Arma - NS6-2 - Totemistic elements in Hungarian armory

NS Vol 6 No 2 (New Year 2000-2001)

Totemistic elements in Hungarian armory

by Béla Kézdy Vásárhelyi de Kézd

THE coats of arms of Western Europe have developed from the signs the Crusaders wore on their armour for identification, but the coat of arms of Hungary has developed on entirely different lines. The Hungarians fought on horseback with their faces unprotected, and thus needed no signs of identification. But they had preserved the totem signs of their heathen ancestors as symbols representing their families, and later on they used them as coats of arms. In Hungary the arms were never tied to the land but from the earliest times were inherited, and thus obtained a permanent character from the beginning.

These totem signs always represented animals. The more important and powerful a family, the more important its animals. This makes it natural that Attila chose the most warlike, the most formidable and pugnacious of them all, the ever ravenous, ever errant wolverine. Although it only weighs 12 pounds [5,4 kg], the wolverine can frighten whole packs of wolves. Its hunger is insatiable, and it is said that once it has eaten its fill it squeezes between two trees to empty itself so that it can start afresh. Thus, in spite of its small size, it can in a single day devour a reindeer ten times its own weight. It dwells in the north, and when it jumps on the snow it lands on all four feet, sinking less than other animals, and thus nothing can escape it. Since it uses its claws to climb trees as easily as if it were walking on level ground, no nest, even, is safe. The peregrinations of the wolverine were expressed by giving it wings, and the result was called a griffin.

The griffin, which had such an influence on the heraldry of all peoples, is found on the golden vessels of the treasure of Nagyszentmiklos. This Hungarian treasure is the most significant in Europe, and is especially interesting because, on its golden vessels, we find all the styles which appeared centuries later – including the medallion style of Louis XIV. The memory of Attila was spread to the four winds with the griffin, which became incorporated in the armorial ensigns of many great families. The embroidery which scientific literature calls the legend of the origin of Attila was found in a princely tomb in Outer Mongolia. It shows a deer being torn to pieces by a winged wolverine. A similar motif was found in the ruined city of Tell-Halaf in Mesopotamia, between the Euphrates and the Tigris. But any combination of bird and mammal is termed a griffin, like the lion-headed eagle, an early masterpiece of Sumerian art, found in Ur and now a pride of the British Museum. Even this latter is in company with a deer, the legendary ancestor of Attila, who seems to have inherited the story of his origin from the Sumerians.

But the wolverine was only the war armorial of Attila; in peace he used the somewhat similar bear. Their respective parts are well illustrated by a still surviving Ostyak folk tale according to which the resident potentate, the bear, sends out the winged one, the wolverine, to find him a new home, and when the wolverine reports to him a new country, rich in pastures, game and fish, he sets out to take possession of it. In Benepuszta, near Kecskemet in Hungary, the tomb of a noble warrior was found, Scientists were puzzled by the inexplicable fact that although the coins found with him were from the second half of the 10th century, in Hungarian times, yet he wore the costume and armour of one of Attila’s warriors. And on the end straps of his bridle the winged wolverine of Attila could be seen. The same wolverine can be seen in numerous other finds from Hungarian times, but it also occurs in Blatnica in the county of Turoc and at Muysen near Malines in Belgium. But while the reverse of the Hungarian finds were ornamented with the characteristic vine motif, this was not the case with the others.

First Attila, then the Avars, brought to Europe the mixed Hellenistic-Scythic culture which flourished around the Black Sea, but the Hungarians made it permanent. Blatnica is situated in that part of Pannonia which Constantinos Porphyrogenetos, the imperial historian of the 10th century, calls the land of the Turks, and which later on was known as Slovensko. In this “Turk” territory many other relics of the mixed Hellenistic-Scythic cultural sphere have been found together with Attila’s wolverine.

The wolverine on the strap mounting from Muysen is Merovingian, that is previous to the Avars and the Hungarians, and must have been brought by Attila. Not being Hungarian it naturally lacks the vine motif which was only used by the Hungarians. Transylvania is the home of a people called Siculs, who differ from the Hungarians, and have an archaistic organisational structure. Their original home was the northern tract inhabited by the Turks, the valley of the River Vag. They consider themselves to be the people of Attila who remained in Pannonia, whom Constantinos Porphyrogenetos mentions. From the River Vag a considerable group travelled to Transylvania, leaving remnants here and there on its way.

We find the war totem animal of Attila, the Turul, in the arms of Transylvanian families; his peace totem animal, the bear, occurs in every unit of that northern territory which has preserved its ancient ensigns, and which Western chronicles call “Black Hungary.” The warrior of Benepuszta probably was a member of a Turk or Sicul family which had found their way to Hungary, and which, after Attila’s son, called themselves descendents of Aba Csaba – and in the period in question actually had a member named Bene. From Attila’s war arms the old chronicles call the territory where Blatnic is situated, which today is known as Turcsan, and where the wolverine identical with the one from Malines was found, the land or country of the Turul. This seems to confirm what Porphyrogenetos has to say about its inhabitants.

The evolution of seals seems to prove that before the totem symbols were turned into armorial charges they reflected the fate of the families in constant change, and thus might be considered as picture histories. In the territory inhabited by the Turks in Arva – as well as in the case of the Siculs of the so-called “Ten Lancer District”, and the Divek tribe which used to live there – trees were added to the bear, because those territories were characterised by forests, while those who migrated to Transylvania use the bear alone in their armorials.

The sun always played an important part with northern people like the Turks. We know that the Sumers were Turks, too, which might explain why they call the returning strength, i e, the sun, Tur-Ullu, or Turul. Even the bear has to do with the sun. The North Pole is called Arctis, which is Greek for bear: thus the setting sun is the symbol of the North and hence of the bear. The female bear is thought of as terrifying while the male is just a pleasant companion. The she-bear gives birth to its cubs in the winter and not only feeds them but if necessary can also protect them in the most heroic way. The moon receives its light from the sun, is its child: thus the setting sun with the moon is the symbol of the she-bear. That is why the armorials of the Siculs who migrated from the North to Transylvania carry a setting sun and moon. Those who remained also augmented their armorial ensigns with the sun and moon in memory of those who had left. And the beautiful epics of the old Germans sing the memory of Attila just as well as the strap mounting of Muysen.

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