Page 5 - Békés megye

History of

Békés County

The area was known to be inhabited back in the 5-4 millen- began. János György Harruckern initiated large-scale re-

nia BC; many different tribes lived in this area: Scythians, population, and settled Slovakians, Germans, and Hungar-
Celts, Gepids, Sarmatians and Avars, and, after the con- ians in an organized manner within the county.

quest of Hungary, it was the property of the Vata clan. Békés On 23rd July, 1715, the forming and offi cial-electing Gen-
County was established in the 11th century, and Békés be- eral Assembly was convened in Békés, and Békés County

came its seat. It was first mentioned in 1213, and its first was re-established. In parallel, the re-population of the

count (ispán) was Damján. towns and villages of the county was started. In 1715, there
By the 13th century, the relatively dense sett lement struc- were residents only in nine towns and villages in the county,
ture, consisting of hundreds of villages and the develop- about two or three thousand people. According to data of
ment of nearly two centuries, were almost completely de- the census, this number reached 70,000 people in 1780. In
stroyed in 1241 during the Mongol invasion, when whole the 18th century, the transformation of the wild, natural en-
areas were depopulated. vironment to cultural landscape began, and during the Na-
The fortress of Gyula was built at the beginning of the 15th poleonic wars, the county was already the dispensary of the

century, and Gyula was awarded the title of county seat country. The general assembly had no established venue un-
during the last third of the century. The fortress was seized til the mid of the 18th century. It was held mostly in Békés,

by the Turks in 1566. The one and a half centuries of Turk- in Füzesgyarmat, in Szeghalom, or occasionally in Vésztő, in
ish conquest was even more devastating than the Mongol Szarvas, in Vári, in Körösladány, or in Csaba. From 1731, the
invasion, and the population disappeared from almost the meetings were usually held in Gyula.

whole of the area. The modern area of Békés County was created by the re-
At the beginning of the 18th century, following the expul- organization in 1950 when a new county seat, Békéscsaba,
sion of the Turks and the Rákóczi War of Independence, was appointed, which serves as the region’s industrial and

the spontaneous return and resettlement of the population commercial centre, as well as its railway junction.

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