Levente Hervay

Levente Hervay

Levente Ferenc Hervay OCist (born January 7, 1919 Pressburg , as Ferenc Hervay ; † February 8, 2016 in Zirc ) was a Hungarian Cistercian monk and church historian as well as librarian and bibliographer .

education

He attended the Nagy Lajos Cistercian grammar school in Pécs from 1929 to 1937. Before graduating from high school, he decided to join the order. He was dressed on August 29, 1937. After graduating from high school, he studied theology in Zirc from 1937 to 1940 . From 1940 he continued his studies at the Péter Pázmány University , where he studied geography and history to become a teacher. He made his solemn profession on January 4, 1944.

Ordination

The Archbishop of Veszprém, József Mindszenty , ordained him priestly on May 16, 1944 in Zirc. He began his teaching internship at the Budapest grammar school on Trefortstrasse, but the school was closed towards the end of 1944 due to the approaching war front. He became a chaplain in Zirc, then assistant novice master, then chamberlain, steward and forester. Abbot Vendel Endrédy transferred him to Eger in 1946, where he taught in the elementary school and in the high school of the order. He was also the boarding school director and scout curate there . Between 1946 and 1952 he was pastor of the parish of St. Bernard in Eger .

Eventful years

After the dissolution of the religious orders from 1953 to 1955, he worked as a forestry worker. From 1955 to 1959 he gave language lessons to private students. In 1959 he was again an unskilled worker in the state forestry in the western Bükk Mountains in Bélapátfalva , after which he worked for a short time at an oil company in Nagy-Alföld .

Between 1959 and 1960 he worked as a librarian in the diocesan library. In 1960/1961 he worked first as a truck attendant, then as a warehouse worker. During this time, too, he dealt with the youth, which is why he was arrested on February 6, 1961 for illegal religious instruction and sentenced to four and a half years in prison. He spent his imprisonment with some fellow priests in Márianosztra and Budapest– Kőbánya . He regained his freedom in 1963 through an amnesty.

Scientific career

Father Levente had been involved in the study of Hungarian sources since 1963, carried out by the Academy of Sciences. He was the editor of the first two volumes of the "Régi Magyarországi Nyomtatványok" (1971 and 1983), in German: "Old print forms from Hungary". During the scientific research Levente Ferenc Hervay examined the books of the Bernhard, Bornemissza, Manilus and Mantskovit printers as well as those of Debrecen and Farkaslöcse. To this end, he worked up Ambrosius Calepinus ' Dictionarium Latinum .

From 1976 until his retirement in 1981 he was a research assistant at the Széchényi National Library . In 1983 he was appointed secretary of the Church History Working Group of the Bishops' Conference and also worked as a chaplain. When the Cistercian Order was re-admitted to Hungary, it was the first to arrive at the Zirc Abbey. From 1998 he headed the New Library there.

Cistercian order

Father Levente Ferenc Hervay worked on the Historical Repertory of the Order in Hungary for over 60 years . Whenever he had the opportunity to travel, he visited the historical places of the order in dozens of different countries. He visited nearly 400 libraries and monasteries from Norway to Sicily, from Ireland to Poland. Numerous bibliographical and historical works have been published. He also researched the history of the Benedictine , Franciscan and Pauline orders . His articles on the history of the Hungarian church and the history of the order have been published in well-known international specialist encyclopedias such as the Dizionario degli istituti di perfezione (DIP).

Works

• (with Felix Vongrey) "Critical remarks on the" Atlas de l'Ordre Cistercien "by Frédéric van der Meer". In: Analecta Cisterciensia . 23.1. 1967. pp. 115-152.
• (Contributor) The Hungarian illuminated chronicle. Chronica de gestis Hungarorum , ed. by Dezsö Dercsényi. Corvina, Budapest 1969.
• (Ed. With Gedeon Borsa) Régi magyarországi nyomtatványok. Res litteraria Hungariae vetus operum impressorum 1, 1473–1600. Akadémiai kiadó, Budapest 1971.
• (Ed. With others) Documenta artis paulinorum . 3 vols. MTA Művészettörténeti Kutató Csoportja, Budapest 1978– (A Magyar Tudományos Akadémia Művészettörténeti Kutató Csoportjának forráskiadványai, 10, 13, 14).
• (Ed. With others) Régi magyarországi nyomtatványok. Res litteraria Hungariae vetus operum impressorum 2, 1601–1635. Akadémiai kiadó, Budapest 1983.
• Repertorium historicum ordinis Cisterciensis in Hungaria . Editiones Cistercienses, Rome 1984 (Bibliotheca Cisterciensis 7).
• (Ed.) Gergely Gyöngyösi (1472–1531): Vitae fratrum eremitarum Ordinis Sancti Pauli primi eremitae . Akadémiai Kiadó, Budapest 1988.
• Zirc. The abbey church. TKM Egyesület, Budapest 1989.
• (Ed. With others) Diplomata Hungariae antiquissima. Accedunt epistolae et acta . In Aedibus Academiae Scientiarum Hungaricae, Budapest 1992.
• (Ed.) Old Transylvanian prints (16th century). Böhlau, Cologne / Vienna 1996 (writings on the regional studies of Transylvania 21).
• (with Legeza László and Szacsvay Péter) Ciszterciek . Mikes, Budapest 1997 (Szerzetesrendek a Kárpát-medencében).

Honors and recognitions

• 2001 Vilmos Fraknói Prize
• August 19, 2011. Széchényi Ferenc Prize in recognition of his life's work for the cultural collections in Hungary.