Liberty Square: The Soviet Obelisk and the American Embassy
Why is it significant?
In the northern half of Szabadság tér a white stone obelisk rises, crowned with a golden star, with bronze Soviet soldiers in relief around its base. Turn around and, just across the grass, you face the fortified fence of the Embassy of the United States.
Key Facts
| Place | Liberty Square: The Soviet Obelisk and the American Embassy |
|---|---|
| Address | Szabadság tér, 1054 Budapest, Hungary |
| Geo Coordinates | 47.50460, 19.05030 |
| Part of Walk | Crown, Dome and River: Budapest's Parliament, St Stephen's Basilica & the Danube Bank |
| Generated | Generated |
In the northern half of Szabadság tér a white stone obelisk rises, crowned with a golden star, with bronze Soviet soldiers in relief around its base. Turn around and, just across the grass, you face the fortified fence of the Embassy of the United States. Few squares in Europe put the two sides of the Cold War this close together.
The obelisk was put up straight after the war for the Soviet soldiers who died taking Budapest in the siege of 1944 and 1945. After 1989, most communist monuments in the city were carted off to a statue park on the outskirts. This one stayed, protected by an agreement between Hungary and Russia on the care of war memorials, and it has been a lightning rod for protests ever since.
Now the embassy. On 4 November 1956, as Soviet tanks rolled back into Budapest, Cardinal József Mindszenty, head of the Catholic Church in Hungary, came through its door asking for asylum. He had already spent years in communist prisons. He stayed inside the building for fifteen years, saying Mass, writing his memoirs and walking in the courtyard, until he finally left the country in 1971.
Look for two Americans in bronze nearby. One is Ronald Reagan, striding towards Parliament, unveiled in 2011 for the hundredth anniversary of his birth. The other is General Harry Hill Bandholtz. In 1919, the story goes, when Romanian troops occupying Budapest wanted to empty the National Museum, he sealed its doors with the only official seals he had to hand, those of the American censor's office... and the soldiers backed off.
Around you stand the palaces of money: the Hungarian National Bank and, across the square, the vast former Stock Exchange, both designed by Ignác Alpár and finished in 1905. Walk now to the southern end of the square, where a newer memorial and a citizens' answer to it face each other.