József Tihamér Antall de Dörgicse et Kisjene was born to an ancient Hungarian family from the lower nobility in Budapest on 8 April 1932.

Her father, István Szűcs (born Hermann Frankl), also became a political figure during the First World War and the interwar period.

After graduating from high school, he studied Hungarian language and literature at the Eötvös Loránd University as well as history and archival science.

Defunct Antall was delegated to the National Roundtable Talks by the Hungarian Democratic Forum on 22 March 1989 and worked in the committee on constitutional reform.

On 21 October 1989 he was elected President of the Hungarian Democratic Forum (MDF) by an overwhelming majority, thus becoming the party's official candidate for prime minister.

The MDF was heavily tipped to win the 1990 elections, and as expected won a sweeping victory with 164 seats, just short of a majority.

He played a great role in the dissolution of the Warsaw Pact and the termination of the Comecon as well as in the withdrawal of the occupying Russian forces in 1991.

In 1991, in Strasbourg, he was awarded with the Robert Schuman Prize for his activities aimed at uniting Europe as well as extending Hungary's European relations.

As prime minister, Antall oversaw the establishment of a legal system to promote a market economy and attract foreign investment.

Older, retired people, more than one-fifth of the population, suffered the most, and the living standards of more than one-third of the populace declined to below subsistence level.

Conflict over their powers erupted between him and Hungary's president, Árpád Göncz, who belonged to the opposing party, the Alliance of Free Democrats.

[7] In the realm of domestic politics, Antall had to face hardships during his career: the taxi-blockade in Budapest in 1990[8] and the withdrawal of the Independent Smallholders' Party from the coalition government forced him to restructure his cabinet in February 1992;[9] that reorganisation ultimately saved his administration from being toppled.

Within MDF, Antall was continuously attacked by István Csurka who later on set into motion a stand-alone movement, thus Hungarian Justice and Life Party (MIÉP) came into existence.

[10] A day before his death, Antall was awarded Grand Cross of the Hungarian Order of Merit by President Árpád Göncz on 11 December 1993.

The announcement of Antall's death happened on a Sunday afternoon, during which the state television channel Magyar Televízió was airing a DuckTales episode called "A Whale of a Bad Time", as part of The Disney Afternoon; at 18:08,[13] mid-cartoon the screen abruptly went black, after which the station logo was shown, and eventually Frédéric Chopin's Funeral March began playing.