Original title: Három régi felirat
Subtitle: To a Hungarian folk text, words on a Transylvanian mangle and the epitaph of a young German girl in a Hungarian village cemetery, for soprano and piano, in Hungarian and German
Dedication: "19 February, 1987: for Márta to our fourty years together"
Premiere location: Berlin
Premiere date: 1988.10.16.
Premiere performers: Adrienne Csengery (soprano); Zoltán Kocsis (piano)
Hungarian premiere date: 1993.03.16.
Language: Hungarian, German
Composition end date: 1987.02.11
Genre: Chamber Music with Voice
Instrumentation: soprano, piano
Duration (minutes): 7
Year of publication: 1992
Publisher: Editio Musica Budapest
Publication number: Z. 13378 – ISMN: M-080-13378-1

1. Flower (János Gugelweit scripsit, 1490)
2. Transylvanian Székely mangle, 1792 (In memoriam Endre Bálint)
3. On a cross in the Cemetery at Mecseknádasd (An epilogue to Ilona Bakó's Soulbird)

 

1 Flower (János Gugelweit scripsit, 1490)
Flower, know I must take leave of you.
In mourning, must I grieve for you.

2 Transylvanian Székely Mangle 1792
You who gave the master the first night,
Anna Cserei, you earthly mortal,
for which I, Gábor Móre, instead of the lamb-tithe,
gave him a clout on the head.
Now I sit heavy in the stocks at Kászonszék,
the pox on Lieutenant Görgényi –
carving this mangle in my misery.

3. On a cross in the cemetery at Mecseknádasd
Here rests in God
Theresia Hengl,
died on the 27th of March 1939
at the age of 29
In the veriest bloom of my young life
the fever devoured me.
So I must depart this life in my prime
out into the cold of the grave.
It is, God, your will,
and I am still.
These were her last words.
Rest gently in peace.

(Translated by Peter Sherwood)