György Kossuth

The native form of this personal name is udvardi és kossuthfalvi Kossuth György. This article uses the Western name order.

György Kossuth de Udvard et Kossuthfalva (Slovak: Juraj Košút, 1781, Kossuth - 31 July 1849, Kossuth) was a Hungarian nobleman, an agronomist and a supporter of the Slovak national movement.

Family

The origin of Kossuth family is dated back to the 13th century when king Béla IV of Hungary granted them the aristocratic title and the feod in Túróc (Slovak: Turiec) in 1263. The family residency was in the village Kosut (before Dvorec, now the part of Martin, Slovakia). The word “košút” in archaic Slovak means “a billy-goat” or “a somersault”. The family was a typical example of provincial gentry in the Kingdom of Hungary and was kindred with other families of the local Slovak gentry in the region of Turóc and Liptó (Liptov) (Beniczky de Benice, Rakovszky de Rákó, Raksánszky de Kisraksa, Záborszky de Zábor and Zatureczky de Zaturcsány). János Kossuth in 1639 helped to establish a Protestant community in Kosut. His son Miklós Kossuth (1595–1661) was a captain of the hussar unit recruited in Turóc, participated in the defence of Érsekújvár (today: Nové Zámky) and died later in Ottoman captivity. The family still exists in Slovakia.

The father of György Kossuth was Pável Kossuth and his mother was Zsuzsanna Kossuth (née Beniczky). György Kossuth had two brothers (Simon and László) and one sister (Jana). László (1762–1839) was the father of Hungarian statesman Lajos Kossuth. György Kossuth was married to Anna (? – 1862?) but this couple had no children.

Political and social activity

György Kossuth inherited and administered the family estate in Kosut. He became famous due to the modern methods of agriculture which he introduced in northern Upper Hungary (which is today Slovakia). He spoke Hungarian, Slovak, Czech, Latin and German and served as a judge of provincial courts.

He strongly supported the Slovak national movement and was one of 48 noblemen from Turóc who required government's approval for publication of Slovak political newspapers. He later financially supported Slovak students and writers.

Relations to Lajos Kossuth

György Kossuth was an uncle of politician Lajos Kossuth (1802–1894). As he did not have his own children his relation to Lajos was first very cordial and Lajos Kossuth regularly visited him in Turóc. But later when Lajos Kossuth adopted Magyar ethnical identity the relation between them was broken. György Kossuth reproached him “a treason of the Slovak nation and Kossuth family” and the fact that Lajos Kossuth as a chief-editor of the Magyar newspaper Hírlap refused to publish György Kossuth's articles in which he was critical to the campaign of Magyarisation. He also used to criticize the political style of Lajos Kossuth. He considered it as hyperemotional, aggressive, thoughtless, hysterical and even “crazy.” His widow (Anna) in 1862 disinherited Lajos Kossuth and entailed the family possession to the children of Lajos Kossuth (Ferenc Lajos, Vilma and Lajos Tódor).

External links

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