I wish to blow it once more before I die.”  Upon the emperor’s bidding, Lehel was given his beautifully carved, silver-inlaid horn.  He raised it to his lips and began to play a mournful death-call.  It reverberated throughout the city and even reached the far-off battlefield, where half-dead warriors raised their heads and began to grasp for their swords.

As his horn fell silent and as the listeners were still entranced, Lehel leaped forward and brought the heavy horn down upon the head of the treacherous Conrad.  In doing so, he cried: “Thou shalt go before me, traitor!  And thou shalt be my servant in the world beyond!”  He did this because he believed, as did the Scythians, that those whom they killed in battle would be their servants in the next world.

Lehel and Bulcsu were then taken to Regensburg and executed. They died believing that Conrad was already waiting to serve them in the afterlife, as befitted a traitor.

Only seven Magyar warriors survived the battle of Lechfeld.  Emperor Otto had their ears cut off and then sent them home to tell about his victory.  But at home the mutilated survivors found no sympathy.  They were ostracized by their families and clans for failing to die like heroes.  They were called gyaszmagyarok (Cowardly Magyars) and were forced to make their living roaming the countryside as begging minstrels.  They sang about the sad fate and heroism of Princes Lehel and Bulcsu, and their defeated men.

With time, Lehel’s horn was returned to Hungary, to be displayed in the town of Jaszbereny.  The crack made when Lehel crushed the traitor Conrad’s skull is still visible today.

The defeat suffered by the Magyars at Augsburg in the year 955—in the battle the Germans call Ungarnschlacht (Destruction of Hungarians)—was also a turning point in Hungarian history.  Dukes Taksony (reigned 952-72) and Geza (reigned 972-77) gradually extended their control over the regional princes and put a stop to their marauding expeditions. 

Geza also began to toy with the idea of Christianizing his people and turning Hungary into an accepted member of the European community of nations.  This goal, however, was not reached until his son Vajk, the later King Saint Stephen, ascended the throne, first as duke (907) and then as king of Hungary (1000-1038).