Szent István Bazilika

Next we headed to Szent István Bazilika (St Stephen’s Basilica), the largest Catholic Church in Budapest and home to the Holy Right Hand and the Holy Left Foot.

The Holy Right Hand is the miraculously mummified right hand of King St Stephen, first king of Hungary, crowned in 1000 AD.

The Holy Left Foot belongs to Ferenc Puskás, Hungary’s greatest ever footballer, who was buried here in 2006 after a state funeral.

The church was built over 50 years from 1851 to 1905, including the rebuilding of the dome which collapsed in 1858, causing much of the then completed building to be knocked down and re-built. It is said there was a long running Hungarian joke at the time that any jobs stalled by procrastination would be finished only when the church was finished.

After exploring the church we took the lift to the level of the roof and then climbed to the stairs to the viewing level some way above the internal dome but below the outer dome. The top of the dome is the same height as the Parliament dome, 96m tall, as a reference to the founding of Hungary in 896.

As you can see, the views were pretty good.

We then took the left back to the roof level and descended the stairs in order to also visit the Treasury halfway down.

It was then time for a Kürtőskalács (Chimney Cake), the official dessert of Hungary. H & S had theirs with ice cream.Read more