The view across to Parliament

The building directly across the water from you was designed for a country twice the size of the Hungary you see today.

In 1867, after years of resistance, Hungary became an equal half of the Habsburg empire, with its own government and its own parliament, and all of that had to meet somewhere. They chose the Pest bank, right across from the royal hill where you're standing now, and built something larger than they needed. Six hundred and ninety-one rooms, nineteen years of construction, and a dome rising ninety-six metres, a height that points back to the year the Hungarians first arrived here.

The architect who designed it went blind during the build and died a few weeks before it was finished. He never saw his own building.

Half a century later, the whole story turned around. After the First World War, under the Treaty of Trianon, Hungary lost two thirds of its territory and a large part of its population, and what remained was a parliament built for a far bigger country. It's still the most sensitive subject in the land, and you're looking at the building that stands over all of it.

Somewhere on that far side, by the head of the bridge, an artificial hill was raised in 1867 for the coronation. We'll come back to that at the end of this walk.

We walk back to the gate with the bronze bird, at the top of the funicular.