The Holy Right is the right hand remained intact of Stephen I. During the discord for the throne after the death of Saint Stephen, the chapter of Fehérvár was worried for that the dead body might be desecrated so that he made set out the body of the marble sarchopagus of the Basilica and hid it in to the graveyard. At this moment the mummified right hand was detached and carried to the treasury of the basilica. The custodian of the treasury, Merkur appropriated and hid it. In 1083, when the procedure to saint Stephen was passed off, Laszlo I had heard about the relic and visited Merkur on his domain in Bihar where he kept the relic, the king forgave him and founded the “Holy Right” abbey here to guard the relic of which the settlement Szentjobb (Holy Right – today it is in Romania) got its name.
During the second world war the Germans took away the relic with crown jewelleries to a cave in Salzburg. The American army pitched up and returned it to Hungary. On 20th August 1987., the Szent Jobb Chapel was consecrated in the Saint Stephen Basilica and the relic was set here. On the 950. anniversary of the death of Stephen, the Holy Right was carried around the country, it was presented in residences of the primacies and episcopates, and at Pannonhalma as well. From 1989, the procession has been organised every year on 20th August.
Budapest, Hercegprímás utca 7.
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