title: Budapest

text: Budapest is among the 25 most visited cities in the world, the city welcoming more than 4.4 million international visitors each year, therefore the traditional and the congress tourism industry also deserve a mention, it contributes greatly to the city's economy. The capital being home to many convention centres and thousands of restaurants, bars, coffee houses and party places, besides the full assortment of hotels. In restaurants offerings can be found of the highest quality Michelin-starred restaurants, like Onyx, Costes, Tanti or Borkonyha. The city ranked as the most liveable city in Central and Eastern Europe on EIU's quality of life index in 2010.


title: Budapest

text: Budapest Stock Exchange, key institution of the publicly offered securities in Hungary and Central and Eastern Europe is situated in Budapest's CBD at Liberty Square. BSE also trades other securities such as government bonds and derivatives such as stock options. Large Hungarian multinational corporations headquartered in Budapest are listed on BSE, for instance the Fortune Global 500 firm MOL Group, the OTP Bank, FHB Bank, Gedeon Richter, Magyar Telekom, CIG Pannonia, Zwack Unicum and more.


title: Budapest

text: Nowadays nearly all branches of industry can be found in Budapest, there is no particularly special industry in the city's economy, but the financial centre role of the city is strong, nearly 40 major banks are presented in the city, also those like Bank of China, KDB Bank and Hanwha Bank, which is unique in the region.


title: Budapest

text: Also support the financial industry of Budapest, the firms of international banks and financial service providers, such as Citigroup, Morgan Stanley, GE Capital, Deutsche Bank, Sberbank, ING Group, Allianz, KBC Group, UniCredit and MSCI among others. Another particularly strong industry in the capital city is biotechnology and pharmaceutical industry, these are also traditionally strong in Budapest, through domestic companies, as Egis, Gedeon Richter, Chinoin and through international biotechnology corporations, like Pfizer, Teva, Novartis, Sanofi, who are also has R&D and production division here. Further high-tech industries, such as software development, engineering notable as well, the Nokia, Ericsson, Bosch, Microsoft, IBM employs thousands of engineers in research and development in the city. Game design also highly represented through headquarters of domestic Digital Reality, Black Hole and studio of Crytek or Gameloft. Beyond the above, there are regional headquarters of global firms, such as Alcoa, General Motors, General Electric, ExxonMobil, BP, BT, Flextronics, Panasonic, Huawei, Knorr-Bremse, Liberty Global, Tata Consultancy, Aegon, WizzAir, TriGránit, MVM Group, Graphisoft, there is a base for Nissan CEE, Volvo, Saab, Ford, including but not limited to.


title: Budapest

text: As the capital of Hungary, Budapest is the seat of the country's national government. The President of Hungary resides at the Sándor Palace in the District I (Buda Castle District), while the office of the Hungarian Prime Minister is in the Carmelite Monastery in the Castle District. Government ministries are all located in various parts of the city, most of them are in the District V, Leopoldtown. The National Assembly is seated in the Hungarian Parliament, which also located in the District V. The President of the National Assembly, the third-highest public official in Hungary, is also seated in the largest building in the country, in the Hungarian Parliament.


title: Budapest

text: Hungary's highest courts are located in Budapest. The Curia (supreme court of Hungary), the highest court in the judicial order, which reviews criminal and civil cases, is located in the District V, Leopoldtown. Under the authority of its president it has three departments: criminal, civil and administrative-labour law departments. Each department has various chambers. The Curia guarantees the uniform application of law. The decisions of the Curia on uniform jurisdiction are binding for other courts.


title: Budapest

text: The second most important judicial authority, the National Judicial Council, is also housed in the District V, with the tasks of controlling the financial management of the judicial administration and the courts and giving an opinion on the practice of the president of the National Office for the Judiciary and the Curia deciding about the applications of judges and court leaders, among others.


title: Budapest

text: The Constitutional Court of Hungary is one of the highest level actors independent of the politics in the country. The Constitutional Court serves as the main body for the protection of the Constitution, its tasks being the review of the constitutionality of statutes. The Constitutional Court performs its tasks independently. With its own budget and its judges being elected by Parliament it does not constitute a part of the ordinary judicial system. The constitutional court passes on the constitutionality of laws, and there is no right of appeal on these decisions.


title: Budapest

text: Budapest hosts the main and regional headquarters of many international organizations as well, including United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations, European Institute of Innovation and Technology, European Police Academy, International Centre for Democratic Transition, Institute of International Education, International Labour Organization, International Organization for Migration, International Red Cross, Regional Environmental Center for Central and Eastern Europe, Danube Commission and even others. The city is also home to more than 100 embassies and representative bodies as an international political actor.


title: Budapest

text: "Environmental issues" have a high priority among Budapest's politics. Institutions such as the Regional Environmental Center for Central and Eastern Europe, located in Budapest, are very important assets.


title: Budapest

text: To decrease the use of cars and greenhouse gas emissions, the city has worked to improve public transportation, and nowadays the city has one of the highest mass transit usage in Europe. Budapest has one of the best public transport systems in Europe with an efficient network of buses, trolleys, trams and subway. Budapest has an above-average proportion of people commuting on public transport or walking and cycling for European cities.


title: Budapest

text: Riding on bike paths is one of the best ways to see Budapest – there are about of bicycle paths in the city, fitting into the EuroVelo system.


title: Budapest

text: "Crime" in Budapest is investigated by different bodies. United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime notes in their 2011 Global Study on Homicide that, according to criminal justice sources, the homicide rate in Hungary, calculated based on UN population estimates, was 1.4 in 2009, compared to Canada's rate of 1.8 that same year.


title: Budapest

text: The homicide rate in Budapest is below the EU capital cities' average according to WHO also. However, organised crime is associated with the city, the Institute of Defence in a UN study named Budapest as one of the "global epicentres" of illegal pornography, money laundering and contraband tobacco, and also a negotiation center for international crime group leaders.


title: Budapest

text: Budapest has been a metropolitan municipality with a mayor-council form of government since its consolidation in 1873, but Budapest also holds a special status as a county-level government, and also special within that, as holds a capital-city territory status. In Budapest, the central government is responsible for the urban planning, statutory planning, public transport, housing, waste management, municipal taxes, correctional institutions, libraries, public safety, recreational facilities, among others. The Mayor is responsible for all city services, police and fire protection, enforcement of all city and state laws within the city, and administration of public property and most public agencies. Besides, each of Budapest' twenty-three districts has its own town hall and a directly elected council and the directly elected mayor of district.


title: Budapest

text: The Mayor of Budapest is Gergely Karácsony who was elected on 13 October 2019. The mayor and members of General Assembly are elected to five-year terms.


title: Budapest

text: The Budapest General Assembly is a unicameral body consisting of 33 members, which consist of the 23 mayors of the districts, 9 from the electoral lists of political parties, plus Mayor of Budapest (the Mayor is elected directly). Each term for the mayor and assembly members lasts five years. Submitting the budget of Budapest is the responsibility of the Mayor and the deputy-mayor in charge of finance. The latest, 2014 budget was approved with 18 supporting votes from ruling Fidesz and 14 votes against by the opposition lawmakers.


title: Budapest

text: Budapest is widely known for its well-kept pre-war cityscape, with a great variety of streets and landmarks in classical architecture.


title: Budapest

text: The most well-known sight of the capital is the neo-Gothic Parliament, the biggest building in Hungary with its length, also holding (since 2001) the Hungarian Crown Jewels.


title: Budapest

text: Saint Stephen's Basilica is the most important religious building of the city, where the Holy Right Hand of Hungary's first king, Saint Stephen is on display as well.


title: Budapest

text: The Hungarian cuisine and café culture can be seen and tasted in a lot of places, like Gerbeaud Café, the "Százéves", "Biarritz", "Fortuna", "Alabárdos", "Arany Szarvas", "Kárpátia" and the world-famous restaurants and beer bars.


title: Budapest

text: There are Roman remains at the Aquincum Museum, and historic furniture at the Nagytétény Castle Museum, just 2 out of 223 museums in Budapest. Another historical museum is the House of Terror, hosted in the building that was the venue of the Nazi Headquarters. The Castle Hill, the River Danube embankments and the whole of Andrássy út have been officially recognized as UNESCO World Heritage Sites.


title: Budapest

text: Castle Hill and the Castle District; there are three churches here, six museums, and a host of interesting buildings, streets and squares. The former Royal Palace is one of the symbols of Hungary – and has been the scene of battles and wars ever since the 13th century. Nowadays it houses two museums and the National Széchenyi Library. The nearby Sándor Palace contains the offices and official residence of the President of Hungary. The seven-hundred-year-old Matthias Church is one of the jewels of Budapest, it is in neo-Gothic style, decorated with coloured shingles and elegant pinnacles. Next to it is an equestrian statue of the first king of Hungary, King Saint Stephen, and behind that is the Fisherman's Bastion, built in 1905 by the architect Frigyes Schulek, the Fishermen's Bastions owes its name to the namesake corporation that during the Middle Ages was responsible of the defence of this part of ramparts, from where opens out a panoramic view of the whole city. Statues of the Turul, the mythical guardian bird of Hungary, can be found in both the Castle District and the Twelfth District.


title: Budapest

text: In Pest, arguably the most important sight is Andrássy út. This Avenue is an elegant long tree-lined street that covers the distance from Deák Ferenc tér to the Heroes Square. This Avenue overlooks many important sites. It is a UNESCO World Heritage Site. As far as Kodály körönd and Oktogon both sides are lined with large shops and flats built close together. Between there and Heroes' Square the houses are detached and altogether grander. Under the whole runs continental Europe's oldest Underground railway, most of whose stations retain their original appearance. Heroes' Square is dominated by the Millenary Monument, with the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier in front. To the sides are the Museum of Fine Arts and the Kunsthalle Budapest, and behind City Park opens out, with Vajdahunyad Castle. One of the jewels of Andrássy út is the Hungarian State Opera House. Statue Park, a theme park with striking statues of the Communist era, is located just outside the main city and is accessible by public transport.


title: Budapest

text: The Dohány Street Synagogue is the largest synagogue in Europe, and the second largest active synagogue in the world. The synagogue is located in the Jewish district taking up several blocks in central Budapest bordered by Király utca, Wesselényi utca, Grand Boulevard and Bajcsy Zsilinszky road. It was built in moorish revival style in 1859 and has a seating capacity of 3,000. Adjacent to it is a sculpture reproducing a weeping willow tree in steel to commemorate the Hungarian victims of the Holocaust.


title: Budapest

text: The city is also home to the largest medicinal bath in Europe (Széchenyi Medicinal Bath) and the third largest Parliament building in the world, once the largest in the world. Other attractions are the bridges of the capital. Seven bridges provide crossings over the Danube, and from north to south are: the Árpád Bridge (built in 1950 at the north of Margaret Island); the Margaret Bridge (built in 1901, destroyed during the war by an explosion and then rebuilt in 1948); the Chain Bridge (built in 1849, destroyed during World War II and then rebuilt in 1949); the Elisabeth Bridge (completed in 1903 and dedicated to the murdered Queen Elisabeth, it was destroyed by the Germans during the war and replaced with a new bridge in 1964); the Liberty Bridge (opened in 1896 and rebuilt in 1989 in Art Nouveau style); the Petőfi Bridge (completed in 1937, destroyed during the war and rebuilt in 1952); the Rákóczi Bridge (completed in 1995). Most remarkable for their beauty are the Margaret Bridge, the Chain Bridge and the Liberty Bridge. The world's largest panorama photograph was created in (and of) Budapest in 2010.


title: Budapest

text: Tourists visiting Budapest can receive free maps and information from the nonprofit Budapest Festival and Tourism Center at its info-points. The info centers also offer the Budapest Card which allows free public transit and discounts for several museums, restaurants and other places of interest. Cards are available for 24-, 48- or 72-hour durations. The city is also well known for its ruin bars both day and night.


title: Budapest

text: In Budapest there are many smaller and larger squares, the most significant of which are Heroes' Square, Kossuth Square, Liberty Square, St. Stephen's Square, Ferenc Deák Square, Vörösmarty Square, Erzsébet Square, St. George's Square and Széchenyi István Square. The Heroes' Square at the end of Andrássy Avenue is the largest and most influential square in the capital, with the Millennium Monument in the center, and the Museum of Fine Arts and The Hall of Art. Kossuth Square is a symbolic place of the Hungarian statehood, the Hungarian Parliament Building, the Palace of Justice and the Ministry of Agriculture. The Liberty Square is located in the Belváros-Lipótváros District (Inner City District), as one of Budapest's most beautiful squares. There are buildings such as the Hungarian National Bank, the embassy of the United States, the Stock Exchange Palace, as well as numerous statues and monuments such as the Soviet War Memorial, the Statue of Ronald Reagan or the controversial Monument to the victims of the German occupation. In the St. Stephen's Square is the St. Stephen's Basilica, the square is connected by a walking street, the Zrínyi Street, to the Széchenyi István Square at the foot of The Chain Bridge. The Hungarian Academy of Sciences and the Gresham Palace and the Ministry of Interior are also located here. Deák Ferenc Square is a central square of the capital, a major transport hub, where three Budapest subways meet. Here is the oldest and best known Evangelical Church of Budapest, the Deák Ferenc Square Lutheran Church. Vörösmarty Square is located in Belváros-Lipótváros District (Inner City District) behind the Vigadó of Pest as one of the endpoints of Váci Street. The Confectionery Gerbeaud is here, and the annual Christmas Fair is held in the Square, as well as is the centre of the Holiday Book Week.


title: Budapest

text: Budapest has many municipal parks and most have playgrounds for children and seasonal activities like skating in the winter and boating in the summer. Access from the city center is quick and easy with the Millennium Underground. Budapest has a complex park system, with various lands operated by the Budapest City Gardening Ltd.


title: Budapest

text: The wealth of greenspace afforded by Budapest's parks is further augmented by a network of open spaces containing forest, streams, and lakes that are set aside as natural areas which lie not far from the inner city, including the Budapest Zoo and Botanical Garden (established in 1866) in the City Park.


title: Budapest

text: The most notable and popular parks in Budapest are the City Park which was established in 1751 (302 acres) along with Andrássy Avenue, the Margaret Island in the Danube (), the People's Park, the Római Part, and the Kopaszi Dam.


title: Budapest

text: The Buda Hills also offer a variety of outdoor activities and views. A place frequented by locals is Normafa, offering activities for all seasons. With a modest ski run, it is also used by skiers and snow boarders – if there is enough snowfall in winter.


title: Budapest

text: The () is a reef in the Danube close to the shore under the Gellért Hill. It is only exposed during drought periods when the river level is very low.


title: Budapest

text: Just outside the city boundary to the north lies the large Szentendre Island () and the much smaller Lupa Island ().


title: Budapest

text: One of the reasons the Romans first colonised the area immediately to the west of the River Danube and established their regional capital at Aquincum (now part of Óbuda, in northern Budapest) is so that they could use and enjoy the thermal springs. There are still ruins visible today of the enormous baths that were built during that period. The new baths that were constructed during the Turkish period (1541–1686) served both bathing and medicinal purposes, and some of these are still in use to this day.


title: Budapest

text: Budapest gained its reputation as a city of spas in the 1920s, following the first realisation of the economic potential of the thermal waters in drawing in visitors. Indeed, in 1934 Budapest was officially ranked as a "City of Spas". Today, the baths are mostly frequented by the older generation, as, with the exception of the "Magic Bath" and "Cinetrip" water discos, young people tend to prefer the lidos which are open in the summer.


title: Budapest

text: Construction of the Király Baths started in 1565, and most of the present-day building dates from the Turkish period, including most notably the fine cupola-topped pool.


title: Budapest

text: The Rudas Baths are centrally placed – in the narrow strip of land between Gellért Hill and the River Danube – and also an outstanding example of architecture dating from the Turkish period. The central feature is an octagonal pool over which light shines from a diameter cupola, supported by eight pillars.


title: Budapest

text: The Gellért Baths and Hotel were built in 1918, although there had once been Turkish baths on the site, and in the Middle Ages a hospital. In 1927, the Baths were extended to include the wave pool, and the effervescent bath was added in 1934. The well-preserved Art Nouveau interior includes colourful mosaics, marble columns, stained glass windows and statues.


title: Budapest

text: The Lukács Baths are also in Buda and are also Turkish in origin, although they were only revived at the end of the 19th century. This was also when the spa and treatment centre were founded. There is still something of an atmosphere of fin-de-siècle about the place, and all around the inner courtyard there are marble tablets recalling the thanks of patrons who were cured there. Since the 1950s it has been regarded as a centre for intellectuals and artists.


title: Budapest

text: The Széchenyi Baths are one of the largest bathing complexes in all Europe, and the only "old" medicinal baths to be found in the Pest side of the city. The indoor medicinal baths date from 1913 and the outdoor pools from 1927. There is an atmosphere of grandeur about the whole place with the bright, largest pools resembling aspects associated with Roman baths, the smaller bath tubs reminding one of the bathing culture of the Greeks, and the saunas and diving pools borrowed from traditions emanating in northern Europe. The three outdoor pools (one of which is a fun pool) are open all year, including winter. Indoors there are over ten separate pools, and a whole host of medical treatments is also available. The Szécheny Baths are built in modern Renaissance style.


title: Budapest

text: Budapest is served by Budapest Ferenc Liszt International Airport (BUD) (named after Franz Liszt, the notable Hungarian composer), one of the busiest airports in Central and Eastern Europe, located east-southeast of the centre of Budapest, in the District XVIII. The airport offers international connections among all major European cities, and also to North America, Africa, Asia and the Middle East.


title: Budapest

text: As Hungary's busiest airport, it handles nearly all of the country's air passenger traffic. Budapest Liszt Ferenc handled around 250 scheduled flights daily in 2013, and an ever-rising number of charters. London, Brussels, Frankfurt, Munich, Paris, and Amsterdam are the busiest international connections respectively, while Toronto, Montreal, Dubai, Doha and Alicante are the most unusual in the region.


title: Budapest

text: Today the airport serves as a base for Ryanair, Wizz Air, Budapest Aircraft Service, CityLine Hungary, Farnair Hungary and Travel Service Hungary among others. The airport is accessible via public transportation from the city centre by the Metro line 3 and then the airport bus No. 200E.


title: Budapest

text: As part of a strategic development plan, €561 million have been spent on expanding and modernising the airport infrastructure until December 2012. Most of these improvements are already completed, the postponed ones are the new cargo area and new piers for terminal 2A and 2B, but these development are on standby also, and will start immediately, when the airport traffic will reach the appropriate level.


title: Budapest

text: SkyCourt, the newest, state-of-the-art building between the 2A and 2B terminals with 5 levels. Passenger safety checks were moved here along with new baggage classifiers and the new Malév and SkyTeam business lounges, as well as the first MasterCard lounge in Europe.


title: Budapest

text: Public transit in Budapest is provided by the Centre for Budapest Transport (BKK, "Budapesti Közlekedési Központ"), one of the largest transportation authorities in Europe. BKK operates 4 metro lines (including the historic Line 1, the oldest underground railway in continental Europe), 5 suburban railway lines, 33 tram lines, 15 trolleybus lines, 264 bus lines (including 40 night routes), 4 boat services, and "BuBi", a smart bicycle sharing network. On an average weekday, BKK lines transports 3.9 million riders; in 2011, it handled a total of 1.4 billion passengers. In 2014, the 65% of the passenger traffic in Budapest was by public transport and 35% by car. The aim is 80%–20% by 2030 in accordance with the strategy of BKK.


title: Budapest

text: The development of complex intelligent transportation system in the city is advancing; the application of smart traffic lights is widespread, they are GPS and computer controlled and give priority to the GPS connected public transport vehicles automatically, as well as the traffic is measured and analyzed on the roads and car drivers informed about the expected travel time and traffic by intelligent displays (EasyWay project). Public transport users are immediately notified of any changes in public transport online, on smartphones and on PIDS displays, as well car drivers can keep track of changes in traffic and road management in real-time online and on smartphones through the "BKK Info". As well all vehicles can be followed online and on smartphones in real-time throughout the city with the "Futár" PIDS system, while the continuous introducing of integrated e-ticket system will help the measurement of passenger numbers on each line and the intelligent control of service frequency.


title: Budapest

text: The development of "Futár", the citywide real-time passenger information system and real-time route planner is finished already and now all of the public transport vehicle is connected via satellite system. The real-time information of trams, buses and trolleybuses are available for both the operators in the control room and for all the passengers in all stops on smartphone and on city street displays.


title: Budapest

text: The implementation of latest generation automated fare collection and e-ticket system with NFC compatibility and reusable contactless smart cards for making electronic payments in online and offline systems in Budapest is started in 2014, the project is implemented and operated by the operator of Hong Kong Octopus card jointly with one of the leading European companies of e-ticket and automated fare collection, Scheidt & Bachmann. The deployment of 300 new digital contactless ticket vending machine will be finished by the end of 2014 in harmonization with the e-ticket system.


title: Budapest

text: The tram lines no. 4 and 6 are the busiest city tram lines in the world, with one of the world's longest trams (54-metre long Siemens Combino) running at 2–3-minute intervals at peak time and 4–5 minutes off-peak. Day services are usually from 4am until between 11pm and 0:30am. Hungarian State Railways operates an extensive network of commuter rail services, their importance in the suburban commuter passenger traffic is significant, but in travel within the city is limited.


title: Budapest

text: The organiser of public transport in Budapest is the municipal corporation "Centre for Budapest Transport" (Budapesti Közlekedési Központ – BKK), that is responsible for planning and organising network and services, planning and developing tariff concepts, attending to public service procurer duties, managing public service contracts, operating controlling and monitoring systems, setting and monitoring service level agreements related to public transport, attending to customer service duties, selling and monitoring tickets and passes, attending to integrated passenger information duties, unified Budapest-centric traffic control within public transport, attending to duties related to river navigation, plus the management of Budapest roads, operating taxi stations, unified control of bicycle traffic development in the capital, preparing parking strategy and developing an operational concept, preparation of road traffic management, developing an optimal traffic management system, organising and co-ordinating road reconstruction and more, in short, everything which is related to transport in the city.


title: Budapest

text: Budapest is the most important Hungarian road terminus, all of the major highways and railways end within the city limits. The road system in the city is designed in a similar manner to that of Paris, with several ring roads, and avenues radiating out from the center. Ring road M0 around Budapest is nearly completed, with only one section missing on the west side due to local disputes. The ring road is in length, and once finished it will be of highway in length.


title: Budapest

text: The city is a vital traffic hub because all major European roads and European railway lines lead to Budapest. The Danube was and is still today an important water-way and this region in the centre of the Carpathian Basin lies at the cross-roads of trade routes.


title: Budapest

text: Hungarian main line railways are operated by Hungarian State Railways. There are three main railway station in Budapest, Keleti ("Eastern"), Nyugati ("Western") and Déli ("Southern"), operating both domestic and international rail services. Budapest is one of the main stops of the on its Central and Eastern European route. There is also a suburban rail service in and around Budapest, three lines of which are operated under the name HÉV.


title: Budapest

text: The river Danube flows through Budapest on its way from (Germany) to the Black Sea. The river is easily navigable and so Budapest historically has a major commercial port at Csepel District and at New Pest District also. The Pest side is also a famous port place with international shipping ports for cargo and for passenger ships. In the summer months, a scheduled hydrofoil service operates on the Danube connecting the city to Vienna.


title: Budapest

text: BKK (through the operator BKV) also provides public transport with boat service within the borders of the city. Two routes, marked D11 and D12, connect the two banks with Margaret Island and Óbuda Island, from Rómaifürdő (Buda side, north to Óbuda Island) or Árpád Bridge (Pest side) to Rákóczi Bridge, with a total of 18 stops, while route D2 circulates in the downtown. Line D14 is a ferry service, connecting Királyerdő on the Csepel Island with Molnár Island on the Pest side, south to the city centre. In addition, several companies provides sightseeing boat trips and also an amphibious vehicle (bus and boat) operates constantly.


title: Budapest

text: Water quality in Budapest harbours improved dramatically in the recent years, treatment facilities processed 100% of generated sewage in 2010. Budapesters regularly kayak, canoe, jet-ski and sail on the Danube, which has continuously become a major recreational site for the city.


title: Budapest

text: Special vehicles in Budapest, besides metros, include suburban rails, trams and boats. There are a couple of less common vehicles in Budapest, like the trolleybus on several lines in Pest, the Castle Hill Funicular between the Chain Bridge and Buda Castle, the cyclecar for rent in Margaret Island, the chairlift, the Budapest Cog-wheel Railway and children's railway. The latter three vehicles run among Buda hills.


title: Budapest

text: The culture of Budapest is reflected by Budapest's size and variety. Most Hungarian cultural movements first emerged in the city. Budapest is an important center for music, film, theatre, dance and visual art. Artists have been drawn into the city by opportunity, as the city government funds the arts with adequate financial resources.


title: Budapest

text: Budapest was named "City of Design" in December 2015 and has been a member of UNESCO Creative Cities Network since then.


title: Budapest

text: Budapest is packed with museums and galleries. The city glories in 223 museums and galleries, which presents several memories, next to the Hungarian ones as well those of universal and European culture and science. Here are the greatest examples among them: the Hungarian National Museum, the Hungarian National Gallery, the Museum of Fine Arts (where can see the pictures of Hungarian painters, like Victor Vasarely, Mihály Munkácsy and a great collection about Italian art, Dutch art, Spanish art and British art from before the 19th century and French art, British art, German art, Austrian art after the 19th century), the House of Terror, the Budapest Historical Museum, the Aquincum Museum, the Semmelweis Museum of Medical History, the Memento Park, Museum of Applied Arts and the contemporary arts exhibition Palace of Arts Budapest. In Budapest there are 837 monuments, which represent the most of the European artistic style. The classical and unique Hungarian Art Nouveau buildings are prominent.


title: Budapest

text: A lot of libraries have unique collections in Budapest, such as the National Széchényi Library, which keeps historical relics from the age before the printing of books. The Metropolitan Szabó Ervin Library plays an important role in the general education of the capital's population. Other libraries: The Library of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences, Eötvös University Library, the Parliamentary Library, Library of the Hungarian Central Statistical Office and the National Library of Foreign Literature.


title: Budapest

text: In Budapest there are forty theatres, seven concert halls and an opera house. Outdoor festivals, concerts and lectures enrich the cultural offer of summer, which are often held in historical buildings. The largest theatre facilities are the Budapest Operetta and Musical Theatre, the József Attila Theatre, the Katona József Theatre, the Madách Theatre, the Hungarian State Opera House, the National Theatre, the Vigadó Concert Hall, Radnóti Miklós Theatre, the Comedy Theatre and the Palace of Arts, known as "MUPA". The Budapest Opera Ball is an annual Hungarian society event taking place in the building of the Budapest Opera ("Operaház") on the last Saturday of the carnival season, usually late February.


title: Budapest

text: There are 11 casinos in Hungary (11 is the maximum number of casinos allowed by law), and 5 of them are located in the capital. All 5 of these casinos are owned by LVC Diamond Játékkaszinó Üzemeltető Kft, the gambling company of late Vajna András (better known as Andy Vajna). The biggest casino in Budapest and in all of Hungary is the Las Vegas Casino Corvin sétány.


title: Budapest

text: Several annual festivals take place in Budapest. The Sziget Festival is one of the largest outdoor music festival in Europe. The Budapest Spring Festival includes concerts at several venues across the city. The Café Budapest Contemporary Arts Festival (formerly the Budapest Autumn Festival) brings free music, dance, art, and other cultural events to the streets of the city. The Budapest Wine Festival and Budapest Pálinka Festival, occurring each May, are gastronomy festivals focusing on culinary pleasures. The Budapest Pride (or Budapest Pride Film and Cultural Festival) occurs annually across the city, and usually involves a parade on the Andrássy Avenue. Other festivals include the Budapest Fringe Festival, which brings more than 500 artists in about 50 shows to produce a wide range of works in alternative theatre, dance, music and comedy outside the mainstream. The LOW Festival is a multidisciplinary contemporary cultural festival held in Hungary in the cities Budapest and Pécs from February until March; the name of the festival alludes to the Low Countries, the region encompassing the Netherlands and Flanders. The Budapest Jewish Summer Festival, in late August, is one of the largest in Europe.


title: Budapest

text: There are many symphony orchestras in Budapest, with the Budapest Philharmonic Orchestra being the preeminent one. It was founded in 1853 by Ferenc Erkel and still presents regular concerts in the Hungarian State Opera House and National Theatre. Budapest also has one of the more active jazz scenes in Central Europe.


title: Budapest

text: The dance tradition of the Carpathian Basin is a unique area of the European dance culture, which is also a special transition between the Balkans and Western Europe regions. The city is home to several authentic Hungarian folk dance ensembles which range from small ensembles to professional troupes. Budapest is one of the few cities in the world with a high school for learning folk dance.


title: Budapest

text: Budapest is home to a fashion week twice a year, where the city's fashion designers and houses present their collections and provide a meeting place for the fashion industry representatives. Budapest Fashion Week additionally a place for designers from other countries may present their collections in Budapest. Hungarian models, like Barbara Palvin, Enikő Mihalik, Diána Mészáros, Viktória Vámosi usually appearing at these events along international participants.


title: Budapest

text: Fashion brands like Zara, H&M, Mango, ESPRIT, Douglas AG, Lacoste, Nike and other retail fashion brands are common across the city's shopping malls and on the streets.


title: Budapest

text: Major luxury fashion brands such as Roberto Cavalli, Dolce & Gabbana, Gucci, Versace, Ferragamo, Moschino, Prada and Hugo Boss, can be found among the city's most prestigious shopping streets, the Fashion Street, Váci Street and Andrássy Avenue in Budapest's main upscale fashion district, the Leopoldtown.


title: Budapest

text: Budapest is a prominent location for the Hungarian entertainment industry, with many films, television series, books, and other media set there. Budapest is the largest centre for film and television production in Hungary. In 2011, it employed more than 50,000 people and generated 63.9% of revenues of the media industry in the country.


title: Budapest

text: Budapest is the media centre of Hungary, and the location of the main headquarters of Hungarian Television and other local and national TV and radio stations, such as M1, M2, Duna TV, Duna World, RTL Klub, TV2 (Hungary), Euronews, Comedy Central, MTV Hungary, VIVA Hungary, Viasat 3, Cool TV, and Pro4, and politics and news channels such as Hír TV, ATV, and Echo TV. Documentary channels include Discovery Channel, Discovery Science, Discovery World, National Geographic Channel, Nat Geo Wild, Spektrum, and BBC Entertainment. This is less than a quarter of the channels broadcast from Budapest; for the whole picture see Television in Hungary.


title: Budapest

text: In 2012, there were 7.2 million internet users in Hungary (72% of the population). and there were 2.3 million subscriptions for mobile broadband.


title: Budapest

text: In the modern age, Budapest developed its own peculiar cuisine, based on products of the nearby region, such as lamb, pork and vegetables special to the region. Modern Hungarian cuisine is a synthesis of ancient Asiatic components mixed with French, Germanic, Italian, and Slavic elements. The food of Hungary can be considered a melting pot of the continent, with a culinary base formed from its own, original Magyar cuisine. Considerable numbers of Saxons, Armenians, Italians, Jews and Serbs settled in the Hungarian basin and in Transylvania, also contributing with different new dishes. Elements of ancient Turkish cuisine were adopted during the Ottoman era, in the form of sweets (for example different nougats, like white nougat called "törökméz"), quince ("birsalma"), Turkish delight, Turkish coffee or rice dishes like pilaf, meat and vegetable dishes like the eggplant, used in eggplant salads and appetizers, stuffed peppers and stuffed cabbage called "töltött káposzta". Hungarian cuisine was influenced by Austrian cuisine under the Austro-Hungarian Empire, dishes and methods of food preparation have often been borrowed from Austrian cuisine, and vice versa.


title: Budapest

text: Budapest restaurants reflect diversity, with menus carrying traditional regional cuisine, fusions of various culinary influences, or innovating in the leading edge of new techniques. Budapest' food shops also have a solid reputation for supplying quality specialised culinary products and supplies, reputations that are often built up over generations. These include many shops, such as Café Gerbeaud, one of the greatest and most traditional coffeehouses in Europe, or the Gundel restaurant and gastro shop in the City Park.


title: Budapest

text: Foodies can also find the highest quality foods served in several Michelin-starred restaurants, like Onyx, Costes, Borkonyha or Tanti.


title: Budapest

text: The 1906 novel "The Paul Street Boys", the 1937 novel "Journey by Moonlight", the 1957 book "The Bridge at Andau", the 1975 novel "Fateless", the 1977 novel "The End of a Family Story", the 1986 book "Between the Woods and the Water", the 1992 novel "Under the Frog", the 1987 novel "The Door", the 2002 novel "Prague", the 2003 book "Budapeste", the 2004 novel "Ballad of the Whisky Robber", the 2005 novels "Parallel Stories" and "The Historian", the 2012 novel "Budapest Noir" are set, amongst others, partly or entirely in Budapest. Some of the better known feature films set in Budapest are "Kontroll", "The District!", "Gloomy Sunday", "Sunshine", "An American Rhapsody", "As You Desire Me", "The Good Fairy", "Hanna's War", "The Journey", "Ladies in Love", "Music Box", "The Shop Around the Corner", "Zoo in Budapest", "Underworld", "" and Spy. "The Grand Budapest Hotel" (2014) is a Wes Anderson film. It was filmed in Germany, and set in the fictional Republic of Zubrowka, which is in the alpine mountains of Hungary.


title: Budapest

text: Budapest hosted many global sporting events in the past, among others the 1994 IAAF World Cross Country Championships, 1997 World Amateur Boxing Championships, 2000 World Fencing Championships, 2001 World Allround Speed Skating Championships, Bandy World Championship 2004, 2008 World Interuniversity Games, 2008 World Modern Pentathlon Championships, 2010 ITU World Championship Series, 2011 IIHF World Championship, 2012 European Speed Skating Championships, 2013 World Fencing Championships, 2013 World Wrestling Championships, 2014 World Masters Athletics Championships, 2017 World Aquatics Championships, and 2017 World Judo Championships, only in the last two-decade. Besides these, Budapest was the home of many European-level tournaments, like 2006 European Aquatics Championships, 2010 European Aquatics Championships, 2010 UEFA Futsal Championship, 2013 European Judo Championships, 2013 European Karate Championships and will be the host of 2023 World Championships in Athletics and 4 matches in the UEFA Euro 2020, which will be held in the 67,215-seat new multi-purpose Puskás Ferenc Stadium, to mention a few.


title: Budapest

text: In 2015, the Assembly of the Hungarian Olympic Committee and the Assembly of Budapest decided to bid for the 2024 Summer Olympics. Budapest has lost several bids to host the games, in 1916, 1920, 1936, 1944, and 1960 to Berlin, Antwerp, London, and Rome, respectively. The Hungarian Parliament also voted to support the bid on 28 January 2016, later Budapest City Council approved list of venues and Budapest became an official candidate for the 2024 Summer Olympic Games. However, they have recently withdrawn and only Paris and Los Angeles remain as candidates for the 2024 Olympics.


title: Budapest

text: Numerous Olympic, World, and European Championship winners and medalists reside in the city, which follows from Hungary's 8th place among all the nations of the world in the All-time Olympic Games medal table.


title: Budapest

text: Hungarians have always been avid sports people: during the history of the Summer Olympic Games, Hungarians have brought home 476 medals, of which 167 are gold. The top events in which Hungarians have excelled are fencing, swimming, water polo, canoeing, wrestling and track & field sports. Beside classic sports, recreational modern sports such as bowling, pool billiard, darts, go-carting, wakeboarding and squash are very popular in Budapest, and extreme sports are also gaining ground. Furthermore, the Budapest Marathon and Budapest Half Marathon also attract many people every year. The city's largest football stadium is named after Ferenc Puskás, recognised as the top scorer of the 20th century and for whom FIFA's Puskás Award (Ballon d'Or) was named.


title: Budapest

text: One of Budapest's most popular sport is football and it has many Hungarian League football club, including in the top level Nemzeti Bajnokság I league, like Ferencvárosi TC , MTK Budapest FC , Újpest FC , Budapest Honvéd FC , Vasas SC , Csepel SC , Budapesti TC .


title: Budapest

text: The Hungarian Grand Prix in Formula One has been held at the Hungaroring just outside the city, a circuit which has FIA Grade 1 license. Since 1986, the race has been a round of the FIA Formula One World Championship. At the 2013 Hungarian Grand Prix, it was confirmed that Hungary will continue to host a Formula 1 race until 2021. The track was completely resurfaced for the first time in early 2016, and it was announced the Grand Prix's deal was extended for a further 5 years, until 2026.


title: Budapest

text: Budapest is home to two four-star UEFA stadiums: Puskás Aréna, Groupama Aréna, and two three-star UEFA stadiums: Hidegkuti Nándor Stadion and Bozsik Aréna.


title: Budapest

text: Budapest is home to over 35 higher education institutions, many of which are universities. Under the Bologna Process, many offered qualifications are recognised in countries across Europe. Medicine, dentistry, pharmaceuticals, veterinary programs, and engineering are among the most popular fields for foreigners to undertake in Budapest. Most universities in Budapest offer courses in English, as well as in other languages like German, French, and Dutch, aimed specifically at foreigners. Many students from other European countries spend one or two semesters in Budapest through the Erasmus Programme.


title: Budapest

text: Like Budapest, many of them are the most influential and largest cities of their country and region, most of them are the primate city and political, economical, cultural capital of their country.


title: Budapest

text: The Mayor of Budapest says the aim of improving sister city relationships is to allow and encourage a mutual exchange of information and experiences, as well as co-operation, in the areas of city management, education, culture, tourism, media and communication, trade and business development.


title: Budapest

text: Some of the city's districts are also twinned to small cities or districts of other big cities; for details see the article List of districts and towns in Budapest.


title: Frank Abagnale

text: Frank William Abagnale Jr. (; born April 27, 1948) is an American author and convicted felon. Abagnale targeted individuals and small businesses yet gained notoriety in the late 1970s by claiming a diverse range of victimless workplace frauds, many of which have since been placed in doubt. In 1980, Abagnale co-wrote his autobiography, "Catch Me If You Can", which built a narrative around these claimed victimless frauds. The book inspired the film of the same name directed by Steven Spielberg in 2002, in which Abagnale was portrayed by actor Leonardo DiCaprio. He has also written four other books. Abagnale runs Abagnale and Associates, a consulting firm.


title: Frank Abagnale

text: Abagnale claims to have worked as an assistant state attorney general in the U.S. state of Louisiana, a hospital physician in Georgia, and impersonated a Pan American World Airways pilot who logged over two million air miles by deadheading. The veracity of most of Abagnale's claims has been questioned and ongoing inquiry continue to confirm that they were made up. In 2002, Abagnale admitted on his website that some facts had been over-dramatized or exaggerated, though he was not specific about what was exaggerated or omitted about his life. In 2020, journalist Alan C. Logan provided evidence he claims proves the majority of Abagnale's story had been invented or at best exaggerated. The public records obtained by Logan have since been independently verified by journalist Javier Leiva.


title: Frank Abagnale

text: Frank William Abagnale Jr. was born in the Bronx, New York City, on April 27, 1948, to an Algerian-American mother who died in November, 2014, and an Italian-American father who died in March, 1972. He spent his early life in Bronxville, New York. His parents separated when he was 12 and divorced when he was 15 years old. After the divorce, Abagnale moved with his father, and his new stepmother, to Mount Vernon, New York.


title: Frank Abagnale

text: Abagnale claims his first victim was his father, who gave him a gasoline credit card and a truck and was ultimately liable for a bill amounting to $3,400. Abagnale was only 15 at the time. In his autobiography, Abagnale says, because of this crime, he was sent to a reform school in Westchester County, New York (fitting the description of the Lincolndale Agricultural School) run by Catholic Charities USA. In numerous interviews Abagnale has claimed he attended an elite Catholic private school in Westchester, NY, Iona Preparatory School, through the tenth grade at age 16 in 1964. However, Abagnale is not mentioned by name, nor do any photographs of him appear in the Iona Preparatory School yearbooks from the time he ostensibly attended. Moreover, no alumni recall Abagnale ever attending the high school.


title: Frank Abagnale

text: In December 1964, he enlisted in the United States Navy at the age of 16. He was discharged after less than three months, and was released on February 18, 1965. Less than two weeks after his release, Abagnale was arrested for petit larceny in Mount Vernon on February 26, 1965. The following month, in March 1965, Abagnale identified himself as a Scarsdale, New York police officer and entered the apartment of a Mount Vernon, New York resident claiming that he was investigating her teenage daughter. Suspicious, the victim called the Mount Vernon police who found Abagnale with a toy gun and a paper police badge. Abagnale was arrested and booked on a vagrancy charge after being identified in a lineup by the victim. The following day Abagnale was ordered by the court to be committed to Grasslands psychiatric institute, in Westchester Country, for observation.


title: Frank Abagnale

text: In June 1965, the Federal Bureau of Investigation arrested Abagnale in Eureka, California for car theft after he stole a Ford Mustang from one of his father's neighbors. Abagnale was pictured in the local newspaper, seated in a car, being questioned by special agent Richard Miller of the FBI. He had financed his cross-country trip from New York to California with blank checks stolen from a family business located on the Bronx River Parkway. Abagnale was also charged with impersonating a US customs official, although this charge was subsequently dropped. On June 2, 1965, this stolen car case was transferred to the Southern District of New York.


title: Frank Abagnale

text: After being released into the custody of his father to face the stolen car charges, 17-year-old Abagnale decided to impersonate a pilot. He obtained a uniform at a Manhattan uniform company and on July 7th, 1965, informed local media that he was a graduate of the American Airlines pilot school in Fort Worth, Texas; however, he was arrested for theft of checks in Tuckahoe, New York days later. Abagnale was sentenced to three years at the Great Meadow Prison in Comstock, New York for these stolen checks. After serving only two years of his sentence, he was released into the custody of his mother. However, he broke the terms of his parole with a stolen car conviction in Boston, Massachusetts, and was returned to Great Meadow for one year.


title: Frank Abagnale

text: After his release on December 24, 1968, twenty-year-old Abagnale disguised himself as a TWA pilot and moved to Baton Rouge, Louisiana, where he talked his way into the house of a local music teacher, whose daughter was a Delta Air Lines stewardess he had met in New York. In Baton Rouge, Abagnale also befriended a local minister, claimed he had a master's degree in social work from Ithaca College, and sought work with vulnerable youth with intellectual and developmental disabilities. The reverend introduced him to Louisiana State University faculty, who determined he was an "obvious phony". The reverend, after Abagnale told him he was a furloughed TWA pilot, became suspicious and called the airline which informed him that Abagnale was a fraud. The reverend notified the Baton Rouge Police Department, and Abagnale was arrested on February 14, 1969, initially on vagrancy charges. Upon his arrest, he was found to have illegally driven his Florida rental car out of state and to possess falsified airline employee identification. The following day, detectives determined that Abagnale had stolen blank checks from his host family and a local business in Baton Rouge, and he was subsequently charged with theft and forgery. Unable to make bail, he was convicted on June 2, 1969, and was sentenced to 12 years of supervised probation, but he soon fled Louisiana for Europe.


title: Frank Abagnale

text: Two weeks after the Louisiana bench warrant was issued, Abagnale was arrested in Montpellier, France, in September 1969. He had stolen an automobile and defrauded two local families in Klippan, Sweden. He was sentenced to four months for theft in France; however, he served only three months in Perpignan's prison.


title: Frank Abagnale

text: He was then extradited to Sweden where he was convicted of gross fraud by forgery. He served two months in a Malmö prison, was banned from Sweden for eight years, and was required to recompense his Swedish victims (which, they say, he never did). Abagnale was deported back to the United States in June 1970 when his appeal failed.


title: Frank Abagnale

text: After returning to the United States, 22-year-old Abagnale dressed in a pilot's uniform and traveled around college campuses, passing bad checks and claiming he was there to recruit stewardesses for Pan Am. At the University of Arizona, he stated that he was a pilot and a doctor. According to Paul Holsen, a student at the time, Abagnale conducted physical examinations on several female college students who wanted to be part of flight crews. None of the women were ever enrolled in Abagnale's fictional program, as his autobiography and film depict.


title: Frank Abagnale

text: After Abagnale cashed a personal check made to look like Pan Am paycheck, on July 30, 1970, in Durham, North Carolina, he again came to the attention of the FBI. He was arrested in Cobb County, Georgia, three months later, on November 2, 1970, after cashing 10 fake Pan Am payroll checks in different towns. Abagnale escaped from the Cobb County jail and was picked up 4 days later in New York City. He was sentenced to ten years in 1971 for forging checks that totaled $1,448.60, and he received an additional two years for escaping from the local Cobb County jailhouse.


title: Frank Abagnale

text: In 1974, Abagnale was released on parole after he had served around two years of his 12-year sentence at Federal Correctional Institution in Petersburg, Virginia. Unwilling to return to his family in New York, Abagnale says he left the choice of parole location up to the court, which decided that he would be paroled in Houston, Texas.


title: Frank Abagnale

text: After his release, Abagnale stated that he performed numerous jobs, including cook, grocer, and movie projectionist; however, he was fired from most of those after it was discovered he had been hired without revealing his criminal past. He again posed as a pilot in 1974 to obtain a job at Camp Manison, a summer children's camp in Texas where he was arrested for stealing cameras from his co-workers. After he received only a fine, he obtained a position at a Houston-area orphanage by pretending to be a pilot with a master's degree. This job had him finding foster homes for the children living at the orphanage. This ruse was eventually discovered by his parole officer, who swiftly removed him from his orphanage work and moved him into living quarters above his own garage so that he "could keep an eye on him". His next position was at Aetna, where he was fired and sued for check fraud.


title: Frank Abagnale

text: According to Abagnale, he approached a bank with an offer in 1975. He explained to the bank what he had done and offered to speak to the bank's staff and show them various tricks that "paperhangers" use to defraud banks. His offer included the condition that if they did not find his speech helpful, they would owe him nothing; otherwise, they would owe him only $50, with an agreement that they would provide his name to other banks. With that, he began a new career as a speaker and a security consultant. During this time, he falsified his resume to show he had worked with the Los Angeles Police Department and Scotland Yard.


title: Frank Abagnale

text: In 1977, Abagnale gave public talks wherein he claimed that between the ages of 16 and 21 years old, he was a doctor in a Georgia hospital for one year, an assistant state attorney general for one year, a sociology professor for two semesters, and a Pan American airlines pilot for two years. In addition, Abagnale claimed that he recruited university coeds as Pan American stewardesses travelling with them for three months throughout Europe. He also claimed he eluded the FBI with a daring escape from a commercial airline toilet bowl, while the plane was taxiing at the John F. Kennedy International Airport in New York. In 1978 Abagnale told a "Honolulu Advertiser" reporter that he was familiar with the toilet apparatus, squeezed himself through the opening, swung down through the lower hatch, landed on the pavement, ran across the runway and hailed a cab. Abagnale claimed he moved the sewage container aside and that no one heard a thing: "I took off running. I thought they were right behind me. What I didn't know was that the door was spring loaded and when it slammed shut the whole assembly fell back into place. Nobody heard anything because of the engines' roar."


title: Frank Abagnale

text: He moved with his wife, Kelly, and their three sons to Tulsa, Oklahoma. He and his family lived in the same house for the next 25 years. After the sons left home for college and careers elsewhere, Kelly suggested that she and Frank should leave Tulsa. They agreed to move to Charleston, South Carolina.


title: Frank Abagnale

text: In 1976, he founded Abagnale & Associates, which advises companies on secure documents. In 2015, Abagnale was named the AARP Fraud Watch Ambassador, where he helps "to provide online programs and community forums to educate consumers about ways to protect themselves from identity theft and cybercrime." In 2018, he began co-hosting the AARP podcast "The Perfect Scam" about scammers and how they operate.


title: Frank Abagnale

text: He has appeared in the media a variety of times. This includes three times as guest on "The Tonight Show", an appearance on "To Tell the Truth" in 1977 "" and a regular slot on the British network TV series "The Secret Cabaret" in the 1990s. The book about Abagnale, "Catch Me If You Can", was turned into a movie of the same name by Steven Spielberg in 2002, featuring actor Leonardo DiCaprio as Abagnale. The real Abagnale made a cameo appearance in this film as a French police officer taking DiCaprio into custody.


title: Frank Abagnale

text: During his many speeches and his appearances on television, Abagnale has alleged many criminal exploits. These include stating that he was wanted in 26 countries, has worked extensively for the FBI, and escaped several times from FBI custody. He also claimed that he cashed over 17,000 bad checks, amounting to $2.5 million USD, and worked as an assistant attorney general and a hospital physician. In addition, he stated that he started a fake stewardess trainee program, traveling with them throughout Europe for two months, and logged over two million air miles disguised as a pilot. Almost all of these claims have been refuted by journalists.


title: Frank Abagnale

text: In public lectures describing his life story, Abagnale has consistently maintained that he was "arrested just once," and that was in Montpellier, France. However, public records show Abagnale was arrested in New York (multiple times), California, Massachusetts, Louisiana, Georgia, and Texas.


title: Frank Abagnale

text: Despite public records showing Abagnale targeted individuals and small family businesses, Abagnale has long claimed publicly that he "never, ever ripped off any individuals." He made the same claim of never targeting individuals and small businesses to BBC journalist Sarah Montague and the Associated Press. According to Abagnale, the only individual he ever swindled was a Miami sex worker: "She tried to charge me $1,000 for an evening, so I gave her a $1,400 forged cashier's check, and got $400 in change." In 2002, Abagnale told the "Star Tribune", "As long as I didn't hurt anyone, people never considered me a real criminal, my victims were big corporations. I was a kid ripping off the establishment."


title: Frank Abagnale

text: However, individuals criminally targeted by Abagnale have described the long-term consequences of victimization:


title: Frank Abagnale

text: His claim that he passed the Louisiana bar exam, worked for Attorney General Jack P. F. Gremillion, and closed 33 cases, was challenged by several journalists in 1978. There is no record of Abagnale ever being a member of the Louisiana Bar and no evidence he ever worked as an assistant attorney general in Louisiana's Attorney General's Office. In 1978, the Louisiana State Bar Association reconciled all those who took the bar exam and concluded that Abagnale never took the exam using his own name or that of an alias; the State Attorney General's Office examined payments to all employees during the time Abagnale claimed he worked there and concluded that he never worked in the office using his name or an alias. After Abagnale appeared on "The Tonight Show", then-First Assistant Attorney General Ken DeJean gave a reporter a series of questions to ask Abagnale about the description of then-Attorney General Jack P. F. Gremillion. Abagnale failed to answer the questions correctly.


title: Frank Abagnale

text: Abagnale claimed that when he was 18 years old he worked for one year as a supervising pediatrician at the Cobb General Hospital in Marietta, Georgia. He maintained that he worked the midnight to 8 a.m. shift, supervising seven residents and 42 nurses. Abagnale claimed that he would visit the university library to memorize medical journals and textbooks: "With my photographic memory, I could easily memorize anything. That did not mean that I could comprehend it, but I could rattle it off verbatim." Abagnale told his audiences that over the course of his one year at Cobb General, no one doubted his position as a physician: "So I made the rounds, picked up the clipboards, scribbled a few lines, initialed them, and everyone thought I was doing a fine job." However, hospital administrators told journalist Ira Perry that there was no midnight to 8 a.m. shift, nor did the position of regular overnight pediatrician exist, at the time. Using records from the New York State Archives, author Alan C. Logan demonstrated that Abagnale was in the Great Meadow Prison, in Comstock, New York, when he was 18.


title: Frank Abagnale

text: Abagnale's claim that he impersonated a doctor is not entirely without merit, however. On the University of Arizona campus in 1970, he stated that he was a pilot and a doctor. According to Paul Holsen, who was an older university student and licensed commercial pilot at the time, Abagnale informed him that he was there on behalf of Pan Am to recruit and conduct physical examinations on candidates. In his autobiography Holsen claimed that after Abagnale's ruse was discovered, authorities informed him that Abagnale had indeed conducted physical exams on students. University of Arizona officials acknowledge that Abagnale had interacted with 12 female students. Abagnale has openly acknowledged that he performed examinations on young women while impersonating a doctor: "When the girls came by I always gave them a thorough examination and sent them on their way. I was young, but not stupid." In 2021 Louisiana State University Manship Chair in Journalism Robert Mann expressed his regret in not confronting Abagnale's claim of conducting physical examinations as a doctor: "Looking back on my story about the event [Abagnale's lecture], I am embarrassed by what I wrote about Abagnale's time posing as a pediatrician. Reading those words now, in which Abagnale bragged about sexual abuse, makes me sick."


title: Frank Abagnale

text: Abagnale has publicly claimed an intelligence quotient (IQ) of 140: "I have an I.Q. of 140 and retain 90 percent of what I read. So by studying and memorizing the bar exam I was able to get the needed score." In 2021 Abagnale gave the keynote at the American Mensa Conference in Houston, Texas. The organizers claimed he was the subject of an FBI manhunt and cashed millions of dollars' worth of checks while impersonating a pilot and doctor. Despite claims of a photographic memory, when queried by "USA Today" journalist Andy Seiler regarding details of his imposter roles and movements in the 1960s Abagnale responded by saying, "You get to a point in your life where you go, 'I don't remember what I did.'"


title: Frank Abagnale

text: One of Abagnale's most notable claims was an alleged escape from the United States Penitentiary, Atlanta in 1971:


title: Frank Abagnale

text: In 1982 Abagnale told the press, "I was and still am the only and youngest man to escape from that prison." However, the Federal Bureau of Prisons confirmed that Abagnale was never housed in the Atlanta Federal Penitentiary: "he was never admitted, so I don't really see how he could have escaped" said acting warden Dwight Amstutz.


title: Frank Abagnale

text: In 1978, after Abagnale had been a featured speaker at an anti-crime seminar, a "San Francisco Chronicle" reporter looked into his assertions. Telephone calls to banks, schools, hospitals and other institutions Abagnale mentioned turned up no evidence of his cons under the aliases he used. Abagnale's response was, "Due to the embarrassment involved, I doubt if anyone would confirm the information." He later said he had changed the names.


title: Frank Abagnale

text: Further doubts were raised about Abagnale's story after an October 1978 appearance on "The Tonight Show Starring Johnny Carson", with a news article saying:


title: Frank Abagnale

text: In December 1978, Abagnale's claims were again investigated after he visited Oklahoma City for a talk. As part of his investigation into the story, Perry spoke with Pan Am spokesman Bruce Haxthausen, who responded to the journalists' inquiry saying:


title: Frank Abagnale

text: In 2002, Abagnale addressed the issue of his story's lack of truthfulness with a statement posted on his company's website, which said in part: "I was interviewed by the co-writer only about four times. I believe he did a great job of telling the story, but he also over-dramatized and exaggerated some of the story. That was his style and what the editor wanted. He always reminded me that he was just telling a story and not writing my biography." However, Abagnale made the primary claims of working as a doctor for a year, an attorney for a year, a PhD professor, and his several escapes on national television in 1977 on the show "To Tell the Truth" and "The Tonight Show Starring Johnny Carson", which predated the 1980 autobiography by several years. He also made these claims in print media, namely the "Fort Worth Star-Telegram", three years before the publication of his co-written autobiography, effectively nullifying the claim his aforementioned co-author, Stan Redding, exaggerated the story.


title: Frank Abagnale

text: Despite Abagnale's website claim about his autobiography co-author Stan Redding, investigative journalist Javier Leiva discovered an obscure cover story of "True Detective" (January 1978) in which Abagnale told the story of his life. In "True Detective" magazine Abagnale claimed to Redding that he passed the Louisiana Bar Exam, worked as an assistant attorney general, was employed as a sociology professor, worked as an Atlanta pediatrician, escaped from an airplane toilet, escaped from the Atlanta Federal Penitentiary, recruited University of Arizona coeds (and traveled with them throughout Europe for weeks), and cashed 2.5 million dollars in checks. These claims predate, by several years, the co-authored autobiography, and they also demonstrate that it was Abagnale who invented and exaggerated his life story, not Stan Redding.


title: Frank Abagnale

text: In 2002, at the "Catch Me If You Can" film premiere, Abagnale conceded to journalist Andy Seiler of USA Today that the impersonations in the autobiography were fabricated: "I impersonated a doctor for a few days, I was a lawyer for a few days. In the book, it's like I am doing this for a year." Despite this admission, in public speeches Abagnale would return to his claims of long-term impersonations of a doctor and for working for a year as an attorney. Abagnale's fees for speaking about his alleged life story are reported to be between $20,000 to $30,000 USD.


title: Frank Abagnale

text: In 2006, KSL journalist Scott Haws challenged Abagnale with his claim that he worked as a PhD-holding sociology professor at Brigham Young University (BYU) for two semesters. Abagnale claimed that he could not recall the details, and that his co-author Redding had exaggerated some things. Haws "refreshed Frank's memory" and showed him his own words, including the "Catch Me If You Can" moviebook and the credits that rolled at the end of the film "Catch Me If You Can", where Abagnale, not Redding, made the BYU professor claim. Abagnale conceded to Haws that he might have been a guest lecturer.


title: Frank Abagnale

text: Leading up to 2020, author Alan C. Logan conducted an in-depth investigation for a book that focused on the perspective of Abagnale's victims. As part of this process, Logan combined earlier newspaper articles, numerous administrative documents, and public records that had not been the subject of scrutiny by major media outlets. Based on these documents, Logan provided a timeline that challenged the overall truthfulness of Abagnale's self-described criminal history and movements between 1964 to 1974. Logan maintains that his investigation found that Abagnale's account of his criminal past is, for the most part, a fabrication. Using records from the New York State Archives, Logan showed that Abagnale was in Great Meadow Prison in Comstock, New York, between the ages of 17 and 20 (July 26, 1965, and December 24, 1968) as inmate #25367, the time frame during which Abagnale claims to have committed his most significant scams. Logan's investigation uncovered numerous petty crimes that Abagnale has never acknowledged. Various media outlets have asked Abagnale to respond to Logan's book content, which included victim statements and citations to publicly-accessible records. Abagnale has responded by stating that the book is "not worthy of a comment".


title: Frank Abagnale

text: Abagnale has told the press, "I was convicted on $2.5 million dollars' worth of bad checks" and that he later hired a law firm to get all the money back to hotels and other companies. However, federal court records show that Abagnale was convicted of forging 10 Pan American Airlines checks in five states (Texas, Arizona, Utah, California and North Carolina), totalling less than US$1,500. Following his parole on February 8, 1974, he claimed he went to work for the FBI. However, after this date Abagnale was arrested for theft at a kids camp in Friendswood, Texas, on August 29, 1974.


title: Frank Abagnale

text: In many interviews and speeches Abagnale has claimed that he has earned millions of dollars from his patents. However, the United States Patent and Trademark Office website does not list Abagnale as a person, or Abagnale and Associates as a business, as holders of any patents and they are not listed as an inventor on any patent. In his cheque design patents, Canadian inventor Calin A. Sandru merely mentions in the Background section of the invention that KPMG and Abagnale and Associates are groups that affirm that cheque fraud is a significant problem.


title: Frank Abagnale

text: Logan, girded with public records, shared his findings in detail on the NPR program "Watching America", August 13, 2021, broadcast on WHRO.


title: Frank Abagnale

text: In 2022, investigative journalist Javier Leiva independently obtained the public records first sourced by Logan. Leiva also confirmed that Abagnale was in prison between the ages of 17 and 20 and then convicted for theft in Baton Rouge in June 1969. Leiva also obtained the federal records connected to Abagnale's Pan Am checks and confirmed that his conviction, at 22 years old, was based on less than $1,500 USD. Leiva says he calculated that between 1965 and 1970, Abagnale was only free for a matter of months and that his records show he was in prison the majority of that time. On June 23, 2022, Leiva confronted Abagnale at the Connect IT Global 2022 conference in Las Vegas with prison and other public records in-hand. Leiva describes these events in his podcast series "Pretend - The Real Catch Me If You Can (Part 1)".


title: Frank Abagnale

text: One of Abagnale's most controversial claims is his relationship with the FBI. In 1977, when Abagnale began claiming a five-year uninterrupted life on the run, involving multi-profession imposter scams, he did not claim to work for the FBI. He did, however, leverage the names of FBI personnel to bolster his new biographical claims. In 1978, journalist Ira Perry determined that Abagnale and his publicist were giving out the names of FBI agents to any party that asked for references or verification of his claimed biography; in particular, they gave out the name of Robert Russ Franck, who they claimed was the "former Atlanta agent" who knew all about Abagnale. When Perry contacted Franck, who had just retired as head of the FBI's Houston Division, and had never worked in Atlanta, Franck told him:


title: Frank Abagnale

text: Franck informed Perry that he had only heard about Abagnale through people attempting to verify his biographical claims, and was unable to confirm whether the claims were true or not. Perry also interviewed Eugene Stewart, a retired FBI agent who was in charge of the Atlanta division when Abagnale claimed he was a pediatrician in suburban Atlanta. Stewart, who at this point was Delta Air Lines chief of security, informed Perry that Abagnale was a low-level criminal: "It's more of a harassment than anything else," said Stewart. In addition, Stewart noted that Abagnale had been using a Delta Air Lines uniform to cash bad personal checks in Texas after his 1974 parole. After his parole Abagnale was arrested for theft from a children’s camp in Friendswood, Texas. Public records show that almost two years after his parole, in October 1975, Abagnale was hired by Aetna Insurance, and was abruptly fired by the company after he allegedly cashed bad personal checks during his employee training. Aetna eventually filed suit against Abagnale after his appearance on "To Tell the Truth" was broadcast, in 1977.


title: Frank Abagnale

text: After the publication of his 1980 autobiography, Abagnale began to inform his audiences that he was on the FBI Ten Most Wanted Fugitives list. He carried this claim into the 90s: "I was the only teenager in the history of the FBI to be put on their 10 Most Wanted list," Abagnale told his audiences in 1994. In the lead up to the release of the film "Catch Me If You Can" , this "Ten Most Wanted Fugitives" claim was used in marketing for the film. Pressed on this claim when the film was released, and with evidence clearly showing the absence of Abagnale on any most wanted list, he conceded on his website that he was never on the FBI's Most Wanted list.


title: Frank Abagnale

text: In 2002, "Los Angeles Times" journalist Bob Baker (1948–2015) reported that there was no FBI task force set up to capture Abagnale. Despite his claims that he was living in the infamous Riverbend Apartments, supposedly eluding the FBI for one year as a pediatrician in suburban Atlanta, the newspaper report of Abagnale's arrest indicated he had been the area for only two days; local FBI agents responded to a tip that Abagnale was in a local hotel and arrested him there. In September 2022, retired FBI agent Alan Brown obtained permission from FBI headquarters to discuss his arrest of Abagnale. Brown spoke to investigative journalist Javier Leiva and acknowledged that the Atlanta field office simply acted on a teletype request to pick Abagnale up at the Squire Inn, in Marietta, Georgia. In contrast to Abagnale's claims about escaping from the hotel, as depicted in the film, Brown stated that Abagnale was arrested in his room without incident. Brown also stated that he had no personal knowledge of Abagnale's arrests prior to 1970, and after 1970 when Abagnale was arrested in Friendswood, Texas.


title: Frank Abagnale

text: In the years following the release of "Catch Me if You Can", Abagnale began claiming that he was granted a unique parole from the federal prison in Petersburg, Virginia, so that he could work for the Bureau: "When the FBI took me out of prison it was to do undercover work." Abagnale has claimed that the clandestine work was given to him directly by Clarence M. Kelley who directed the FBI from 1973 to 1978. In his "Talks at Google" lecture, Abagnale claimed that because of his photographic memory, Kelley asked him to memorize the components of military hardware and infiltrate bases as a lieutenant. Abagnale describes Kelley's instructions this way: "Okay, you are a lieutenant in the army. You have been in the army this many years. Your expertise is this missile. I need you to learn all of this in two weeks, and I'm sending you to this base, and I want you to find out what's going on in this particular area." In the lecture Abagnale also claims Kelley sent him on similar missions "as a scientist at a lab in New Mexico."


title: Frank Abagnale

text: Jerri Williams, a retired FBI agent who specialized in white collar crime and fraud, spoke to investigative journalist Javier Leiva about these claims. Williams refuted Abagnale's claims of being tasked with clandestine operations directly by Kelley:


title: Frank Abagnale

text: After the film was released, Abagnale began to use the first-person plural pronoun "we" to refer to the FBI; he also began to inform audiences that he was directly working for the FBI and celebrating each anniversary of his unique parole and the opportunity to go to work at the FBI: for example, in 2006 he informed his audiences that "this year I am celebrating 31 years with the FBI," in 2014 he told his audiences that "this year I'm celebrating 38 years at the FBI where I work today." However, the dates of this anniversary celebration point to 1976 and do not line up with Abagnale's claim of a parole-release deal. Abagnale was, according to United States Board of Parole and Federal Bureau of Prisons standard practice at the time, sent to a Pre-Release Center in Houston in 1973, within the 120 days prior to his actual federal parole date of February 8, 1974.


title: Frank Abagnale

text: Ira Winkler, former intelligence analyst for the United States Department of Defense, and current chief security architect for Walmart stores internationally, describes an encounter with Abagnale. Winkler queried Abagnale on the specifics of his position at the FBI. Abagnale responded that he was, "a special agent". Winkler says, "You mean a full fledged special agent?", to which Abagnale responded in the affirmative.


title: Frank Abagnale

text: In a 2018 interview broadcast on PBS, Abagnale publicly criticized former FBI director James Comey for his unprofessionalism during the 2016 US presidential election. In the same interview Abagnale claims that the FBI is concerned that he is of retirement age: "The FBI always ask me when am I going to retire, because they don't want me to," said Abagnale. In interviews Abagnale has claimed that his work with the FBI is pro bono, although he has claimed publicly that his company has made millions of dollars from contracts with the US government: "Today, Frank Abagnale and Associates does $10.5 million of business per year, 90 percent of it with the federal government," he told his audience in 1988. In 1991 Frank Abagnale, and his wife Kelly, filed for bankruptcy in Tulsa, Oklahoma. In the court filings Abagnale claimed that he had $1.6 million USD in debts and $308,000 in assets.


title: Frank Abagnale

text: Journalist Ira Perry was unable to find any evidence that Abagnale worked with the FBI; according to one retired FBI special agent in charge, Abagnale was caught trying to pass personal checks in 1978 several years after he claimed that he began working with the FBI. Dating back to the 1980s Abagnale claimed that Joseph Shea, an FBI agent, had pursued him for 5 years (between 1965 and 1970). Abagnale claimed that Shea befriended and supervised him during his parole. However, when "Catch Me If You Can" was released in theatres, "The Atlanta Journal-Constitution" reported that Abagnale and Shea only reunited in the late 1980s, almost 20 years after Shea arrested him. Abagnale spotted Shea at an anticrime seminar in Kansas City and sought out Shea to shake his hand.


title: Frank Abagnale

text: When the film was released an FBI spokesperson acknowledged that Abagnale had given lectures at the Academy "from time to time," but denied that Abagnale had been given commendations by the agency as claimed in the film's marketing. At no point has the FBI made an official statement corroborating Abagnale's biographical claims, nor has the agency confirmed his extraordinary claims that he was sent into a military base as an expert on missiles, and into a secret lab in New Mexico. Abagnale has claimed in public lectures that he was discussed in detail in a coffee table book celebrating 100 years of the FBI. However, Abagnale's name does not appear anywhere in the official book celebrating 100 years of the FBI. In his public lectures Abagnale has taken on a pseudo-spokesperson role for the FBI. In discussing recruitments he states, "currently [2017] we take 1 in 10,000 applications." Abagnale made this same claim of 1 in 10,000 applications to Idaho Statesman journalist Michael Katz in 2019. However, there are 11,500 applications per year for 900 positions at the FBI (2018) - which is approximately 1 in 13 applicants.


title: Frank Abagnale

text: In 2020 Abagnale was confronted by one of his victims in Baton Rouge, Louisiana. When asked why he talks about being an attorney general and passing the state's bar exam, and yet failing to acknowledge his arrest and conviction in Baton Rouge, Abagnale said, "That's because I work for the FBI." Abagnale claimed to the "Star Tribune" that he is an ethics instructor at the FBI Academy, located in Quantico, Virginia: "I teach ethics at the FBI academy, which is ironic, but years ago, someone at the Bureau said, 'who better than you to do this?'—I try to teach young agents the importance of doing the right thing."


title: Frank Abagnale

text: In August, 2022, Google disabled all comments and added a disclaimer to Abagnale's "Talks at Google" which now states: "Disclaimer: Google does not endorse or condone the content contained within this video, nor does it lay claim to the validity of the actions described herein. The following is presented unaltered as it was recorded on Nov 27, 2017, and remains on the Talks at Google YouTube channel for historical purposes." In the video disclaimer Google did not provide an explicit reason for the abnegation of Abagnale's video or whether or not it was part of their new initiative to work with journalists to combat misinformation and disinformation. However, according to investigative journalist Javier Leiva, the move was made in response to members of his audience.


title: Frank Abagnale

text: On September 12, 2022, Frank Abagnale was awarded the "Heroes in Ethics" award by Xavier University, located in Cincinnati, Ohio. Abagnale gave the keynote lecture at the University's annual Heroes of Professional Ethics series. At the conclusion of his talk Abagnale invited the audience to ask him any questions on any matter. A member of the audience, Jim Grinstead, the host of the podcast "Scams and Cons", asked Abagnale, “So I wonder, in light of the ethics award you’re going to be presented tonight, would you come clean? Would you tell the truth about the stories you’ve told? Will you admit that you just lied to everybody, and you’re still conning them?” In his response Abagnale denied telling any lies or spreading any misinformation. He claimed he had nothing to do with his autobiography, the film, and the Broadway musical. Xavier University has removed any discussion of the September 12 event from its website.


title: Frank Abagnale

text: The incident at Xavier University was not the first time Abagnale's story caused controversy on a university campus. In 1981, after criminal justice professor William Toney and his students debunked Abagnale's biographical claims, several universities cancelled Abagnale's appearances. In an attempt to provide compromise, the University of South Carolina asked Abagnale to sign a Truth Affidavit that would attest to the truthfulness of his biographical claims. The university informed Abagnale that he would still be allowed to give the speech and collect his speaking fee, even if he didn't sign the affidavit. However, if he refused the university would warn the students at the outset of the speech that Abagnale had not promised to tell the truth. Abagnale refused to sign the Truth Affidavit, referring to the document as a "slap in the face".


title: Frank Abagnale

text: As disbelief in Abagnale's story spread, in part due to the work of professor William Toney, he cancelled his own university bookings. In a letter to Georgia Southwestern State University, Abagnale wrote that it was wrong to profit from his criminal past by speaking about it to college campuses. Furthermore, in the letter to GSSU Abagnale stated that he was cancelling all college speaking engagements because the criminal aspects of the life story he was presenting "[are] not something to which young impressionable minds should be exposed". In the midst of this controversy, Abagnale was queried by journalist John Dagley, who asked him if his biography was a lie, to which he replied:


title: Frank Abagnale

text: Abagnale and his wife Kelly live on Daniel Island, near Charleston, South Carolina. They have three sons, Scott, Chris, and Sean. Abagnale maintains meeting his wife as the motivation for changing his life. He told author Paul Stenning that he met her while allegedly working undercover for the FBI when she was a cashier at a grocery store.


title: Inferno (Dante)

text: Inferno (; Italian for "Hell") is the first part of Italian writer Dante Alighieri's 14th-century epic poem "Divine Comedy". It is followed by "Purgatorio" and "Paradiso". The "Inferno" describes Dante's journey through Hell, guided by the ancient Roman poet Virgil. In the poem, Hell is depicted as nine concentric circles of torment located within the Earth; it is the "realm ... of those who have rejected spiritual values by yielding to bestial appetites or violence, or by perverting their human intellect to fraud or malice against their fellowmen".


title: Inferno (Dante)

text: As an allegory, the "Divine Comedy" represents the journey of the soul toward God, with the "Inferno" describing the recognition and rejection of sin.


title: Inferno (Dante)

text: The poem begins on the night of Maundy Thursday on March 24 (or April 7), 1300, shortly before the dawn of Good Friday. The narrator, Dante himself, is thirty-five years old, and thus "midway in the journey of our life" ("Nel mezzo del cammin di nostra vita") – half of the biblical lifespan of seventy (Psalm 89:10, Vulgate; Psalm 90:10, KJV). The poet finds himself lost in a dark wood ("selva oscura"), astray from the "straight way" ("diritta via", also translatable as "right way") of salvation. He sets out to climb directly up a small mountain, but his way is blocked by three beasts he cannot evade: a "lonza" (usually rendered as "leopard" or "leopon"), a "leone" (lion), and a "lupa" (she-wolf). The three beasts, taken from Jeremiah 5:6, are thought to symbolize the three kinds of sin that bring the unrepentant soul into one of the three major divisions of Hell. According to John Ciardi, these are incontinence (the she-wolf); violence and bestiality (the lion); and fraud and malice (the leopard); Dorothy L. Sayers assigns the leopard to incontinence and the she-wolf to fraud/malice. It is now dawn of Good Friday, April 8, with the sun rising in Aries. The beasts drive him back despairing into the darkness of error, a "lower place" ("basso loco") where the sun is silent ("l sol tace"). However, Dante is rescued by a figure who announces that he was born "sub Iulio" (i.e., in the time of Julius Caesar) and lived under Augustus: it is the shade of the Roman poet Virgil, author of the "Aeneid", a Latin epic.


title: Inferno (Dante)

text: On the evening of Good Friday, Dante hesitates as he follows Virgil; Virgil explains that he has been sent by Beatrice, the symbol of Divine Love. Beatrice had been moved to aid Dante by the Virgin Mary (symbolic of compassion) and Saint Lucia (symbolic of illuminating Grace). Rachel, symbolic of the contemplative life, also appears in the heavenly scene recounted by Virgil. The two of them then begin their journey to the underworld.


title: Inferno (Dante)

text: Dante passes through the gate of Hell, which bears an inscription ending with the phrase ""Lasciate ogne speranza, voi ch'intrate"", most frequently translated as "Abandon all hope, ye who enter here." Dante and his guide hear the anguished screams of the Uncommitted. These are the souls of people who in life took no sides; the opportunists who were for neither good nor evil, but instead were merely concerned with themselves. Among these Dante recognizes a figure who made the "great refusal," implied to be Pope Celestine V, whose "cowardice (in selfish terror for his own welfare) served as the door through which so much evil entered the Church". Mixed with them are outcasts who took no side in the Rebellion of Angels. These souls are forever unclassified; they are neither in Hell nor out of it, but reside on the shores of the Acheron. Naked and futile, they race around through the mist in eternal pursuit of an elusive, wavering banner (symbolic of their pursuit of ever-shifting self-interest) while relentlessly chased by swarms of wasps and hornets, who continually sting them. Loathsome maggots and worms at the sinners' feet drink the putrid mixture of blood, pus, and tears that flows down their bodies. This symbolizes the sting of their guilty conscience and the repugnance of sin. This may also be seen as a reflection of the spiritual stagnation in which they lived.


title: Inferno (Dante)

text: After passing through the vestibule, Dante and Virgil reach the ferry that will take them across the river Acheron and to Hell proper. The ferry is piloted by Charon, who does not want to let Dante enter, for he is a living being. Virgil forces Charon to take him by declaring, "Vuolsi così colà dove si puote / ciò che si vuole" ("It is so willed there where is power to do / That which is willed"), referring to the fact that Dante is on his journey on divine grounds. The wailing and blasphemy of the damned souls entering Charon's boat contrast with the joyful singing of the blessed souls arriving by ferry in the "Purgatorio". The passage across the Acheron, however, is undescribed, since Dante faints and does not awaken until they reach the other side.


title: Inferno (Dante)

text: Virgil proceeds to guide Dante through the nine circles of Hell. The circles are concentric, representing a gradual increase in wickedness, and culminating at the centre of the earth, where Satan is held in bondage. The sinners of each circle are punished for eternity in a fashion fitting their crimes: each punishment is a "contrapasso", a symbolic instance of poetic justice. For example, later in the poem, Dante and Virgil encounter fortune-tellers who must walk forward with their heads on backward, unable to see what is ahead, because they tried to see the future through forbidden means. Such a "contrapasso" "functions not merely as a form of divine revenge, but rather as the fulfilment of a destiny freely chosen by each soul during his or her life". People who sinned, but prayed for forgiveness before their deaths are found not in Hell but in Purgatory, where they labour to become free of their sins. Those in Hell are people who tried to justify their sins and are unrepentant.


title: Inferno (Dante)

text: Dante's Hell is structurally based on the ideas of Aristotle, but with "certain Christian symbolisms, exceptions, and misconstructions of Aristotle's text", and a further supplement from Cicero's "De Officiis". Virgil reminds Dante (the character) of "Those pages where the Ethics tells of three / Conditions contrary to Heaven's will and rule / Incontinence, vice, and brute bestiality". Cicero, for his part, had divided sins between Violence and Fraud. By conflating Cicero's violence with Aristotle's bestiality, and his fraud with malice or vice, Dante the poet obtained three major categories of sin, as symbolized by the three beasts that Dante encounters in Canto I: these are Incontinence, Violence/Bestiality, and Fraud/Malice. Sinners punished for incontinence (also known as wantonness)  –  the lustful, the gluttonous, the hoarders and wasters, and the wrathful and sullen  –  all demonstrated weakness in controlling their appetites, desires, and natural urges; according to Aristotle's "Ethics", incontinence is less condemnable than malice or bestiality, and therefore these sinners are located in four circles of Upper Hell (Circles 2–5). These sinners endure lesser torments than do those consigned to Lower Hell, located within the walls of the City of Dis, for committing acts of violence and fraud  –  the latter of which involves, as Dorothy L. Sayers writes, "abuse of the specifically human faculty of reason". The deeper levels are organized into one circle for violence (Circle 7) and two circles for fraud (Circles 8 and 9). As a Christian, Dante adds Circle 1 (Limbo) to Upper Hell and Circle 6 (Heresy) to Lower Hell, making 9 Circles in total; incorporating the Vestibule of the Futile, this leads to Hell containing 10 main divisions. This "9+1=10" structure is also found within the "Purgatorio" and "Paradiso". Lower Hell is further subdivided: Circle 7 (Violence) is divided into three rings, Circle 8 (Fraud) is divided into ten "bolge", and Circle 9 (Treachery) is divided into four regions. Thus, Hell contains, in total, 24 divisions.


title: Inferno (Dante)

text: Dante wakes up to find that he has crossed the Acheron, and Virgil leads him to the first circle of the abyss, Limbo, where Virgil himself resides. The first circle contains the unbaptized and the virtuous pagans, who, although not sinful enough to warrant damnation, did not accept Christ. Dorothy L. Sayers writes, "After those who refused choice come those without opportunity of choice. They could not, that is, choose Christ; they could, and did, choose human virtue, and for that they have their reward." Limbo shares many characteristics with the Asphodel Meadows, and thus, the guiltless damned are punished by living in a deficient form of Heaven. Without baptism ("the portal of the faith that you embrace") they lacked the hope for something greater than rational minds can conceive. When Dante asked if anyone has ever left Limbo, Virgil states that he saw Jesus ("a Mighty One") descend into Limbo and take Adam, Abel, Noah, Moses, Abraham, David, Rachel, and others (see Limbo of the Patriarchs) into his all-forgiving arms and transport them to Heaven as the first human souls to be saved. The event, known as the Harrowing of Hell, supposedly occurred around AD 33 or 34.


title: Inferno (Dante)

text: Dante encounters the poets Homer, Horace, Ovid, and Lucan, who include him in their number and make him "sixth in that high company". They reach the base of a great Castle – the dwelling place of the wisest men of antiquity – surrounded by seven gates, and a flowing brook. After passing through the seven gates, the group comes to an exquisite green meadow and Dante encounters the inhabitants of the Citadel. These include figures associated with the Trojans and their descendants (the Romans): Electra (mother of Troy's founder Dardanus), Hector, Aeneas, Julius Caesar in his role as Roman general ("in his armor, falcon-eyed"), Camilla, Penthesilea (Queen of the Amazons), King Latinus and his daughter, Lavinia, Lucius Junius Brutus (who overthrew Tarquin to found the Roman Republic), Lucretia, Julia, Marcia, and Cornelia Africana. Dante also sees Saladin, a Muslim military leader known for his battle against the Crusaders, as well as his generous, chivalrous, and merciful conduct.


title: Inferno (Dante)

text: Dante next encounters a group of philosophers, including Aristotle with Socrates and Plato at his side, as well as Democritus, "Diogenes" (either Diogenes the Cynic or Diogenes of Apollonia), Anaxagoras, Thales, Empedocles, Heraclitus, and "Zeno" (either Zeno of Elea or Zeno of Citium). He sees the scientist Dioscorides, the mythical Greek poets Orpheus and Linus, and Roman statesmen Marcus Tullius Cicero and Seneca. Dante sees the Alexandrian geometer Euclid and Ptolemy, the Alexandrian astronomer and geographer, as well as the physicians Hippocrates and Galen. He also encounters Avicenna, a Persian polymath, and Averroes, a medieval Andalusian polymath known for his commentaries on Aristotle's works. Dante and Virgil depart from the four other poets and continue their journey.


title: Inferno (Dante)

text: Although Dante implies that all virtuous non-Christians find themselves here, he later encounters two (Cato of Utica and Statius) in Purgatory and two (Trajan and Ripheus) in Heaven. In "Purg." XXII, Virgil names several additional inhabitants of Limbo who were not mentioned in the "Inferno."


title: Inferno (Dante)

text: Dante and Virgil leave Limbo and enter the Second Circle – the first of the circles of Incontinence – where the punishments of Hell proper begin. It is described as "a part where no thing gleams". They find their way hindered by the serpentine Minos, who judges all of those condemned for active, deliberately willed sin to one of the lower circles. At this point in Inferno, every soul is required to confess all of their sins to Minos, after which Minos sentences each soul to its torment by wrapping his tail around himself a number of times corresponding to the circle of Hell to which the soul must go. The role of Minos here is a combination of his classical role as condemner and unjust judge of the underworld and the role of classical Rhadamanthus, interrogator and confessor of the underworld. This mandatory confession makes it so every soul verbalizes and sanctions their own ranking amongst the condemned since these confessions are the sole grounds for their placement in hell. Dante is not forced to make this confession; instead, Virgil rebukes Minos, and he and Dante continue on.