Hungarian capital, formed 1872 from merger of two cities on opposite shores of the Danube, Buda (probably from a word originally meaning "water") + Pest, a Hungarian word meaning "furnace, oven, cove," also in Slavic (cf. Russian pech'). Cf. Ofen, literally "oven," the old German name for the place.
mid-15c., probably literally "land of the Huns," who ruled a vast territory from there under Attila in the Dark Ages; from Medieval Latin Hungaria, from Medieval Greek Oungroi, the name applied to the people whose name for themselves we transliterate as Magyars. Also related are French Hongrie, German Ungarn, Russian Vengriya, Ukr. Ugorshchina, but the Turkish name for the country, Macaristan, reflects the indigenous name.
Capital of Hungary and largest city in the country, located in north-central Hungary on both banks of the Danube River; the industrial, cultural, and transportation center of Hungary.
Republic in central Europe, bordered by the former Czechoslovakia to the north, Ukraine to the northeast, Romania to the east and south, Yugoslavia and Croatia to the south, and Slovenia and Austria to the west. Its capital and largest city is Budapest.
Note: Hungary is a former Eastern Bloc country.
Note: The Austro-Hungarian Empire, in which Austria and Hungary were equal partners, was established in 1867 and collapsed in World War I.
Note: Soviet troops invaded Hungary in 1956 to put down a revolution against the communist government.
Note: Hungary held multiparty free elections in October 1990, ending forty-two years of communist rule. In 1999, it joined NATO.