Ügyek (second half of the 8th century – first half of the 9th century), also known as Ugek or Vgec, was – according to the chronicler

Anonymus Anonymus is the Latin spelling of anonymous, traditionally used by scholars in the humanities for any ancient writer whose name is not known, or to a manuscript of their work. Such writers have left valuable historical or literary records through ...

(or "Master P.") – the father of

Álmos Álmos (), also Almos or Almus (c. 820 – c. 895), was—according to the uniform account of Hungarian chronicles—the first head of the "loose federation" of the Hungarian tribes from around 850. Whether he was the sacred ruler (''kende'') of ...

, the first

Grand Prince of the Hungarians Grand Prince ( hu, Nagyfejedelem) was the title used by contemporary sources to name the leader of the federation of the Hungarian tribes in the tenth century.Constantine VII mentioned Árpád in his book De Administrando Imperio as ', while Bru ...

. However, according to a conflicting source,

Simon of Kéza Simon of Kéza ( hu, Kézai Simon) was the most famous Hungarian chronicler of the 13th century. He was a priest in the royal court of king Ladislaus IV of Hungary. In 1270–1271, bearing the title "master" (''magister''), Simon was part of a d ...

(writing about five to eight decades later),

Előd Előd was – according to the chronicler Anonymus (or "Master P."), author of the ''Gesta Hungarorum'' – one of the seven chieftains of the Magyars (Hungarians), who led them to the Carpathian Basin in 895. There are three somewhat differing ...

was the father of Álmos, while the chronicler referred to Ügyek as Álmos' grandfather. He is the earliest known ancestor of the

Árpád dynasty The Árpád dynasty, consisted of the members of the royal House of Árpád (), also known as Árpáds ( hu, Árpádok, hr, Arpadovići). They were the ruling dynasty of the Principality of Hungary in the 9th and 10th centuries and of the King ...

. He was said to be a Scythian, i.e. to be from Dentumoger, the homeland of the Magyars, which the chroniclers identify with Scythia, and use to refer both to the land and its inhabitants.

Life

Ügyek was born in the last third of the 8th century. Anonymus writes that Ügyek married Emese, a daughter of "Prince Eunedubelian" in 819. She had seen a divine dream of a

Turul The Turul is a mythological bird of prey, mostly depicted as a Falcon, in Hungarian tradition and Turkic tradition, and a national symbol of Hungarians. Origin The Turul is probably based on a large falcon. The Hungarian language word ''tur ...

bird before

's birth in c. 820, according to the chronicles. The Turul's role is interpreted as guardian spirit, who protects the baby from harm until he grows up. It is supported by the chronicles, according to whom the Turul appears to the ''already pregnant'' woman. Historian

Gyula Kristó Gyula Kristó (11 July 1939 – 24 January 2004) was a Hungarian historian and medievalist, member of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences The Hungarian Academy of Sciences ( hu, Magyar Tudományos Akadémia, MTA) is the most important and pres ...

said Ügyek's name may have been the chronicler' invention, since it derives from the ancient Hungarian ''ügy'' ("saint, holy") word. Simon of Kéza's ''

Gesta Hunnorum et Hungarorum The ''Gesta Hunnorum et Hungarorum'Reader's encyclopedia of Eastern European literature'', 1993, Robert B. Pynsent, Sonia I. Kanikova, p. 529. (Latin: "Deeds of the Huns and Hungarians") is a medieval chronicle written mainly by Simon of Kéz ...

'' narrated that royal lineage that makes Hunnic ruler Attila the sixth-generation ancestor of

Árpád Árpád (; 845 – 907) was the head of the confederation of the Magyar tribes at the turn of the 9th and 10th centuries. He might have been either the sacred ruler or '' kende'' of the Hungarians, or their military leader or '' g ...

, conqueror of the

Pannonian Basin The Pannonian Basin, or Carpathian Basin, is a large basin situated in south-east Central Europe. The geomorphological term Pannonian Plain is more widely used for roughly the same region though with a somewhat different sense, with only th ...

, through Attila's son

Csaba Csaba () is a Hungarian given name for males. Csaba is the native Hungarian name for Ernak, the youngest son of Attila the Hun.''Gesta Hungarorum'', Simon Keza, Edited and translated by Laszlo Veszpremy and Frank Schaer with a study by Jeno Szucs ...

, his son Ed, his son Ügyek, his son Előd, his son Álmos. Álmos was ruler of the Magyars and the father of Árpád.

Meaning of the name

Anonymus gives the name as ''Vgec''; this caused much speculation later, as to the meaning of it. The latest research on the subject gives the following explanations regarding the origin and meaning of the name: * Ügyek - Dezső Pais, in his book of 1926, put forward the idea that the name is to be derived from the Hungarian word igy/egy (‛holy’). Gyula Kristó also shared this view. * Öge/Üge - Dignitary name, according to historian

György Györffy György Györffy (26 September 1917 – 19 December 2000) was a Hungarian historian, and member of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences ( hu, MTA). Biography Györffy was born in Szucság (Suceagu, today part of Baciu, Romania), Hungary the son o ...

. The meaning of it is "wise" and "sage", also "councillor". The word, as 10% words in modern Hungarian, is of Turkic origin. Many Hungarian personal names, and also animal and plant names, are of Turkic origin. Further, the majority of Hungarian tribal names were of Turkic origin, who overall made a significant contribution to Hungarians during their century-long cohabitation. * Üge - The last ruler of the

Uyghur Empire The Uyghur Khaganate (also Uyghur Empire or Uighur Khaganate, self defined as Toquz-Oghuz country; otk, 𐱃𐰆𐰴𐰕:𐰆𐰍𐰕:𐰉𐰆𐰑𐰣, Toquz Oγuz budun, Tang-era names, with modern Hanyu Pinyin: or ) was a Turkic empire that ...

, also a contemporary to Ügyek. He was murdered in 846 in the Altai Mountains. It is speculated, that when the Empire fell apart, some Uyghur fragments could have escaped westward.

Significance

There are three types of great ancestry in the traditional steppe culture. # The distant, 'spiritual' ancestor, who took an important step, but the real power of his dynasty came many generations later; # The founder of an empire, that is inherited by the descendants; # Someone important in the family tree, related to whom the descendants must define themselves. Ügyek clearly belongs to the first group. Other examples belonging to this category are Ertogrul, (father of Osman), Sheikh Safi (founder of the

Safavids Safavid Iran or Safavid Persia (), also referred to as the Safavid Empire, '. was one of the greatest Iranian empires after the 7th-century Muslim conquest of Persia, which was ruled from 1501 to 1736 by the Safavid dynasty. It is often conside ...

), Saman Khuda (founder of the

Samanids People Samanid Samanid Samanid The Samanid Empire ( fa, سامانیان, Sāmāniyān) also known as the Samanian Empire, Samanid dynasty, Samanid amirate, or simply as the Samanids) was a Persianate Sunni Muslim empire, of Iranian dehqan orig ...

), among many others.B. Szabó-Sudár 2017. The Turul narrative is strongly reminiscent of an episode narrated in ''

The Secret History of the Mongols ''The Secret History of the Mongols'' (Middle Mongol: ''Mongɣol‑un niɣuca tobciyan''; Traditional Mongolian: , Khalkha Mongolian: , ; ) is the oldest surviving literary work in the Mongolian language. It was written for the Mongol royal fam ...

'', concerning the foundation of the royal Mongol dynasty. All these traditions popular among different peoples, including the Magyars, were informed by the traditional steppe culture, and do not belong to any specif ethnic group.

Family tree

The family tree contains both the contradictory reports of Anonymus and Simon Kézai. Majority of the historians accept Anonymus' concept which suggests Ügyek was the father of Álmos.

References

Sources