Pécs is the industrial and cultural capital of the region,
with a population over 170.000. From street to street the character
of the city changes suddenly: medieval, Turkish, Baroque, early
20th century and vast new housing and shopping developments
in bigger-than-life socialist style.
The cultural collisions that created Pécs could not be more
succintly illustrated than in the main square, Széchenyi tér.
A Turkish mosque stands at one end of the long, canted plaza,
a Catholic church at the opposite end. On the mosque's dome
a cross surmounts a crescent with ambiguous symbolism.
