Csepel (), officially known as the 21st District of Budapest ( Hungarian: ''Budapest XXI. kerülete'') is a

district A district is a type of administrative division that in some countries is managed by the local government. Across the world, areas known as "districts" vary greatly in size, spanning regions or county, counties, several municipality, municip ...

and a neighbourhood in

Budapest Budapest is the Capital city, capital and List of cities and towns of Hungary, most populous city of Hungary. It is the List of cities in the European Union by population within city limits, tenth-largest city in the European Union by popul ...

Hungary Hungary is a landlocked country in Central Europe. Spanning much of the Pannonian Basin, Carpathian Basin, it is bordered by Slovakia to the north, Ukraine to the northeast, Romania to the east and southeast, Serbia to the south, Croatia and ...

. Csepel officially became part of Budapest on 1 January 1950.

Name

The village and the island were named after the first () of the area, ''Csepel'' . The German and Serbo-Croat names are derived from the older Hungarian one .

Location

Csepel is located at the northern end of

Csepel Island Csepel Island (, ) is an island in the Danube in Hungary. It is long; its width after sections of bifurcation and rejoining (confluence) varies from . It has an area of and its population is 165,000. The isle extends south from Budapest; its ...

in the

Danube The Danube ( ; see also #Names and etymology, other names) is the List of rivers of Europe#Longest rivers, second-longest river in Europe, after the Volga in Russia. It flows through Central and Southeastern Europe, from the Black Forest sou ...

, and covers one-tenth of the island's area. Being on an island, it is the only complete district of Budapest which is neither in Pest nor in

Buda Buda (, ) is the part of Budapest, the capital city of Hungary, that lies on the western bank of the Danube. Historically, “Buda” referred only to the royal walled city on Castle Hill (), which was constructed by Béla IV between 1247 and ...

. On the western side it is bordered by the Danube, while the Ráckevei-Duna (Ráckeve's Danube) runs along the eastern side. The twenty-first district is bordered by the settlements of

Szigetszentmiklós Szigetszentmiklós ( /nowiki>; German language, German: ''Nigglau'') is a city in Pest County, Hungary, with around 40,000 inhabitants. Name * Sziget – island: Szigetszentmiklós is a town on Csepel Island * Szent Miklós – Saint Nichol ...

and Lakihegy to the south. It has approximately 85,000 inhabitants.

Transportation

Csepel is most easily accessed from central Budapest by the H7 Csepel HÉV, a high capacity suburban railway. In addition, it is served by BKK buses 138, 35, 36, 148, 151, and 179. Bridges connect Csepel to southern parts of Pest,

Ferencváros Ferencváros (, ) is the 9th district of Budapest (), Hungary. Name The southern suburb of Pest was named after King Francis II, Holy Roman Emperor, Francis I on 4 December 1792 when he was crowned king of Hungary. History The developmen ...

and

Pesterzsébet Pesterzsébet is the 20th district of Budapest, Hungary. It is located in the southern part of the capital and is the 17th biggest district in the city. It is a mostly suburban area with approximately 70,000 residents. History Pesterzsébet was ...

, and a ferry links Csepel to

Soroksár Soroksár () is the 23rd district of Budapest, Hungary. List of mayors Twin towns - twin cities * Törökbálint – Hungary * Nürtingen – Germany * Odorheiu Secuiesc – Romania * Tvardica – Bulgaria * Tongzhou (Beijing) – Ch ...

. By car Csepel can be reached by crossing the Kvassay Bridge (''Kvassay híd''), Gubacsi Bridge (''Gubacsi híd''), the D-14 ferry, or via the

M0 motorway The M0 motorway is a beltway, ringroad around Budapest, the capital of Hungary. The ring presently connects motorways M1 motorway (Hungary), M1, M7 motorway (Hungary), M7, M6 motorway (Hungary), M6, M5 motorway (Hungary), M5, M4 motorway (Hungary ...

. A separated bike path is also maintained across the Kvassay and Gubacsi Bridges.

History

Csepel Island became the personal domain of

Árpád Árpád (; 845 – 907) was the head of the confederation of the Magyar tribes at the turn of the 9th and 10th centuries. He might have been either the sacred ruler or '' kende'' of the Hungarians, or their military leader or '' g ...

after the migration of Hungarians into

Pannonia Pannonia (, ) was a Roman province, province of the Roman Empire bounded on the north and east by the Danube, on the west by Noricum and upper Roman Italy, Italy, and on the southward by Dalmatia (Roman province), Dalmatia and upper Moesia. It ...

in the early 10th century. It remained a favourite resort of the Hungarian kings in the Middle Ages. From 1484 onwards Csepel was the wedding present to future Hungarian queens. The Ottoman Turks destroyed the village and the royal manor house in the 16th century. At the end of the 17th century, Serb refugees from Turkish-occupied Serbia settled here. At the beginning of the 18th century

Prince Eugene of Savoy Prince Eugene Francis of Savoy-Carignano (18 October 1663 – 21 April 1736), better known as Prince Eugene, was a distinguished Generalfeldmarschall, field marshal in the Army of the Holy Roman Empire and of the Austrian Habsburg dynasty durin ...

, owner of the island, re-established the settlement and populated it with German colonists. It became an independent municipality in 1742. The original village was located in the present-day

freeport Freeport, a variant of free port, may refer to: Arts, entertainment, and media * Freeport, name of several space stations in the video game ''Freelancer'' (2003) * Freeport, a fictional town in the video game ''SiN'' (1998) * ''Freeport: The Cit ...

( Szabadkikötő) area but it was destroyed by the great flood of 1838. The new village was built on higher ground, in present-day

Ófalu Ófalu () is a village in Pécsvárad District of Baranya County in Hungary Hungary is a landlocked country in Central Europe. Spanning much of the Pannonian Basin, Carpathian Basin, it is bordered by Slovakia to the north, Ukraine to the ...

(Old Village). The town had a population of 9462 according to the 1910 census (the ethnic composition was 84% Hungarian and 18% German). Formerly it was a working-class borough with several factories; there was even a bicycle named ''Csepel''. During the

Hungarian Revolution of 1956 The Hungarian Revolution of 1956 (23 October – 4 November 1956; ), also known as the Hungarian Uprising, was an attempted countrywide revolution against the government of the Hungarian People's Republic (1949–1989) and the policies caused by ...

in Budapest, Hungarian fighters made their last stand in Csepel. Today, Csepel contains housing estates as well as middle-class garden suburbs. The district is home to the sports club

Csepel SC Csepel SC () is a Hungary, Hungarian sports club based in Csepel, the XXI district of Budapest, which is on an island in the Danube in the south of the city. The club was formed in 1912 as ''Csepeli Torna Klub'' ("gymnastics club"). The Csepel ...

Population

Ethnic groups (2001 census): *

Magyars Hungarians, also known as Magyars, are an ethnic group native to Hungary (), who share a common culture, language and history. They also have a notable presence in former parts of the Kingdom of Hungary. The Hungarian language belongs to the ...

– 92.4% *

Germans Germans (, ) are the natives or inhabitants of Germany, or sometimes more broadly any people who are of German descent or native speakers of the German language. The Basic Law for the Federal Republic of Germany, constitution of Germany, imple ...

– 0.7% *

Romani Romani may refer to: Ethnic groups * Romani people, or Roma, an ethnic group of Indo-Aryan origin ** Romani language, an Indo-Aryan macrolanguage of the Romani communities ** Romanichal, Romani subgroup in the United Kingdom * Romanians (Romanian ...

– 0.7% * Others – 0.9% * No answer – 5.3% Religions (2001 census): *

Roman Catholic The Catholic Church (), also known as the Roman Catholic Church, is the largest Christian church, with 1.27 to 1.41 billion baptized Catholics worldwide as of 2025. It is among the world's oldest and largest international institut ...

– 41.4% *

Calvinist Reformed Christianity, also called Calvinism, is a major branch of Protestantism that began during the 16th-century Protestant Reformation. In the modern day, it is largely represented by the Continental Reformed Protestantism, Continenta ...

– 13% *

Greek Catholic Greek Catholic Church or Byzantine-Catholic Church may refer to: * The Catholic Church in Greece * The Eastern Catholic Churches The Eastern Catholic Churches or Oriental Catholic Churches, also known as the Eastern-Rite Catholic Churches, Ea ...

– 2.2% *

Lutheran Lutheranism is a major branch of Protestantism that emerged under the work of Martin Luther, the 16th-century German friar and Protestant Reformers, reformer whose efforts to reform the theology and practices of the Catholic Church launched ...

– 1.7% * Other (

Christian A Christian () is a person who follows or adheres to Christianity, a Monotheism, monotheistic Abrahamic religion based on the life and teachings of Jesus in Christianity, Jesus Christ. Christians form the largest religious community in the wo ...

) – 1% * Other (non-Christian) – 0.3% *

Atheists Atheism, in the broadest sense, is an absence of belief in the existence of deities. Less broadly, atheism is a rejection of the belief that any deities exist. In an even narrower sense, atheism is specifically the position that there no ...

– 25.1% * No answer, unknown – 15.2%

Landmarks

Noteworthy sights include the Baroque parish church built in 1770, the Csepel Gallery and Museum of Local History (newly moved to Szent Istvan ut. 230), and the Csepel Collection of Factory History.

List of mayors

Twin towns – sister cities

Csepel is twinned with: *

Băile Tușnad Băile Tușnad (; , ) is a town in Harghita County, Romania in eastern Transylvania. With a population of 1,372 (as of 2021), it is the smallest town in Romania by population. It is located at an altitude of in the southern reaches of the Ciuc ...

, Romania *

Gănești Gănești (, Hungarian pronunciation: ) is a commune in Mureș County, Transylvania, Romania. It is composed of four villages: Gănești, Păucișoara (''Küküllőpócsfalva''), Seuca (''Szőkefalva'') and Sub Pădure (''Erdőalja''). It also in ...

, Romania *

Kielce Kielce (; ) is a city in south-central Poland and the capital of the Świętokrzyskie Voivodeship. In 2021, it had 192,468 inhabitants. The city is in the middle of the Świętokrzyskie Mountains (Holy Cross Mountains), on the banks of the Silnic ...

, Poland *

Rijeka Rijeka (; Fiume ( �fjuːme in Italian and in Fiuman dialect, Fiuman Venetian) is the principal seaport and the List of cities and towns in Croatia, third-largest city in Croatia. It is located in Primorje-Gorski Kotar County on Kvarner Ba ...

, Croatia *

Salonta Salonta (; , colloquially , ; ) is a municipiu, city in Bihor County, in the geographical region of Crișana, north-western Romania, near the Hungarian border. Population According to the 2021 Romanian census, 2021 census, Salonta has a popu ...

, Romania *

Wołomin Wołomin is a town in the Warsaw metropolitan area in the Masovian Voivodship, seat of Wołomin County. Wołomin is situated approximately east of Warsaw, the capital of Poland, near the railway to Białystok. It has approximately 43,000 inhabit ...

, Poland

Gallery

Csepelcivertanlegi2.jpg Városháza, Csepel, civertan légi1.jpg Kisboldogasszony-templom, Csepel, civertan, légi3.jpg Csepelcivertanlegi4.jpg Csepelcivertanlegi5.jpg, Béke téri Stadion Csepelcivertanlegi6.jpg

References

External links

Official web site

Aerial photographs of Csepel
{{Districts of Budapest

Name

Location

Transportation

History

Population

Landmarks

List of mayors

Twin towns – sister cities

Gallery

See also

References

External links