Kálmán Széll de Duka et Szentgyörgyvölgy (8 June 1843 – 16 August 1915) was a Hungarian politician who served as Prime Minister of Hungary from 1899 to 1903. Early career He was born in the ancient Hungarian noble family Széll de Duka et Szentgyörgyvölgy, that originally hailed from Vas county, in the western region of the Kingdom of Hungary. His father was József Széll (1801-1871), ispán-regent of Vas county, and his mother was a noblewoman, Júlia Bertha de Felsőeőr (1817–1873). Among his Hungarian noble ancestors were his maternal grandfather, Ignác Bertha de Felsőeőr (1780-1847), vice-ispán of Vas county, jurist, landowner, and his maternal great-grandfather, József Sümeghy de Lovász et Szentmargitha (1757–1832), royal counselor, jurist, landowner, and vice-ispán of Zala County. He studied in Pest and Vienna, and in 1867 became deputy for the district of Szentgotthárd. He quickly garnered the reputation of being remarkably well informed on economic and financial questions. Széll was one of Ferenc Deák's confidants, whose ward, the daughter of the Hungarian poet Mihály Vörösmarty, he married. In 1875, he was finance minister in the cabinet of Kálmán Tisza, and as such imposed on himself the task of restoring the shattered credit of Hungary. In 1878, he concluded with Austria the first economic "balancing" (). At that time, the National Austrian Bank was changed, in conformity with this arrangement, into the Austro-Hungarian Bank, and Széll consolidated the Hungarian Rentes, and nearly succeeded in balancing the state finances. As he feared that this balance would again be upset by the occupation of Bosnia and Herzegovina, he resigned from the cabinet, incurring thereby the displeasure of the crown. He still kept his seat in parliament, and as deputy constantly criticized the financial policy of the Tisza cabinet. At the beginning of the 1880s Széll founded the Hungarian Mortgage Credit Bank, of which he was governor until the end of his life. He opened entirely new sources of credit for Hungarian agriculture. He declined repeated offers of the portfolio of finance. Prime Minister When Dezső Bánffy's ministry suffered a serious crisis at the end of 1898 and was compelled to resign in February 1899, Széll was entrusted with the formation of a new cabinet. By means of the Pact of 23 February 1899, he restored parliamentary peace. On the basis of the so-called Széll formula, a new Ausgleich with Austria until the year 1907 was concluded after long negotiations. The