History of the old giant chestnut tree in King's Valley.Our chestnut tree has been standing here for centuries.
People considered its age to 800 years.
Its fate was predestinated in 1964 - no new branch has sprouted any more.
The conservation of the tree could not be solved locally, and as the rottening tree meant more and more threat, the tree was cut in february 1981. The exhibited trunk circle was built from the intact slices of the trunk itself.
For the first time Kalman Chernel attracted attention for this extraordinary sized chestnut tree in 1864. At this time the owner of the tree was Janos Stegmuller. Later on Gusztav Czeke donated the tree to the city of Koszeg in 1917. The leafy tree was still flourishing in the beginning of the century but it began to die during the next decades.
It was one of the largest trees of the country with its 1050cm perimeter. This size is represented by the trunk slices. The inner part of the trunk was completely rotten so the exact age of the tree could not be determined. The remaining healthy part contains 330 annual rings. Dividing the missing radius from the trunk by the average annual ring thickness you'll get 151 (+/- 20) years. Adding the counted annual rings you get 481 years. If you subtract it from the year of the last blossoming 1963 you get the year 1482.
It was the era under domination of King Mathias, more specificly the year when he conquered back Koszeg from the austrian emperor Friedrich III.