Szigetvar Attractions

Szigetvár is a provincial town of 12,000 inhabitants, situated 34km (21mi.) west of Pécs. The legendary defense of its castle against overwhelming Turkish odds has won this little town a permanent place in Hungarian history. In the summer of 1566 the 2400-strong garrison of this marshland town (Szigetvár means "island castle") held out for a whole month against a besieging force of 100,000 Turks before finally succumbing. In the course of the siege the Turkish army, led by Sultan Suleiman II, lost more than 20,000 men; the commander of the castle, Count Miklós Zrinyi (1508-66) and all his men were killed. A great-grandson of the Count, the poet and army commander Miklós Zrinyi the Younger (1620-64), who also fought against the Turks, composed a literary monument to this heroic deed in the form of his epic poem "The Siege of Sziget".