is insignificant today, but it was not always insignificant. Location played a large part in our history.
We were a fierce, pagan nation, in a rapidly Christianizing Europe. The Carpathian basin, a fertile plane descends from the high mountains and stretches over the Tisza and the Duna valleys. Bestriding one of Europes major water highways, it has always been both desirable and beautiful.
Our legend tells of two princes and their hunting party chasing a golden hind. the chase lead them to the enchanted land between two majestic rivers. This land was inhabited by a tribe of fairy women who took the hunters to be their men and thus populated the land known today as Hungary.
It is a nice legend, indeed my grandchildren enjoyed it as much as all preceding generations had, but it is a legend. However legends usually spring from some germ of truth. It is true that we were a nation on horseback, in fact, our first parliament was held on horseback. Where we came from is shrouded in mystery. What is sure, is that we rode like the wind, fought like fiends, and spoke a language that was unlike any other on the European continent. It is also sure that we looked much like other Europeans, smaller than some, darker than some, but not as dark as the people around the Mediterranean, and not the least bit Asian.
There we were and there we planed to stay, and have done so for over one thousand years. After the fall of the Roman Empire all the tribes who inhabited the European continent fought to carve out their own space. The struggle was fierce and we were among the fiercest. We held the land at the crossroads against all, and ranged far and wide on the continent.
King István, who ruled from 997 to 1038, Christianized his people, some by force, thinking that being Christian we would make us more acceptable to our neighbors. Alas it did not, and to date some Hungarians feel it weakened the country. Pope Sylvester II sent a crown, which can today be seen in the Parliament building in Budapest. Later István was Canonized for his efforts and became Szent István, St Stephan, and the first Catholic monarch of Hungary.
Living at the crossroads is dangerous, someone always wants to go through you, or add you as a buffer for their own protection. Add to this that the terrain was, and is, temptingly beautiful and rich in unusual flora and fauna, as well as water. Water, that resource without which there is no life.
TO BE CONTINUED
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