Batthyány-Strattmann Palace Complex

The pride of Körmend is the princely Batthyány-Strattmann palace, one of the country's most significant historical monuments. In Hungary, it is one of the palace complexes that have been designated as culturally significant, which are the most representative examples of Hungarian castle architecture: Zichy Palace in Óbuda, Esterházy Palace  in Fertőd, Grassalkovich Palace in Gödöllő, Batthyány-Strattmann Palace  in Körmend, and Festetics Palace in Keszthely. The monument in Körmend stands out among the above due to its long history, as the 15th-century castle was used to build the Baroque palace.

The building erected in the northeast corner of the city— the predecessor of today's castle – is only known from 1459, when it was referred to as "Castellum" in contemporary Latin documents. The meaning of this word in the late Middle Ages was a noble mansion built in the style of a castle, surrounded by a moat and high walls. We can assume that it was built by the Széchenyi family, who owned Körmend at the time. Its architectural appearance is unknown, as no descriptions or illustrations of it have survived from the Middle Ages. The town, and with it the Renaissance castle, changed hands frequently in the 15th and 16th centuries: Bertold Ellerbach, later Tamás Bakócz, and then the Erdődy family. With the threat of the Turks looming, the Batthyány family, who had acquired the castle, reinforced it. First in the 1610s, then later in the early 1650s, it was rebuilt on a larger scale.

Ádám Batthyány I commissioned the plans for the reconstruction from Filiberto Lucchese, the outstanding Italian military engineer of the time, who later became Imperial Chief Architect. Based on these plans, the work was carried out under the supervision of master builder Carlo della Torre between 1653 and 1657. As a result, there were now two-story wings on all four sides, with towers rising above them. The wooden courtyard tower was replaced by a brick, two-story tower with arches. At that time, most of the windows still opened onto the courtyard, but some on the upper floor had already been removed. Although the palace retained its solid and heavy medieval character, its interior became more habitable, and the expanded rooms became more comfortable.

According to the first surviving town plan from 1667, the palace stood on a low island surrounded by a wide moat in the Rába floodplain. In the moat, on the western side, in front of the gate, there was an artificial island with a two-story tower on it. The road leading from the town to the palace crossed this double moat via wooden bridges and an outer tower built in the middle of the moat, in front of which stood an iron gate. The first gate was probably in this tower, and the second in front of the gate tower protruding from the former castle wall. The third gate after the tower was operated by a heavy iron bar assembled from beams.
After the expulsion of the Turks, Körmend was among the castles that became redundant. The Vienna War Council issued an order for its demolition on January 26, 1702, but its owner, Ádám Batthyány II, managed to save the castle. During the Rákóczi War of Independence, the town suffered greatly, and in 1706, the army of Kuruc general Antal Eszterházy burned the settlement to the ground, along with the palace and the castle.

The construction of the baroque palace from the fortress is associated with the name of Chancellor Lajos Batthyány, who later became palatine. The building, which had previously been used for defense, had to be rebuilt in accordance with the new way of life. It was no longer surrounded by moats, but stood in an open park. The designer of the complex was  Italian Donato Felice de Allio, who was already one of the leading representatives of Austrian Baroque in the first half of the 18th century. In order to design the view, the more distant surroundings of the palace were also included in the scope of influence: its buildings were arranged along a single north-south axis, and tree-lined avenues led to the already transformed main building from a distance of several kilometers. The outbuildings that formed the palace forecourt were built on both sides of this axis.

The construction began with the demolition of the castle gate tower and the filling in of the moat. Then, another floor was added to the entire building. The main facade of the palace was created on the south side of the building, where a wide, protruding central block, known as a central risalit, was erected. In the middle of this stood the main gate, behind which was the new gatehouse, which formed the axis of the castle complex and continued into the gatehouse built on the north wing. In the inner courtyard, the arched corridor was demolished and replaced with solid-walled corridors lit by windows. On the eastern side, the smaller Sala Terrena – a cooling room – was built, with two decorative rooms on either side. The south side was occupied by the entrance hall and a decorative staircase, while the existing upper floor housed staff rooms. Above it, on the second floor, there were oil paintings of various sizes, some painted and some with stucco ceilings, furniture, antique items, and weapons from military collections. and living rooms.
Among the outbuildings located in front of the main building, the western carriage house was used to store the court carriages. The eastern building housed the stable for the horses, with seven feeding troughs built into the wall on both sides.

Among the two-story buildings in the south courtyard, the western one was the riding hall. The eastern building served several purposes. On the ground floor was the larger Sala Terrena, a summer hall richly decorated with paintings and marble columns. The smaller hall above it was also used for festive occasions. At that time, the archives and library were located on the single-room second floor. The next buildings opposite were service apartments, where the estate manager and the Kőrösmajor lived.
At the turn of the century, the new architectural fashion reached Körmend, and buildings were rebuilt in this spirit between 1799 and 1809. The classicist style left its mark on all the buildings: the central part of the southern main facade was redesigned, with a six-column balcony and roof, supported by six half-columns, was replaced by a triangular pediment adorned with the gilded coat of arms of the Batthyány family. All the exterior and courtyard facades were rebuilt, the windows were uniformly enlarged, and a mansard roof was added.
In the 1880s, during the reign of Duke Ödön Batthyány, historical renovations were carried out on the palace complex, which was then painted yellow. After Ödön's death, a count Batthyány's descendant, Dr. László Batthyány-Strattmann, inherited the duke's title and the trust of the people. His name is associated with the renovation of the representative second floor and the creation of its rich neo-baroque stucco decoration in 1920.

In 1945, László Batthyány-Strattmann II was forced to leave Körmend palace, which had been owned by his ancestors for 340 years and had been occupied by the Russian army. The building was converted into barracks, which were demolished by tanks. When the Russian soldiers left the palace in 1957, the furnishings of the main building were gone, but the interior decoration was still intact. Subsequently, the interior of the palace was altered in several ways, the most drastic of which was the conversion into a dormitory in the early 1960s. At that time, the rich stucco decorations on the representative level were knocked down, and walls were demolished, the materials of which were not removed but simply placed as fill in the ground floor rooms. The last major renovation took place in 2001, when the palace chapel was restored to its original three-story form.
 

Based on the palace's inventory and surviving interior photographs, we know that the duke's residence was furnished with princely pomp. Even more valuable than the Baroque and Rococo furniture were the collections kept in the palace before World War II: a family archive of exceptional importance to historical science, a library valuable in terms of both content and binding, and an armory of national significance. The palace was occupied by the Russian army, which marked the beginning of the final destruction of the property left in the building. The remaining furniture was carried away, and some of it was thrown out of the windows and smashed. They scattered the rare items in the famous weapons and saddle collection, and scattered the documents from the huge archive, estimated at thirty-five cubic meters, from the windows of the building onto the bare ground. Some of them were collected by soldiers and carried to the twenty boilers operating in the courtyard, while the rest was collected in Hegyalja, beyond the Rába River. Witnesses reported on the conditions in the castle: "I saw that in large sacks, royal charters from the time of Béla IV, Károly Róbert, Lajos Nagy, Zsigmond, and Mátyás were hanging in large sacks, along with royal documents bearing seals, to which the Russian soldiers had attached large quantities of potatoes, ash, straw, plaster, soot, and other rubbish. The sight is beyond imagination, beyond belief... the torn pieces of the gallery, old handwritten maps stretched on canvas, and torn 17th-century Instead of broken windowpanes, they used... filth, stench, and dirt, destruction everywhere."

However, the antiquities amassed in the palace were not only destroyed; conscientious residents of Körmend who valued historical heritage also worked to save them. In the summer of 1945, under risky circumstances, Director-Teacher János Kőszegi—assisted by students from Körmend—rescued part of the archives from the hands of Russian soldiers who had partially destroyed them. He was supported by Dr. István Kevey, chief district administrator, and to a lesser extent by József Peszeszér, the duke's head gardener, thus saving the collection from certain destruction.

Over the centuries, the Batthyány family accumulated a vast quantity of documents. The portion relating to the duke's branch had been preserved in Körmend, in one of the palace’s outbuildings, from the 18th century onward. The archive was transferred from Körmend to Keszthely in 1947, and then to Budapest in 1953, where it suffered further severe damage during the 1956 Revolution.

The country's second largest family archive, comprising 210.7 linear meters, can now be researched in Budapest at the Hungarian National Archives, but some of the documents  scattered during the war can be found in Körmend Museum as well as in other public and private collections.

The Batthyány archives contain historically valuable documents relating to the anti-Turkish wars of the 17th century. The detailed estate management documents from this period are particularly valuable sources. In the 18th century, family members who held national offices brought political, military, and cultural history documents to the archives. For the 16th-19th centuries, it contains missives of unparalleled value among all Hungarian archives.
Károly Batthyány established his library in Vienna, Trautmannsdorf, and Payersbach. After his death in 1772, his family created an impressive collection from the duke's books in Körmend. They themselves added to the number of inherited books, which explains why some of the volumes found today are later editions. The fate of the library after 1945 is controversial based on the sources, but it is certain that in July 1947 its contents were placed in the Museum of Applied Arts, where 2,617 volumes are currently held.
The diversity of the collection was determined by the former owner's wide-ranging interests. Based on his studies and his long military career, Károly Batthyány collected a large library of practical books. Among the volumes, there are a considerable number of treatises, dealing with theoretical warfare, as well as practical manuals and works on military history. Noteworthy is the collection devoted to philosophy, which includes handbooks on scholastic philosophy as well as the most modern works of the period. Ancient and modern literature was an important area of the library. This is interesting material from several points of view, indicating that the library grew as a result of careful selection. On the other hand, it also testifies to a love of German-language Enlightenment literature, which later turned to French classics. The number of theological books is also quite large. Examining these, we can identify the former owner's interests, who also shows particular attention to ecclesiastical rhetoric. In addition to historical, philosophical, and theological works, we also find dictionaries, along with scientific publications of the period, which showcase every article of encyclopedic scholarship.

The library is outstanding not only in terms of content, but also in terms of appearance, as it contains several special and unique works can be found in it. The volumes have whole or half leather bindings, and it is not uncommon to find examples with embossed, gilded front covers. The high-quality workmanship is evident in the gilded or marbled cut surfaces and the ornate spines.
The weapon collection located in the main building of the palace, together with the saddle room, was recorded by Baron Kálmán Miske in 1915. According to the inventory data, it consisted of 980 items, more than 1,000 pieces. At that time, 365 rifles, 134 pistols, 140 swords, and 37 bayonets made up two-thirds of the collection. There were also wire cutters, shields, helmets, and weapons and equipment obtained as spoils of war during battles, with swords of considerable value. The tents, military insignia, saddles, decorative saddle blankets and horse tack, quivers, bows, spears were among the highlights of the collection. The weapons and saddle collection included many rare items. There was a full suit of armor made for a child, an elephant bone saddle decorated with a depiction of Saint George slaying the dragon from the Sigismund era, a fragment of a flag, which, according to family tradition, originated from the disaster of Mohács, and last but not least, Joseph II's childhood practice rifle and toy soldiers.
The devastation of war destroyed the famous weapon collection. The Russian soldiers who occupied the palace destroyed, damaged, and stole some of the collection. János Kőszegi managed to save 650 pieces, which were transferred to the Hungarian National Museum in 1948.

Source: Batthyány-Strattmann László Museum