Hungarian National Digital Archive • MaNDA database

History locked in glass: from aurulent plate photos to grey glass negatives

Although it is natural now that you can take a photo in seconds, you rarely think about how rugged road led to quick photography and to the possibility of making good-quality photos. In the beginning, the incipient accomplishments achieved by inventors were considered as sensations, but later, the occurring deficiencies, new demands and fortunate circumstances resulted in the development of methods. At the dawn of photography, the invention of the silver-plated copper method as well as the glass plate negatives were regarded as an important milestone.
Gyula Juhász and his correspondents

Dear Readers,

What novelty could be written about Gyula Juhász that you do not know yet? That Anna was not quite eternal? That this young man from Szeged was terrified in his whole life that he would become dement due to his imaginary syphilis, while he should have worried about his depression? The writer of these lines can only hope that you will not find these lines debunking and will read them with pleasure.
Small investors in the world of stock exchange speculators and riggers

In the golden age of stoke-broking in Hungary, simple citizens’ investments and shares also had a great role in many success stories (like Vígszínház) and in the realisation of numberless giant investments. The widespread stoke-broking culture and the judgement of self-interest and greediness reached their present forms as a result of several contradicting historical and cultural effects.
Behind the camera: István Skoflek

In István Skoflek’s pictures, not only the figure of an enthusiastic local patriot is drawn but also his love of nature and collecting. Skoflek was not a professional photographer – just like Elemér Révhelyi – this is why his collection is so special. What architecture meant to Révhelyi was that nature meant to Skoflek. The common thing is Tata with a difference of a couple of decades. In our actual selection, you can skim through his pictures; his legacy is preserved by the Kuny Domokos Museum of Tata, whom we would like to thank for enriching our database.
Crimes at the turn of the century

Crime stories attract people’s attention; mysteries, thrill and scandals can always arouse great interest. It was not differently at the beginning of the 20th century either, as the great interest in the Elza Mágnás murder case shows – to mention a recently hyped case from the history of Hungarian criminalistics.

Virtual exhibitions

Besides searching and browsing digitized cultural contents, visitors can view thematic virtual exhibitions from the records of MaNDA’s database, which are widened weekly. Our aim with the exhibitions is to introduce the cultural contents of the database in a new context, in a way that they would never be in the same virtual room otherwise, due to their spatial, legal or formal features. You can see our former exhibitions under this menu.

Partner institutes

Establishment of Europeana

During the period of the Swedish EU presidency in April 2001 in Lund, representatives of the then 15 Member States formulated their demand that a breakthrough in the field of cultural digitisation was necessary. One of their most important issues was that a cooperative forum should be created in order to put cultural digitisation in the European dimension and the accessibility and visibility of the European digital cultural heritage must be promoted.