Shoes on the Danube Bank

Sixty pairs of iron shoes, cast in the styles of the 1940s and bolted to the stone embankment a few hundred metres south of the Parliament.

They mark the place where members of the Arrow Cross militia shot Jewish residents of Budapest into the river during the winter of 1944–45. The victims were made to take off their shoes at the water's edge first, because leather had value and the bodies were carried away by the current.

The memorial was created in 2005 by the sculptor Gyula Pauer to a concept by the film director Can Togay. It has no plinth, no railing and no figures. The shoes are worn, scuffed, some fallen on their sides, arranged as if just stepped out of — men's, women's, and small ones.

Its power is entirely in the restraint. There is nothing to look up at and nothing explaining how to feel; you come across it at ankle height while walking the promenade, and understanding it takes a moment longer than seeing it.

People leave candles, flowers and pebbles in them. It is on the open embankment, free, and accessible at any hour — and it is worth going at a quiet one.