ABSTRACT
Hungary's place in the medieval world, especially its status in relation to Western Europe, has been much debated in scholarship. Without reviewing them all, the example of some of the most influential statements concerning the nature of medieval Hungary suffices to show how their authors speak of two or three medieval Europes. Analysing the fortunes of 'pagans' in Hungary also raises the question of the applicability to medieval Hungary of the 'persecuting society' thesis. The analysis of medieval Hungary's status should not turn medieval regional differences into an explanation of the country's modern backwardness and peripheral position. It still needs to be remembered that 'the explanation of the more recent by the more remote has sometimes dominated our studies to the point of hypnosis'. Hungary was on the frontier of Latin Christendom from the moment of its creation as a Christian kingdom in the tenth–eleventh centuries until well into the modern era.
