Lukács Spa
The Szent-Lukács-Heilbad ( Hungarian Szent Lukács gyógyfürdő ), also Lukács-Bad (Hungarian Lukácsfürdő , German outdated Lucasbad ), is one of the oldest Budapest thermal baths .
location
The Lukács is located on Frankel Leó utca in the 2nd district of Budapest, near the Danube .
Surname
The origin of the name is not clearly established. The healing springs that arise here were called Lochbad by the German-speaking population , while the corresponding Hungarian name was lyukfürdő or lukasfürdő . It is believed that the name originated from the similar sound of "Lukas" and "Lukács", especially since the evangelist Lukas was traditionally associated with medicine.
Another theory is that the name can be traced back to the previous owner of the area in the Middle Ages.
history
The healing springs at the foot of the Szemlő-hegy were already used by the Romans , an inscription from the time of Emperor Claudius refers to these warm springs ( aquae calidae superiores et inferiores ). At the time of the Hungarian conquest around 896, the settlement "Felhévíz" ( hévíz means "warm water", "healing water" in Hungarian ) stood on the site of the two current spas (Lukács fürdő and Császár fürdő ). In the 12th century, knightly orders settled (1178 the Order of St. John , later also the Sovereign Order of Malta ), who built hospitals next to their religious houses and used the healing springs.
During the time of Turkish rule (1541–1686) there were several Turkish baths in the area of today's baths (the Veli-bej bath and the baruthâne ılıcasi , translated “bath next to the powder mill ”). During this time, the springs were mainly used to operate the powder and grain mill. The mill was expanded in the time of Sokollu Mustafa Pascha , who was the Beylerbey of Buda from 1566 to 1578 .
After the liberation of Ofen in 1686, the court chamber took over the management of all spas and healing springs, including the springs in the area of today's Császár and Lukács baths. The English doctor Edward Brown wrote about the bath next to the powder mill in 1697 . In the course of the 18th century this bath lost its importance. In 1852 it was reported that the tubs in the Lucasbad were mainly used by farmers in the area.
In 1857 a mill master from Altofen began to expand the spa, in 1884 Fülöp Palotay bought the property and invested in the further expansion of the spa. Palotay supervised Rezső Ray with the design of the new building. In 1893 the bath was converted into a stock corporation ( Actien Gesellschaft Sct. Lucasbad ) and the parts of the building that make up today's bath were built. The spa hotel, the swimming pools, the departments for mud cures and the public bath were set up. Since then the name Szent Lukács gyógyfürdő has been used. Until the opening of the Gellért fürdő (1912), the Lukács bath was considered one of the most modern and - also by visitors from abroad - the most visited baths in Budapest. During this time, numerous recovered guests donated marble votive tablets . In 1937 a marble drinking hall was built and inaugurated by Josef Franz von Austria on the occasion of the International Baths Congress .
The building was severely damaged during the Battle of Budapest at the end of World War II. Among other things, the majority of the votive tablets were destroyed; the preserved panels were built into the wall of the spa during renovation work.
After the Second World War, the Szent Lukács gyógyfürdő was nationalized and merged with the neighboring Császár fürdő (Imperial Bath ). This resulted in the state rheumatic hospital. Through further amalgamations, the bath became part of the State Institute for Rheumatology and Physiotherapy . The Lukács bath had a mud bath until 1999 , which was provided with a concrete basin in the 1950s to prevent the healing water from seeping away. The mud bath was closed for hygienic reasons around the turn of the millennium. The first extensive renovation work began around this time and lasted until 2013.
Renovation works
In 1999 the modernization of the swimming pools began. While the water in the basins used to be drained into the Danube at regular intervals , a water circulation system has now been set up. The mud bath was replaced by an "adventure pool". Since the building is a listed building , the plans for the renovation were drawn up together with the “Authority for the Cultural Heritage” ( Kulturális Örökségvédelmi Hivatal ). In the first stage, a sauna area with a relaxation area was created near the adventure pool. A cold water basin, showers, toilets and a snack bar were also built in the sauna area. The pillars of the vestibule were reconstructed using archive images. In addition, the locking system for the lockers and cabins, which until then required the presence of a lifeguard, was converted to an electronic chip system.
In 2012, the second stage of the renovation work began. In the course of this work, several parts of the building were renovated, such as the pavlatschen aisles typical of Budapest and the cabins located there. A separate “sauna world” was set up in a previously unused part of the building. In the entrance area, the bilingual tiled wall, reminiscent of the establishment of the spa at the end of the 19th century, and the magnificent fountain were renovated. As a historical and technical monument, the old electrical control center of the Lukács baths was kept as an exhibit. The cost of the renovation was 1.5 billion forints , 70% of which was covered by EU funds.
investment
building
The ruins of the original powder and grain mill were uncovered in the course of the renovation work and can now be viewed in the building on the passage to the medicinal water basin. The spa makes an eclectic impression because of the frequent renovations inside and out. The so-called Moorish elements and the characteristic four towers disappeared. The spa was given its current appearance in 1921 by the architect Rezső Hikisch . Until the 1970s, the main building was expanded again and again.
garden
Two memorial benches were erected in the garden of the Lukács Baths. The benches donated by the descendants of György Schiller and Júlia Lux were originally in the garden and were moved to a pillar niche during the renovation work in 2012. In 2013 a fountain with the statute “The bathing nymph” by Lajos Rápolthy was built in the garden. The statue originally stood in another bath in Budapest.
Pools, saunas and steam baths
The areas for recovery, sport and wellness are located in different parts of the building.
The thermal bath has three warm water basins with a water temperature of 32, 36 and 40 ° C. Two outdoor pools are set up for swimming, which are 22 ° C and 26 ° C respectively and in which you can swim parallel to the long side. (In other spas, such as the Széchenyi Thermal Bath , it is customary to swim all around.)
Originally, like all other Budapest baths, the Lukács baths had two swimming and recreation areas, separated by sex. That is why the pools are still called men's and women's pools (Hungarian férfi medence , női medence ). In the past, the two swimming areas were separated by a wall; female guests were allowed to go into the men's pool, but conversely, male guests were not allowed to use the women's pool. The separation was lifted after the Second World War.
The adventure pool (water temperature 32–33 ° C) is designed as a whirlpool, it has a whirlpool, two water jets and several massage jets built into the pool floor.
The relaxation area houses an infrared sauna , a Finnish sauna , an ice dispenser and a barrel-shaped cold water pool. On the mezzanine floor of the relaxation area there is a weight bath and a pool for water aerobics , and a Kneipp facility has been created at the entrance to the adventure pool . The sauna world, which was built in 2012, has a cold water pool (22 ° C), a salt crystal sauna, an aromatic steam bath, an infrared sauna, a Finnish sauna, a naturist sauna, a cold chamber and a tepidarium.
The healing water
The Lukács bath is supplied with healing water from the János Molnár cave . The 6 kilometer long cave lake has a water depth of 30 meters.
The cave was named after the doctor and chemist János Molnár, who was the first to publish an article about it in the medical journal Orvosi Hetilap in 1858 . The cave lake was discovered in 1937 and further explored by divers from the 1960s.
Meaning and reception
Since the 19th century, the Lukács Bath has not only served as a therapeutic bath and place of relaxation, but has also been the center of social life in Budapest. In the 20th century, Zoltán Kodály , Gyula Illyés , Tibor Déry , Károly Makk , Péter Bacsó and István Örkény were regular guests of the spa. Originally, the cabins parallel to the men's pool were reserved for regular guests. One of these was Károly Molnár, to whom a memorial plaque was dedicated in 1996. At that time, as a 102-year-old, he was still a daily guest in the Lukács baths.
The Lukács bath is mentioned several times in Hungarian literature. Gábor Görgey calls the bath in his novel The Shell of the Lobster a “refuge in the face of the horrors and humiliations of the 20th century”. In the novel Parallel Stories, Péter Nádas describes the different seasons in the Lukács bath.
Individual evidence
- ↑ A short story on the Szent Lukács Gyógyfürdő website (accessed May 31, 2020).
- ^ Péter Nádas: Parallelgeschichten, Rowohlt Berlin, 2012, p. 133 ff.
literature
- Orsolya Miksa: Ottoman-Turkish baths in Budapest: Research into the continuity of their use as reflected in historical documentation, 2018, Kassel University Press, ISBN 978-3-7376-0542-7
- Meskó Csaba: Gyógyfürdők (medicinal baths). Budapest: Városháza. 1998. ISBN 963 8376 78 3 (Hungarian)
- Meleghy Péter: Budapest fürdői (The Baths of Budapest). Budapest: Corvina. 2012. ISBN 978 963 13 6042 4 (Hungarian)
- Búza Péter: Fürdőző Budapest (The Bathing Budapest) Budapest: Holnap. 2006. ISBN 963 346 719 5 (Hungarian)
- Soós Péter, Balogh Éva, Fluck István: Budapest fürdőváros (Bath City Budapest) Budapest: Fővárosi Fürdőigazgatóság. 1996. ISBN 963-02-9932-1 (Hungarian)
Web links
- Official German-language website of the Lukács spa
- Archive recordings of the Lukács spa (1900 - 2010)
Coordinates: 47 ° 31 ′ 4.1 ″ N , 19 ° 2 ′ 12.8 ″ E