HISTORY (After WWI)
At the collapse of the Austria-Hungary Empire at the end of the first World war, the Hungarians declared themselves independent. Benefiting from circumstances, the communist party managed to conquer the power and controlled Hungarian Soviet republic during three months in 1919.
The communist regime fast arrived at its end, and was followed by another tragedy for the Hungarians: the treaty of Trianon in 1920 by which 2/3 of the territory of the country was lost, and only 1/3 remained Hungarian, which corresponds to what we call Hungary today. Then Admiral Horthy establishes then an authoritarian government and ultra conservative. During the Second World War, the Hungarians fought beside the Germans, but they tried to withdraw from the war in 1944. So the Germans came to occupy the country. The freedom was then regained thanks to the communist troops in 1945. They occupied all of the country and through their influence Hungary gradually became a communist satellite state of the Soviet Union, and in 1948 a democratic republic under the dictator Rakosi.
The communists governed the country from 1945 till 1989 (except for a small period during the revolution of 1956). Since, Hungary found all its independence in 1989, and although the policy can seem a little bit unstable, the freedom was got back and the country is getting better. Hungary is member of the European Union since 2004.
(References : Wikipedia, http://www.europa-planet.com/hongrie/histoire.htm, www.hongrietourisme.com )

Major languages and any ethnic religion
For 95% of the population the mother language is Hungarian, but there are some German speaker (1.2%) and a very few other eastern languages.
According to a survey of Eurostat in 2005, 44% of them are believers. And the big majority of them are catholic, and 19.5% are protestants ( Demographic data – Hungarian Central Statistical Office 2001). There are some jews too