Trnava, Slovakia

🇸🇰 Trnava is the natural centre of region of Dolné Považie, the seat of both the district and regional administration. Trnava is the seat of the Trnava University and the University of Sts. Constantine and Methodius, and since 1978 the Slovak metropolitan seat of the archbishop. The city has a historic center. Because of the many churches within its city walls, Trnava has often been called "Little Rome" (Malý Rím, parva Roma), or more recently, the "Slovak Rome".

History Permanent settlements on the city's territory are known from the Neolithic period onwards.

History: Middle Ages During the Middle Ages, an important market settlement arose here at the junction of two important roads – from Bohemia to Hungary and from the Mediterranean to Poland.

The first written reference to Trnava dates from 1211. In 1238, Trnava was the first town in (present-day) Slovakia to be granted a town charter (civic privileges) by the king. The former agricultural centre gradually became a centre of manufacture, trade, and crafts. By the early 13th century, the king of Hungary had invited numerous Germans to settle in Trnava; this settlement increased after the Tatar invasion in 1242. At the turn of the 13th and 14th centuries, a part of Trnava was enclosed by very long city walls. The original Slovak market settlement and the Germans stayed behind this wall.

Trnava was also the place of many important negotiations: Charles I, the king of Hungary, signed here a currency agreement with the Czech King John of Luxemburg in 1327, and King Louis I (who often stayed in the town and died there in 1380) signed a friendship agreement with Emperor Charles IV there in 1360.

Hussites and Slovak majority The temporary German majority in Trnava's population yielded in favour of the Slovaks during the campaigns undertaken by the Czech Hussites in the 15th century. In April 1430, the Hussites penetrated close to the town and defeated the Hungarian army in the Battle of Trnava. However, they suffered heavy losses and withdrew to Moravia. On 24 Jun 1432 a small group of Hussites masked as tradesmen entered the town, overcame the guards in the night and captured the town without a fight. Then, they made Trnava the centre of their campaigns in north-western Kingdom of Hungary from 1432 to 1435.

16th-18th centuries The town, along with the rest of the territory of present-day Slovakia, gained importance after the conquest of most of what is today Hungary by the Ottoman Empire in 1541, when Trnava became the see (1541–1820) of the Archbishopric of Esztergom (before 1541 and after 1820 the see was the town of Esztergom, which was conquered by the Ottoman Turks in 1543). The cathedrals of the archbishopric were the Saint John the Baptist Cathedral and the Saint Nicholas Cathedral in the town. Many ethnic Hungarians fleeing from the Turks moved to the town after 1541 from present-day Hungary, which remained under Ottoman rule until 1699.

In the 16th and especially the 17th century, Trnava was an important centre of the Counter-Reformation in the Kingdom of Hungary (at the time largely identical with the territory of present-day Slovakia and a strip of western Hungary). The Archbishop Nicolas Oláh invited the Jesuits to Trnava in 1561 in order to develop the municipal school system. Subsequently, he had a seminary opened in 1566 and in 1577 Trnava's priest Nicolas Telegdi founded a book-printing house in the town. The first Catholic Bible translation into Hungarian (based on the Latin Vulgate) was also completed in the town by the Jesuit György Káldi who was born there in 1573. The 17th century was also characterized by many anti-Habsburg uprisings in the country – these revolts of Stephen Bocskay, Gabriel Bethlen, George I Rákóczi, and Imre Thököly negatively affected Trnava's life. On 26 December 1704 Francis II Rákóczi's army suffered a decisive defeat against the Imperial Army, led by Sigbert Heister, near Trnava.

The Jesuit Trnava University (1635–1777), the only university of the Kingdom of Hungary at that time, was founded by Archbishop Péter Pázmány. Founded to support the Counter-Reformation, Trnava University soon became a centre of Slovak education and literature, since most of the teachers, one half of the students and the majority of the town's inhabitants were Slovaks. Pázmány himself was instrumental in promoting the usage of Slovak instead of Czech and had his work "Isteni igazságra vezető kalauz" (Guide to the Truth of God) and several of his sermons translated into Slovak. From the late 18th century Trnava became a centre of the literary and artistic Slovak National Revival. The first standard codification of Slovak (by the priest Anton Bernolák in 1787) was based on the Slovak dialect used in the region of Trnava.

19th century to Great War During the Hungarian Revolution of 1848 Richard Guyon's army fought here with an Austrian army on 14 December, in 1848.

The importance of the town decreased in the early 19th century, when the university was moved to Buda (today: Eötvös Loránd University) and the see of the archbishopric moved back to Esztergom. It increased however partly again after 1844, when Trnava was connected with Bratislava through the first railway line in the Kingdom of Hungary, which was a horse railway (steam engines were used since 1872). The railway connection launched a modernization of the town, which started with the erection of a big sugar factory, a malt-house and of the Coburgh's factory (later referred to as Trnavské automobilové závody, i.e. "Trnava Car Factory"). The St. Adalbert Association [cs] (Spolok sv. Vojtecha), founded in 1870 when the Slovak foundation (Matica slovenská) was prohibited by the Hungarian authorities, kept up the Slovak national conscience at a time of strong Magyarisation in Hungary. In the 19th but mainly in the early 20th century the town grew behind its city walls and a part of the wall was demolished in the 19th century, but most of it is still well-preserved.

Jewish history Jews arrived into the area in the 11th century. A presence in Trnava is documented from the 14th century. In 1494, 14 Jews were brought to death by burning following a blood libel. An 1503 account of the 1494 ritual murder trial introduces for the first time in history the notion that Jews as a collectivity were of feminine gender and had monthly bleedings, a libel which would become part of the repertoire of Christian antisemitism from then on. After another blood libel, the Jews were expelled from the city in 1539 and only in 1783 were Jews allowed to return to the city. Until World War II, Trnava was home to a sizable Jewish minority. During the Holocaust, 82% of the Jews were sent to extermination camps in 1942.

After 1918 After the creation of Czechoslovakia in 1918, Trnava was one of the most industrialised cities of the country. During World War II, Trnava was occupied on 1 April 1945 by troops of the Soviet 2nd Ukrainian Front. In 1977, by a decision of Pope Paul VI, Trnava became the see of a separate Slovak archbishopric (although the seat moved to Bratislava in 2008, the city still remains a seat of its own archbishopric). With the establishment of this archbishopric, Slovakia became independent of Hungary again also in terms of church administration for the first time in centuries.

After the establishment of Slovakia (1993), Trnava became the capital of the newly created Trnava Region in 1996. The French car manufacturer PSA Peugeot Citroën began construction of a large automobile plant in Trnava in 2003.

Geography Trnava lies at an altitude of 146 metres (479 ft) above sea level and covers an area of 71.535 square km (27.6 sq mi). It is located in the Danubian Lowland on the Trnávka river, around 45 km (28 mi) north-east of Bratislava, 50 km (31 mi) west of Nitra and around 70 km (43 mi) from the Czech border. The closest mountain ranges are the Little Carpathians to the west and the Považský Inovec to the north-east of the city.

Tourist Industry As early as in the Middle Ages, Trnava was an important centre of Gothic religious and lay architecture – St. Nicolas's Church, St. Helen's Church and several church monastery complexes (Clarist, Franciscan and Dominican) were built in this period.

The Renaissance (16th century) added a town tower to Trnava's silhouette. Nicolas Oláh ordered the erection of the Seminary and Archbishop's Palace. Péter Bornemisza and Huszár Gál [hu], the leading personalities of the Reformation in the Kingdom of Hungary, were active in Trnava for a short time. The town ramparts were rebuilt to a Renaissance fortification as a reaction to the approaching Turkish danger from the south.

The 17th century was characterized by the construction of the Paulinian Church that bears badges of Silesian Renaissance. Trnava was gradually redesigned to Baroque. The erection of the St. John the Baptist Church and of the university campus launched a building rush that continued with the reconstruction of the Franciscan and Clarist's complexes. Builders and artists called to build the university also participated in improvements of the burgher architecture. The Holy Trinity Statue and the group of statues of St. Joseph, the Ursulinian and Trinitarian Church and Monastery are of recent construction.

The District hospital was built 1824. The building of the theatre started in May 1831 and the first performance was played at Christmas. Both of the Trnava synagogues, historical structures with oriental motifs, date back to the 19th century. The Synagogue Status Quo Ante currently houses the Jána Koniareka art gallery.

Museums • Galéria Jána Koniarka (Ján Koniarek Gallery) • West-Slovak Museum

Controversies Renovated in 2010, the 19th-century Orthodox Synagogue which was falling into disrepair, was turned into a chic, modern cafe named Synagoga Cafe in 2016.

Critics view the business as an example of exploitative cultural appropriation in the wake of the Holocaust, where the former occupants were sent to concentration camps. Whereas, advocates argue that it reflects respect and nostalgia for Jews in addition to providing a vehicle for at least some preservation of the heritage site.

Nationality (2001 census): • Slovaks (96.89%) • Czechs (0.79%) • Romas (0.27%) • Hungarians (0.21%)

Age: • Pre-productive Age: 9,947 • Productive Age: 46,742 • Post-productive Age: 11,603

Government The current government structure has been in place since 1990, and is composed of a mayor (primátor) and of a city council (Mestské zastupiteľstvo), which in turn leads a city board (Mestská rada) and city commissions (Komisie mestského zastupiteľstva). The mayor is the city's top executive officer, elected for a four-year term; the current mayor is Peter Brocka, who is serving his first term and was inaugurated to function on 12 December 2014. The city council is the highest legislative body of the city, represented by 31 councillors, elected to a concurrent term with the mayor's. Since 2002, Trnava is divided into six urban districts, with area and further sub-units in parentheses: • Trnava-centre (2.15 km2; Staré mesto [Old Town], Špiglsál) • Trnava-west (20.60 km2; Prednádražie) • Trnava-south (8.03 km2; Tulipán, Linčianska) • Trnava-east (10.66 km2; Hlboká, Vozovka) • Trnava-north (22.33 km2; Kopánka, Zátvor, Vodáreň) • Modranka (7.76 km²)

However, compared to the present-day total area of 71.53 km2, the city used to have a larger area. Its height was in the 1970s, when it annexed villages of Modranka, Biely Kostol and Hrnčiarovce nad Parnou, reaching an area of almost 90 km². The latter two separated in 1993 and 1994, respectively.

Education Trnava is the seat of two universities: University of Trnava (present) with 7,159 students, including 446 doctoral students. and of the University of Ss. Cyril and Methodius, with 6,833 students. The city's system of primary education consists of nine public schools and one religious primary school with a total of 5,422 pupils enrolled in 2006. Secondary education is represented by four gymnasia with 2,099 students, 7 specialized high schools with 3,212 students, and 6 vocational schools with 3,697 students.

Transport: Road The city lies at the crossroads of two roads of international importance; from the Czech Republic to southern Slovakia and from Bratislava to northern Slovakia. The D1 motorway connects the city to Bratislava, Trenčín and Žilina and the R1 expressway connects it to Nitra. A part of a planned bypass is currently under construction.

Transport: Rail The city also has an important station on the Bratislava–Žilina railway, with two tracks from Sereď and Kúty (near the Czech border) ending in the city.

Transport: Air Although there is a small airstrip Letisko Boleráz to the north of the city, the closest international airports are in Bratislava and Vienna.

Local public transit The city also operates a public transport service, currently with 16 lines.

Parks • Ružový park • Janko Kráľ park • Bernolákov sad • Park of Belo IV • Park pri Kalvárií • Park SNP • Univerzitný parčík • Recreation zone Štrky • Trnava ponds.