Then, instead of leaving, she too kissed her son good-bye and placed him in King Stephen’s arms.  “Rear him as if he were your own son.  When he grows up, tell him about his father.  Tell him that Prince Thonuzoba died an honorable death and that his only sin was his loyalty to the god of his forefathers.”

One of the better-known tragic legends about the Christianization of Hungary is that of Thonuzoba, prince of the pagan Pechenegs. On King Stephen's orders, Thonuzoba and his wife were buried alive for refusing to convert (woodcut by Joseph Mor).

Upon this Thonuzoba’s young wife stepped into the grave and clung to her husband: “I have sworn to be faithful to my husband unto death, and to follow him to the grave.  And upon the words of my ancestors, I cannot break my vow.”

Hearing this, the priests of the new God went to work.  But as the grave of Prince Thonuzoba and his loyal wife was being filled to the brim, the sky turned angry with rain.  The old god was crying, mourning the fate of his children.  But amidst all the thunder and lightning, one could still hear the reverberating sound of the Hymn of the Dead—until that too died out.

Thonuzoba's son, Orkond, grew up be a valiant prince.  He became the founder of the powerful Tomaj clan.  King Stephen reared him as a Christian, but Orkond was never able to wipe out the memory of his parents.  Once every summer, on the night of a full moon, he visited their unmarked grave near the place where Magyar tradition had placed the burial ground of the mighty King Attila.  There, Orkond prayed for their souls.  And although a true Christian, he often found himself praying to the old god.  It was said that he could sense the presence of his long-departed forefathers and feel their breath upon him.

Thus, the Christianization of Hungary came at a heavy price, with heroes and villains on both sides.  Some of these heroes fell victim to Christianity; others became victims of the unavoidable pagan reaction, like the saintly bishop Gerard, or Gellert. He was a Venetian nobleman who had played a major role in the Christianization of Hungary.

After King Stephen's death, however, the followers of the old faith caught Gerard and cast him into the Danube from a hill overlooking present-day Budapest. It still bears his name: Szent Gellerthegy (Saint Gerard's hill). His life and his achievements are the subjects of a number of legends.