TUSOR PÉTER: Fraknói Vilmos és a püspöki kar. Küzdelem a Szent István római történeti, művészeti és egyházművelődési intézet megalapításáért (1910–1913) (CVH I/27), szerk. Kőhalmi Olivér, Budapest–Róma 2026. (348 p. + 6 p. műnyomó mell. kép)
The principal achievement of the monograph lies in demonstrating that, through the lens of a particularly significant and symbolic issue—the proposed foundation of a Hungarian ecclesiastical institute in Rome—the intellectual outlook of the Catholic ecclesiastical elite at the turn of the twentieth century can now be understood more clearly, while the internal fault lines within that milieu emerge far more distinctly than before. Thanks to the dense evidentiary documentation of the tension between a partly pragmatist, partly paternalist and aristocratic conservatism, on the one hand, and the organised ecclesiastical “progression” represented, mobilised and structured not only by Ottokár Prohászka but also by Vilmos Fraknói, historical scholarship can no longer regard Hungarian Catholicism around the turn of the century as a monolithic entity. This represents a significant historiographical result even though, after the First World War, both the external context and the internal balance of forces underwent profound transformation and realignment. In the Hungary of the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, Vilmos Fraknói embodied a form of patriotic elitism marked by a conspicuous sense of social responsibility, situated within the intellectual frameworks of Romantic historicism and modern Catholicism.
Building on a solid foundation of historical research, the volume also succeeds in definitively dispelling and clarifying the confabulatory origin myths that currently link certain Hungarian institutions operating in the Eternal City with the figure of Fraknói. The essence of this clarification is that while the concept formulated by Kunó Klebelsberg, emphasising Italian–Hungarian cultural and diplomatic relations, remains very much alive in Rome, Fraknói’s scholarly legacy lacks any institutional base in the Italian capital. No Hungarian ecclesiastical or state-supported historical research institute or artists’ residence presently exists there. At the same time, however, clear intellectual antecedents of the Pontifical Hungarian Institute—which maintains only a latent connection with Fraknói’s legacy and does not acknowledge it in its official self-definition—may be discerned in Fraknói’s proposal formulated in February 1912, as well as in the negotiations conducted under the leadership of Bishop Károly Hornig until November of that same year. The scholar–abbot’s plan of 20 August 1910, invoking the name of Saint Stephen and seeking to revive the tradition of the medieval Hungarian pilgrims’ house in Rome, finds its partial realisation in the Saint Stephen House—precisely the institution that in no way traces its origins to Vilmos Fraknói.
Alongside these two major historical arguments, the volume presents a whole series of smaller yet illuminating findings related to Fraknói’s biography. From its pages we learn why he was compelled to leave Rome permanently in 1905, how his relationship evolved with his fellow canons in Nagyvárad (Oradea) and with Count Miklós Széchényi, bishop of the diocese, as well as several details of his journey to India in 1910 and his visit to the United States in 1912. The book also sheds light on his plans for a comprehensive synthesis in cultural history, his 1914 resignation from the abbacy of Szentjobb and from his canonry in Várad, followed by the rapid withdrawal of that resignation, among other episodes. These are precisely the kinds of details that were either absent from or only briefly mentioned in the centenary memorial volume devoted to him.