Borrowing the Indian: Native Americans in Hungarian Travel Writing During the Age of Reform

This thesis set out to investigate Hungarian travel accounts on the United States before the Revolution and War of Independence of 1848-49, focusing on the image of Native Americans projected by them. In terms of travel, the first half of the nineteenth century proved to be a significant period not only internationally (considering the development of technology, transportation and infrastructure) but also in Hungary where the growing interest in travel together with the ideas of the Enlightenment led to the emergence of the first travelogues in Hungarian. There is no doubt that these writings provide valuable insights into contemporary American life but the authenticity of the texts has been questioned many times. Hungarian travelers often returned from the New World with extraordinary narratives about unbelievable events and amazing creatures, thereby giving rise to skepticism and the assumption that the adventurers borrowed their ideas from the popular scientific publications and fictional works of the era. The primary purpose of this study was to determine whether (and if so, how) the works of foreign authors influenced Hungarian perceptions of the United States at the turn of the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, focusing on the representation of Native Americans in the books of the first two Hungarians to share their travel experiences in Hungarian, Sándor Bölöni and Ágoston Haraszthy.MSc/MAAmerikanisztika mesterképzés (MA