Zimányi Vera: Economy and society in sixteenth and seventeenth century Hungary, 1526-1650 - Studia historica Academiae Scientiarum Hungaricae 188. (Budapest, 1987)

ECONOMY AND SOCIETY IN SIXTEENTH AND SEVENTEENTH CENTURY HUNGARY (1526-1650) By V. Zimányi In the first part of the 16th century the Hun­garian state, important and independent in the Middle Ages, became divided into three parts and its middle region came under Turkish rule for one and a half centuries. This work describes the main trends of the economic and social development of this tragic period from both military and political point of view. During this period Hungarian economy became integrated into the international division of labour to an unprecedented degree with the export of agrarian products. The trend of the change in prices and foreign-trade income proves that the international agrarian boom also reached Hungary. As a reaction a series of seigneurial demesnes cultivated by robot was established. As, however, the main export prod­ucts, cattle and wine, were produced not on the seigneurial demesnes nor on the land held by the serfs but on the independent parts of the peasant farms, considerable strata of peasantry profited from the boom. Due to this fact, Hun­garian development proved to be more favour­able than the development in the Polish and the Baltic societies. This, however, did not stimulate the handicapped Hungarian industry. Therefore, with the end of the agrarian boom the favourable economic opportunities of some three-quarters of a century came to an end as well. AKADÉMIAI KIADÓ BUDAPEST

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