Ferenc Rákóczi II began the 8-year-war for liberty (from the Habsburg power) through two announcements written in 1703-ban in Brezan. He appointed Tamás Esze as general of the army and he gifted flags "Cum Deo pro Patria et Libertate" (With God for the country and for liberty) to the king. As a result of the fights a permanent Hungarian army and a free Hungarian state came to life. Though the war ended up in a failure, Rákóczi became one of the chief figures of Hungarian history.

The emperor arrived to Szeged on 20th July 1704. He managed to occupy the town, but the castle was to hard to conquer. On 13th August he finally turned away, but he circulated his important regulation about religious freedom. The people of Szeged still pay homage and reverence to Rákóczi.

The exhibition entitled Cum Deo pro Patria et Libertate opened (arranged by Konstantin Medgyesi and dr. Imre Orbán) in the Black House of the History Department of the Móra Ferenc Museum, on the 300th anniversary of the war for independence. The exhibition provides a taste of the weapons used at the time. An especially important item of all is a 17th century sward which was used by ordinary horsemen against heavily armed horsemen. The economic base of the war was provided by the financial reform, and to commemorate this the exhibition demonstrates notes of the times and later notes published in the memory of the war, such as our 50 Fts note recently used. The most cherished item of the exhibition is a document from 1710, whic contains the signature of the emperor. Also, the army command of general Antal Eszterházy (1709) is an interesting item in which he forbade the soldiers to torture the people of Szeged, for they were officially protected by Rákóczi.

The exhibition also deals with the reburial of the emperor in Kosice in 1906 and the Szegedian references of this, such as a horsemen statue of Rákóczi made by Junior György Vastagh. This statue is now erected in the Aradian Martyrs Sqare. The thought of erecting the statue here came to life when the train transporting the remainder of the emperor was passing through in Szeged in 1906.

There is another prominent item, which is the beautiful flag of the Rákóczi Union, with the writing on: Pressa resurco (Oppressed I Will Resurrect).