Our allies called up allies of their own
— The savage pagan bands known as Magyars
Who wander the wild steppes with no fixed home —
Unto this weakened, squabbling land of ours.
So Christians serve their brothers in the faith
By urging pagans to put them to death!
How much historical truth there is behind Štúr’s literary handling of the ancient Magyars is, of course, beside the point. As we have mentioned, in a Hungary where magyarisation was the axe lain at the root of Slovak nationhood, one of the ways in which Slovak identity is confirmed is by underscoring the fact of one not being a Magyar. And if the nineteenth century Magyars were, on the whole, unkindly disposed to the Slovaks, Štúr takes the occasion to project the present situation of Magyar-Slav relations on the past. Once
