Hungary was accidentally erased from a map and replaced with Romania. It happened in Italy, in a geography textbook that fourth graders learn from.
The map in which Hungary was replaced by the Italians with Romania. PHOTO: gyerkensz.hu
Hungarians are outraged after discovering their country has been “forgotten” from a map of Italy that also features other European countries. It is a textbook intended for fourth grade students in Italy.
The Hungarian website gyekserz.hu reported this error, noting that the map in the manual shows Romania instead of Hungary, so that Romania appears as a direct neighbor to Austria, Slovenia, Croatia and Serbia, writes Ziare.com.
“This omission, discovered on page 23 of the textbook in the ‘New Superheroes 2030’ series, was noticed by a student aged just 9, who brought the mistake to his teacher’s attention. His reaction was one of surprise, and the teacher promised to address and correct the error in his lessons. At the same time, the situation was reported to the publisher of the textbook, Lisciani Scuola, but so far no response has been received from him”the Hungarian website shows.
According to the quoted source, the publisher Lisciani Scuola, responsible for the “New Superheroes 2030” series, has not yet offered an official explanation of how this error occurred, nor when it will take the necessary measures.
The moment when the question of a union between Romania and Hungary was raised
Although the map is obviously wrong, there was a time in history when Romania and Hungary were about to unite. In 1919, less than a year after the Great Union, part of the Hungarian elite demanded union with Romania. The well-known Italian historian Stefano Bottoni explained, in an interview for “Adevărul”, why the project never came to life and what the Hungarians were really aiming for.
“It was a diplomatic step, and we know now, but I think even the contemporaries knew that it had little chance of being realized. The reality was imposed, so to speak, on the ground, when the Romanian Army entered Transylvania, in the fall and winter of 1918-1919, and created a totally different situation compared to what it was before. After the army entered, after the Romanian military administration imposed itself in Transylvania, it was absolutely impossible for anyone to imagine a step back from Bucharest. There was total chaos in Budapest too, with Karoly’s rule and after Bela Kun’s confrontations with the Bolsheviks. And we also have the diplomatic framework, powers like France and Italy being favorable to Romania, so neither Paris nor Rome had any reason to support such a proposal“, explained the well-known Italian historian.
