the first hungarian institutes abroad, the so-called collegium hungaricum, were established by kunó klebelsberg (minister of culture at the time) in the 1920s in order to build relations with the international scientific community (in vienna and berlin in 1924, in rome and paris in 1927). organising scientific life and education make up a fundamental part of the institutes’ activity even today. apart from differences shaped by history, there are also variations in the scope of activities, services and equipment of the institutes. some of them maintain libraries, hungarian language teaching centers and galleries in addition to their primary work in culture, education and organising science.