It seems on the Szigetbecse welcome table, that our community is living by German nationality.Our municipality has got 1400 inhabitants, approx. the 30% are German Nationality. But when and how where these Germans coming here?More than thousand years are Germans living in the Carpathian basin. After the dislodgement of Turks in the beginning of the 1700s Hungary under crowded and needed recruital. That is why the National Assembly ordered the organised colonization. In the 18th century the Germans have been colonysated to Hungary in three stages. The majority of Germans came to Hungary from middle and south part of Germany. The settlers arrived to Szigetbecse from Bavarian and Styrian provinces.

Colonization of Germans

The first settlers where coming by ships on the Danube from Alamannia.

The Csepel – Island had been populated from

Szentmiklós to Becse

Germans populated Hungary

The crest and anthems of Germans in Hungary

Swabian folk costumes

Postcard about Szigetbecse from 1940s

Germans settled in the village, they built a church, and set a statue to the Patron of the village, who has been Saint John of Nepomuk.

Weddings photos from the 1920s. Around this time switched to a black wedding dress to white.

Brass orchestra in the 1930s

Fences from the 1930s

Till the II. World War lived almost only German origin in the village

The II. World War brought a big change in the life of the village. On the 28th December 1944 collected 120 youth and got a 5 years penal to the Soviet Union. There they lived in inhumane conditions and worked in the mine. 39 peoples died as a result of hunger and life-threatening work.

The punishment of the II. World War was the evacuation.

400 people were deployed out of Szigetbecse.

They had to leave their houses and lands here. Instead Hungarians resettled from Slovakia.Hungarians and Germans lived and live peacefully together. They got a lot of mixed marriage.

Swabian family fhoto/ Here is the family together. /

After the II. World War the family was broken in three parts.

Our heritage

After the II. World War it was forbidden to speak to German, so the childhood don't speak the local former.

In 2002 was founded the German Ethnical Municipality, which aims are to preserving our heritage and assist the German education in the kindergarten and in the school.

In the kindergarten and in the school is teaching German language.

German poem contest in our school

Project day in our school: working from cornhusk

Products from cornhusk

We collected the old things and made an exhibition

rokka Mángorló / mangle

jug flatiron pitcher

Our exhibition from the collected materials

A part of the things are now in the village museum.

With the help of European Union contest was this Swabian house renovated. It becames a village museum.

The village museum seems inside like in 1940s

The music friends send on the Swabian songs.

Get ready for Easter

Easter egg running is the country’s unique tradition.

The festival begins with the hymn, than the runners dance to wind-band music. They're clothes shows Hungarian colors, and they are

wearing more than 100 years old Swabian headkerchiefs.

They trough eggs in the high, sometimes among the lookers.

The vintage parade

It begins the vine-harvest ball

Candle panning for honour of Saint John of Nepomuk

Martinmas

Paper lantern parade is German tradition too.

Storytelling about Martin

Fairy-lamp parade

Memorial ceremonyWelcome to the epidemics of forced labour

65th anniversary of the deployment

Memorial ceremony

Epitaphs are preserved the German surnames.

Made by: Mária Lerner president of the German Ethnical

Municipality in SzigetbecseWith the help of Monika Cserna-Kurucz and students from the 7th and 8th grades.

Thank you for watching!