Gift from the National Széchényi Library to Pope Francis

2023/04/28

His Holiness Pope Francis has arrived in Hungary. The National Library is proud to have been able to include a copy of the newly published Buda Chronicle among the official gifts to the Pope.

The Buda Chronicle, the first book printed in Hungary, will be 550 years old on the Vigil of Pentecost 2023. Printing was established in Hungary just two decades after Gutenberg's first printed work. Andreas Hess' work is unique in the history of European typography, as there is no other example of a nation recording its own history in its first printed publication. Only ten of the presumed two hundred original copies of the chronicle survive, preserved in famous libraries from St Petersburg to Princeton. The Hungarian National Library's copy is complete, having been reproduced in facsimile editions twice: in 1900 and in 1973. On the occasion of the anniversary, the library has republished the book, edited by the cultural historian Gábor Farkas Farkas and published by the eminent Hungarian book artist Gyula Schöck.

A special copy for Pope Francis, decorated with gilded copper embossing and cabochon chrysoprase gemstones, in gilded white leather binding, accompanied by a volume of studies in Latin, Hungarian and English.