Szelesteys
The chronicle of the Szelesteys from the Jaák clan

When I started to seriously research my family's history and I conceived of making this permanent and public domain, I was thinking of a completely scientific monography. As I was going deeper and deeper in it it became clearer to me that my preparedness is not enough for it or rather it is not enjoyable for me or for the reader. I decided that I will write a historical documentary novel about a family and about those living in the same region. Every base situation has historical adherence. It was written based on archival material, charters, different records, on the Szelestey archives and on relevant letters by related families or rather on their monographies. Where there is a full name in the text that is all documented and real. For the enjoyment of the stories I wrote supporting characters referred to with only first names. I know that there is no serious mistake in my work. Where I was unsure I noted this there. This mainly refers to the part about the ancestry history. I think for many the chronicle is overcrowded with names but apart from the family I mainly wrote my work for the fellow amateur ancestry researchers. As a practicing researcher I know how big of a treasure it is if somewhere I hit upon the name of my family. Those being here supporting characters can be for someone main characters and from a small creek can become a big stream or even a river. Many-many family chronicles can fill the tightly cramped pages of our official history with life. Also the book is for the current occupants living on the long-ago Jaák land, who may hit upon some of their long forgotten ancestor, about whom they've never heard.

In conclusion I think this volume contains a vast information and data about a family, about a population living on an easily containable land whom even if lived on different levels and in different situations but lived their lives during the the same historical course and along the same local peculiarities. What I managed to write down is only the tip of the iceberg a lot of open questions were left unanswered and a lot of unsolved and not understood connection were left in the shadows. But if with my little creation I could only blow off the dust covering the surface my work was not in vain. I hope there will be someone who is more patient, more thorough, more persistent and has much more professional training than me. And those doors that I was knocking on opens or even steps through them.

With the words of archaeologist László Zolnay...

Read my work with as much love as with I was stooping over it during it's writing.

I haven't finished writing the book because I can only work on it in my free time. I hope it will be finished by 2015. Here I present a little taste of the work that is in the making.

I can't resist not to write at least one quotation from Albert Wass: