Prof. Dr. Mária Schmidt

Széchenyi Prize-laureate historian, Director General of the Foundation for Research on Central and Eastern European History and Society. She has been university professor at the Pázmány Péter Catholic University since 2010. She has held postgraduate scholarships and been a visiting lecturer at universities around the world. She was a senior adviser to the Prime Minister from 1998 to 2002. She was Government Commissioner responsible for the commemorative year of the 1956 Revolution and Freedom Fight between 2015 and 2017, for the commemoration of the First World War between 2018 and 2020 and the commemorative year “30 Years of Freedom” between 2019 and 2022.  She has received numerous national and international awards for her work, in 2014 she was awarded the Széchenyi Prize, and in 2023 she was awarded the Middle Cross of the Hungarian Order of Merit with the Star, Civilian category. She has written numerous works of history.