Huedin town

Huedin (Hungarian: Bánffyhunyad) is a town in the west of Cluj County, on the DN1 (E60) road, about 50 km west of Cluj-Napoca and 100 km east of Oradea. It lies on the Crișul Repede river, where it meets the Domoș stream, and is the smallest town in the county, with 8,069 inhabitants at the 2021 census. The first written record dates from 10 May 1327, under the name Hunyad. The settlement lay on the old salt road between the Transylvanian Depression and the Western Plain, became an important market town in the 15th century and received oppidum status in 1437. It was declared a town in 1961. The main monument is the Reformed church on Piața Republicii, built in the 13th and 14th centuries. Its eastern, Gothic part was built in 1483 with the support of the Bánffy family, as the family's chapel. The church was fortified and was badly damaged during the Tatar raids of 1660-1661, then rebuilt in stages. Inside are painted wooden coffered ceilings: the one in the nave dates from 1705, and the one in the choir was made in 1780 by Lőrinc Umling the Younger and János Umling. The organ was built in 1874 by István Kolonics. The town also has the 18th-century Barcsay Manor, now a school, and the Orthodox church built between 1931 and 1934 in Neo-Byzantine style. The Reformed church is a category A historic monument (LMI code CJ-II-m-A-07679), and the Barcsay Manor is a category B monument (CJ-II-m-B-07678). On Prolic hill, also called the "Earth Fortress", lies a Hallstatt-period fortified settlement listed as a historic monument (CJ-I-s-A-07073). Did you know that the stone pulpit of the Reformed church was not made for Huedin? It was carved in the 18th century by Kidei Sipos Dávid for the church in Drag and was brought to Huedin only after that church was demolished, in the late 1960s or early 1970s.