ACSÁDY, IGNATZ (IGNATIUS):
By: Max Weisz
Hungarian historian; born at Nagy-Károly, September, 9, 1845. He was educated at Debreczin and Budapest, and he began his journalistic career in 1869 as contributor to "Századunk," a political journal. In 1870 he joined the staff of the "Pesti Napló" and remained a regular contributor. In acknowledgment of his merits as a historian he was elected corresponding member of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences in 1888. His researches deal chiefly with the economic life of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries in Hungary. He has also tried his hand at writing novels and dramas. Since 1894 he has taken an active part in the work of the Hungarian Jewish Literary Society as chairman of the committee on documents.
His more important works are: "Az Általános Államjog és a Politika Története" (The Common State Law and the History of Politics), Budapest, 1875-76, published by the Hungarian Academy; "Zsidó és Nem Zsidó Magyarok az Emanczipáczio után" (Jewish and Non-Jewish Hungarians after the Emancipation), 1883; "Az Osztrák Császári Czim és Magyarország" (The Austrian Imperial Title and Hungary), Budapest, 1877; "Széchy Mária" (1885); "Magyarország Budavár Visszafoglalása Korában" (Hungary at the Time of the Reoccupation of Buda), prize essay, 1886; "Magyarország Pénzugyei I. Ferdinand Alatt" (The Financial Affairs of Hungary under Ferdinand I.), 1888, and "Közgardaszégi á Lapotsunk XVI. és XVII. Szazadban" (Our Economic Conditions in the Sixteenth and Seventeenth Centuries), 1889.
In 1891 he edited the "Kis Cyclopedia" at the request of the Athenæum Society. He wrote the fifth and sixth volumes of Szilágyi's "National History of Hungary," published in 1895-98, on the occasion of the thousandth anniversary of the existence of Hungary. The fifth volume of this work deals with the conditions prevailing in Hungary after the battle of Mohacs, 1526, and the sixth with the reigns of Leopold I. and Joseph I.
He has been a prolific contributor to Hungarian journals, such as "Magyar Tanügy," "Budapesti Szemle," "Századunk," "Magyar Zsidó Szemle," etc.
- Pallas, Magyar Lexicon, i. 70;
- Szinnyei, Magyar Irók Tára, i. 50;
- Magyar Szalon, 1887, p. 481.