History of the Reformed Church College in Sárospatak

Sárospatak... Perhaps it is not an exaggeration to state that this town retains a special place in Hungarian history and culture. The different generations of the Rákóczi family, with their convictions about independence, their courageous stance and their willingness to engage in struggle, welded into one the settlement and its surrounding region. Building on medieval traditions of worthy note, the Reformed faith community always provided and still provides generous intellectual munition for this nearly continuous struggle. It is indeed of struggle that we must speak, for the history of the entire region consists of series after series of grim battles. The town and its surrounding region repeatedly found itself in the crossfire of contradictory influences stemming from geographic, historical, social and economic factors. It is for this very reason that the history of the region's prominent cultural centre, the Reformed Church College in Sárospatak, is so riveting, so abundant in changes of course and in achievements. This rendition is not the first, of course, for there have been and are many others who are involved in many ways with the research and presentation of this wealthy historical tradition. Beginning with János Szombathi, who lived in the 18-19th centuries, interest in the history of the College has been virtually continuous ever since. Strangely enough, however, no true monograph has yet been prepared on this topic. Coming closest to this was the volume of collected scholarly articles published in 1981 on the occasion of the 450th anniversary of the traditionally accepted date of the founding of the institution. With the combined effort of prominent historians -József Barcza, Kálmán Benda, László Makkai, Jenő Szűcs- and the co-workers of the church administered Scholarly Collections -Imre Czegle, Richard Hörcsik, Sándor Koncz, Mihály Szentimrei, Béla Takács-, the volume entitled The History of the Reformed Church College in Sárospatak did provide an overview which, if perhaps not entirely unified, was in all of its aspects generously detailed. This volume, however, is now only available in libraries while many visitors to the exhibitions and classical library hall would like to become better acquainted with the history of the renown school.