Zalavár

Zalavár
Zalavár Location of Zalavár
Coordinates: 46°40′12″N 17°09′25″E / 46.66996°N 17.15683°E / 46.66996; 17.15683Coordinates: 46°40′12″N 17°09′25″E / 46.66996°N 17.15683°E / 46.66996; 17.15683
Country	Hungary
County	Zala county
Area
– Total	31.06 km2 (12 sq mi)
Population (2001)
– Total	959
– Density	30.88/km2 (80/sq mi)
Time zone	CET (UTC+1)
– Summer (DST)	CEST (UTC+2)
Postal code	8392
Area code(s)	83

Zalavár is a village in Hungary, located in the Zala county. It is located around 9 km (6 mi) southwest of the Lake Balaton.

Name

In Hungarian, it is known as Zalavár, in Slovak as Blatnohrad, in Croatian: Blatnograd , in Serbian: Блатноград, and in German as Moosburg. It was also known as Mosapurc and Kolon. Ján Kollár called it Salavár in his travel book and described the state of the ruins in 1841.

History

Remains of the Romanesque basilica in Zalavár

In the 9th century, the city of Blatnograd/Blatnohrad, a fortified city built at the Zala river, was a capital of the Slavic Balaton Principality ruled by prince Pribina ("Privinae civitas, munimen, castrum in nemore et palude Salae" in a Salzburg chronicle). During the reign of Pribina's son, prince Kocel (861-876), in the summer of 867, it provided short-term hospitality to brothers Cyril and Methodius on their way from Great Moravia to the pope in Rome to justify the use of the Slavonic language as a liturgical language. They and their disciples turned Blatnograd into one of the centers that spread the knowledge of the new Slavonic script (Glagolitic alphabet) and literature, educating numerous future missionaries in their native language.