Kálmán Mikszáth Memorial House

The Kálmán Mikszáth Memorial House is a literary memorial site located in Horpács, Nógrád County, built for and at the expense of Kálmán Mikszáth, and it is the only Mikszáth museum in Hungary. Since 1997 it has been operating in its present (2019) function, and its operator is the municipal government. The building was constructed in 1906 based on the designs of the writer’s older son. It is privately owned but under national monument protection.

The writer also has a memorial house in Mikszáthfalva, Slovakia (the former Szklabony), which is operated by the Museum of Hungarian Culture in Slovakia.

General description

The building standing in the cared-for park was built in an eclectic (classicizing) style. Its main façade features a portico with a pediment supported by four Ionic columns. Two short staircases lead up to the main entrance from the sides, but the museum is entered not there but by passing the building on the left.

A permanent exhibition presenting Mikszáth’s life path was opened in 1997. Childhood, the Balassagyarmat and Szeged periods, and then the capital and literary successes are recalled by a series of pictures and documents placed on the walls. In addition to his literary work, significant sections deal with the writer’s connection to Nógrád, his work as a newspaper writer and editor, and his parliamentary years (Mikszáth was a parliamentary representative for more than twenty years). Among the documents are, among others, the sale‑purchase contract of the Szontagh manor and the castle blueprint – imagined larger than the current one.

The former living rooms have been furnished partly in period style and partly with original items. Among them are some remaining pieces of salon furniture, a writing desk, several personal items of the writer, and the pipe room. The wooden, restored staircase leading to the upper floor is also original.

In front of the museum they placed a full‑length statue of Mikszáth sitting on a log, and in the park stands a bust of the writer’s wife, Ilona Mauks. Both are works of the sculptor István Szabó Jr.

The writer and his family at the Horpács manor (early 20th century)

In November 1904 Kálmán Mikszáth bought the approximately 400‑acre Horpács estate and manor from Pál Szontagh’s son, but he first traveled there for Easter in April 1905. At that time the Szontagh manor was a dilapidated, single‑storey building standing next to the present museum building, which has since been expanded to two storeys. The writer, of course, did not intend to farm (the estate was leased out), but desired a quiet rural place. The manor soon proved too small, so Mikszáth had the much larger building, originally called a “castle” and now functioning as a museum, constructed. The construction costs were covered by the honorarium he received for the book *Jókai Mór élete és kora*. The “castle” was completed by the summer of 1906 according to the plans of the writer’s elder son, Kálmán Mikszáth Jr.

Károly Csáky writes that Horpács was the writer’s “new home”, his “final station”. However, according to Mihály Praznovszky, Mikszáth spent only part of his summers with his family at Horpács. “He wrote only three tiny fragments in the few years—or rather a few weeks—he spent in this village. For the Pentecost, Easter, and occasional summer stays together amount to barely one or two months in total.”

After the writer’s death his wife Ilona Mauks lived in the manor with the family until her death in 1926, and from the 1930s until 1950 the elder son, Kálmán Mikszáth Jr., lived there with his family. They also endured the years of the Second World War there. In 1950 the family was declared a class enemy and relocated to Budapest. Earlier, the writer’s books, relics, and artworks had been removed by truck.

The building and the museum history (second half of the 20th century)

From 1951 the “castle” housed first the agricultural cooperative, then the municipal council; the municipal library and the cultural house also found a place there. In 1954 a Mikszáth memorial room was set up in the building. The neglected building was renovated by the county council for the 50th anniversary of the writer’s death, and on May 29, 1960 the expanded memorial museum was ceremonially opened.

The former “castle” was a state‑run children’s home from the mid‑1960s until 1993. Meanwhile the small exhibition was rearranged again in 1972 and 1982. A journalist who visited in 1981 described the situation as follows: “A ransacked, wild castle, abandoned, wild children, dirty, ownerless, left alone free. They run among the crumbling historic‑value furniture of the house. (…) up there a few photographic copies and a room locked with a key. Where is the museum? Where is the guard of the memorial room? Where are the children’s caregivers, the educators, the supervisors?” The children’s home, or already “children’s home and primary school”, ceased to exist on September 1, 1993.

After its relocation the building was renovated and on October 17, 1997 the new permanent Mikszáth exhibition was opened in five ground‑floor rooms. Previously, in 1993, the Mikszáth Society was founded; every year on October 13, Kálmán’s Day, a Mikszáth celebration is organized.

On October 13, 1999 the full‑size Mikszáth statue erected in front of the building, created by the younger István Szabó, was unveiled.

In the 21st century

After the county government sold the entire property (the building and the park as well) in 1997, the museum was still in an uncertain situation in 2012. Its collection naturally remained in state ownership, but the building became private property and, together with the permanent exhibition, required renovation.

By the end of 2015 the building’s energy modernization was completed.

The opening of the renovated permanent exhibition (Storytelling Mikszáth) took place on June 8, 2024, in a ceremonial setting.