The Animal-Head Waterspout of the Zsolnay Fountain

Bull or Ox? Was it really the chalice of Attila? Did they originally plan to erect one fountain or two? Did they really just barely find the hidden fountain after World War I? The story of our museum’s eosin-glazed waterspout provides an answer to these questions.

The HMA MPDC Hungarian Museum of Architecture safeguards an eosin-glazed animal-head waterspout that is not just a product of the Zsolnay factory, but was a part of the fountain erected in Pécs in memory of Vilmos Zsolnay. The first international success of the ceramics manufacturer from Pécs, Vilmos Zsolnay, came from the 1873 Vienna World’s Fair. His trip to London with Ödön Lechner to collect artworks resulted in a relationship as friends and collaborators that even today ties his name to the Hungarian Art Nouveau movement. The high quality and unmatched beauty of the Zsolnay Factory’s ceramics became world renowned through the 1896 Millennial Exhibition and then the 1900 Paris World’s Fair. Not only Hungarian artists worked together with him, but also well-known foreign architects such as Otto Wagner and Joseph Maria Olbrich.

One of the most extraordinary products of his work was the eosin ceramic glaze. The composition of this product that originated in Italy was long unknown to scientists. However, the chemist Vince Wartha together with Vilmos Zsolnay succeeded in determining the composition of the material at the beginning of the 1890s, and thus were able to work out the procedure to employ it in art.

Vilmos Zsolnay made a pledge to Pécs a few years before his death that he would donate a memorial fountain decorated with eosin-glazed ceramics to be located in front of the city hall that was under construction. After his death, his son Miklós made every effort to fulfill his father’s promise. In 1909, Andor Pilch began preparing the designs for the fountain under the direction of Miklós and with the support of the Parks Department of the Mecsek Association. This outstanding architect of Art Nouveau in Pécs completed the plans by 1911, which were accompanied by a color design by Géza Nikelszky, while the town councilors tried to find a site for the fountain. At first, they planned two smaller fountains for the area in front of the city hall, but they did not fit in with the designated site. They tested out a larger fountain by erecting a wooden model of it, but it would have blocked the view of the entrance. Széchenyi Square, which was in line to be remodeled, became the choice for its location, but the work had not yet begun, so the erection of the fountain was also delayed.

Miklós Zsolnay handed over the completed fountain to the city in 1913, although at that time it was not in its final location. The fountain made from more than 60 parts was first placed in the city hall’s medical office according to the local newspapers, and later they succeeded in hiding it in the basement of the vintners’ school on Ágoston Square when the First World War broke out. In 1923, just five years after the war and one year after the death of Miklós Zsolnay, it was discovered amongst thick cobwebs, packed in moldy straw and paper. Since the work on Széchenyi Square was just beginning at this time, the city decided to hold a ceremony for the erection of the fountain. However, in the end, it was not until May of 1930 when it was placed in the square in front of the church of the Brothers Hospitallers, which since 2003 has been known as Zsolnay Square.

The decoration of the Zsolnay Fountain fits in well with the artistic program from the Hungarian pavilion of the 1911 Turin World’s Fair, which was referred to as “The Palace of Attila.” The fountain is a structure made by chiseled carving of Haraszt limestone with four water basins and four eosin-glazed animal heads above which there is the crest of the city of Pécs on the northern and southern sides and the five-towered emblem (Quinque Ecclesiae) of the Zsolnay Factory on the eastern and western sides with eosin-glazed rosettes. An inscription on the edge of the fountain in runic script reads, “May the memorial fountain of Vilmos Zsolnay forever be a witness to the flourishing of the city of Pécs and the happiness of its inhabitants.”

The animal-head waterspouts may have been inspired by the bull’s-head drinking bowl that is part of the Treasure of Nagyszentmiklós discovered in 1799. This motif has appeared in the works of numerous artists, including the Blood Oath fresco by Bertalan Székely made for the city hall of Kecskemét, the funeral bier of Mihály Munkácsy, the tomb of Ferenc Pulszky, and the pyrogranite roof elements on the Budapest Postal Savings Bank. The find has had a great influence on artists seeking a Hungarian national artistic vocabulary. They considered it to be the chalice of Attila the Hun, but since then archaeologists have instead linked it to the Avars. Rather than being a bull, it appeared to the artists to be an ox, which has much stronger ties to Hungarian folk art. As a consequence, Alajos Stróbl referred to it as an ox head in his works.  

A point of interest is that the drinking bowl continued to be a recurring motif. It appears on the funeral parlor in Debrecen built in 1932 according to the designs of József Borsos, the drinking fountain of the Hungária Spring in the Tabán district of Budapest (1934), and the “Drinking Bowl Paraphrase” public sculpture on Boráros Square that was a 1983 work of the sculptor Imre Varga. This sculpture makes reference to János Boráros, who the square is named after and who had the treasure shipped to the Kunsthistorisches Museum in Vienna.

The Zsolnay Fountain in Pécs has been restored several times, first in the 1980s and most recently in 2000, on the 100th anniversary of the death of Vilmos Zsolnay. According to the report of the silicate restoration expert Klára Csáki, “Of the gres glazed fountain elements, the four water basins and the fountain base decorated with eosin inlays as well as the surfaces of the eosin-glazed bull’s-head waterspouts had become encrusted with limescale and the pointing between the elements had fallen out.” In the end, the client decided to have the waterspouts remanufactured. The original elements were placed for safekeeping at the Zsolnay Factory, the Zsolnay Museum in Pécs, and the Pécs municipal government. The fourth one landed up at the Pécs office of the former National Historic Preservation Agency. From there, the historic property supervisor Henriette Levárdy handed it over to the Hungarian Museum of Architecture that was run by the agency at that time.

 

author: Eszter Baldavári

Photographs: Gábor F. Tóth, Fortepan

Sources:

Baranyai Pál: Zsolnay Vilmos emlékkútja 100 éves (Vilmos Zsolnay’s memorial fountain is 100 years old). Pécs, 2012, 30–57.

Bálint Csanád: A nagyszentmiklósi kincs (The Treasure of Nagyszentmiklós). Budapest, 2004.

The oral report of the silicate restoration expert Klára Csáki, August 2021.

Csenkey Éva: Zsolnay szecessziós kerámiák (Art Nouveau Zsolnay Ceramics). Budapest, 2000.

Lyka Károly: Zsolnay Vilmos. Magyar Iparművészet 1900/3. sz.

Mendöl Zsuzsanna: Pécs építészete a századfordulón (The Architecture of Pécs at the Turn of the Century). Magyar Építőművészet 1989/80. 6. sz. 4–8.

Nikelszky Géza: Zsolnay Vilmos emlék-kutja (Vilmos Zsolnay’s Memorial Fountain). 1 June 1930.

Ruzsás Lajos: A Pécsi Zsolnay-gyár története (The History of the Zsolnay Factory in Pécs). Pécs, 1954.

Szlávik Lajos – Fejér László: 111 vízi emlék Magyarországon (111 Memorials of Water Management in Hungary). Budapest, 2008, 96–97.

Pécsi Napló 6 February 1910.

Pécsi Napló 30 September 1925.

Dunántúl 9 May 1930.