The story of Hungary

by Ármin Vámbéry

The fortunes of war were once more propitious to the Hungarians—in their war against Venice—but for several years afterwards history records nothing but a long series of uninterrupted disasters. The war with Venice was carried on to get possession of the littoral islands and cities. Venice was shamefully beaten, and the peace-suing ambassadors of the proud city of St. Mark had to undergo the humiliation of seeing before their very eyes nineteen of their flags torn to pieces in the streets of Buda. But the new banners of Venice were soon destined to be victoriously planted on the Hungarian littoral territory, and Sigismund was compelled to sign a peace by which the nation lost her seacoast possessions. And while the power of Venice was curtailing the country in the south, the richest towns in the north were being lost through the recklessness of Sigismund. In order to extricate himself from financial embarrassments he hypothecated to Ladislaus, the king of Poland, thirteen of the wealthiest cities of the Szepes country, which was largely settled by German merchants and tradesmen. These places remained hypothecated until the first partition of Poland, 1772, when Hungary was reinstated in the full possession of the mortgaged towns. After arranging these affairs the king went abroad, where he remained for six years. During his absence the country, owing to the despotic rule of Barbara, his queen, became a prey to disorder. It would cover pages unprofitably to give a detailed account of the private affairs of the wanton queen, and, passing over these, we shall accompany her royal husband on his journey to the Council of Constance.

The condition of the Church of Rome was at that period a most lamentable one. The question of reforms within the Church became from day to day more pressing. Wycliffe, the Englishman, had the boldness to assume the rôle of a heretic. John Huss, the rector of the university of Prague, soon became a zealous propagator of his teachings. The majority of the inhabitants of Bohemia embraced the new tenets, assuming, after their leader, the name of “Hussites.” One of the chief objects of the Council of Constance—1414-1418—was to extirpate heresy, and to exterminate its votaries. Numerous ecclesiastical and lay lords gathered at Constance to advise together under the guidance of the emperor-king, who presided. The attending Hungarian magnates deemed it due to their fame and dignity to indulge in the most extravagant luxury. The emperor-king felt constrained to eclipse his subjects in sumptuous display on such an occasion, and, in order to accomplish this, he had to sell Brandenburg to Frederick of Hohenzollern, and there can be no doubt that through this sale he unwittingly contributed to the future greatness of the present imperial dynasty in Germany. We will not attempt to describe here the Council of Constance, but need only mention that it was the treachery and bad faith of Sigismund which caused the tragic end and martyrdom of John Huss. His disciples vowed vengeance, and Hungary, of all the dominions of the emperor-king, was, during many years, most exposed to their cruel devastations.

After an absence of six years, during which Sigismund had visited Germany, France, Italy, and England, he at length returned to Hungary. He found the country unsettled, and menaced on two sides by powerful enemies. Having sent his wife, the cause of the internal disorders, to prison, he led an army against the Turks, who were threatening the southern portion of the country. Before describing the events of that campaign let us cast a rapid glance at the condition of the Moslem world in Europe. A dreadful blow had fallen on the Ottoman empire in July, 1402. Timur, the Central-Asian conqueror, destroyed the Turkish army near Angora, and captured the person of the redoubtable Bajazet himself. The impaired power of the Ottoman empire was still more weakened by the internecine strife between Bajazet’s sons. Mohammed I. emerged at last as the victorious sultan, and in his person the warlike qualities of his ancestors reappeared once more on the throne of the Osmanlis. The rulers of Servia and Moldavia very soon acknowledged his sovereignty. Hervoja, the Bosnian boyar, followed their example. The three captains of Sigismund, John Maróty, John Garay, and Paul Csupor, marched against the latter. The engagement resulted in the victory of Hervoja. Csupor was taken prisoner, while his fellow-captains sought safety in an ignominious flight. Csupor, years ago, had scoffingly greeted Hervoja, when at the Hungarian court, by bellowing like an ox, and the victor, now remembering the affront put upon him, revenged himself by having the ill-fated captain sewn into an ox’s skin, and telling him: “Now thou canst bellow as much as thou likest; thou hast also the shape of an ox.” He caused him to be thrown into the water, where he was drowned.

Meanwhile Stephen Lazarevitch, the Prince of Servia, became weary of the Turkish alliance, and with a view to securing to his nephew, George Brankovitch, the succession in Servia, he sought the aid of Sigismund, offering to surrender to him several important fortified places along the Danube for his services. The Prince of Servia died in 1428, and Sigismund claimed the possession of the places promised to him. The Servian commander of Galambócz, one of the strongest of these fortresses, however, treacherously allowed it to pass into the hands of the Turks. It was to re-possess himself of this fortress, which he could not permit to remain in Moslem hands, that Sigismund marched against the enemy. He had nearly succeeded in capturing it, when news reached him that Sultan Murad II. was approaching. Sigismund did not dare to engage in battle with such overpowering numbers, and having stipulated for himself and his army free passage, he pusillanimously gave up the siege. Yet the Hungarians were just beginning to cross the Danube, when the Turks, breaking faith, attacked them. Sigismund himself was in great danger, and he owed his escape only to the heroism of Cecilia Rozgonyi, the wife of the captain-in-chief, who facilitated his flight in a galley steered by herself. This was Sigismund’s last armed encounter with the Turks, and its issue did by no means add to his laurels.

The remaining years of Sigismund’s reign were taken up with the organization of the defences of the country and with continual warfare against the Czech Hussites in the north. Wenceslaus, the king of Bohemia, died in 1419, and Sigismund endeavored to obtain his brother’s crown. The Czechs hated the executioner of their beloved spiritual teacher, and conceded to Sigismund the Bohemian crown only after a hard and protracted struggle. Hungary had to suffer for the ambition of her king, for, during these struggles, the exasperated Czechs, on more than one occasion, laid waste her territories in the north-west. Sigismund, however, did not allow himself to be deterred from pursuing his aim. Acting upon the principle of divide et regna, he very sensibly conciliated a portion of the Czechs by granting them religious reforms, and whilst the people were desperately fighting among themselves he succeeded in securing the crown of Bohemia.

Sigismund may be said to have reached the goal of all his wishes. He united on his head the crowns of imperial Germany, Hungary, and Bohemia. Yet, on the whole, he was not a happy man. His wife Barbara had regained her freedom and was embittering the last days of the sickly monarch. This ambitious woman coveted the crown of Hungary, and in order to obtain it she was scheming, first of all, to hinder the succession of Albert, the son-in-law of the emperor-king. With this view she entered into negotiations with Ladislaus III., the king of Poland, the purport of which was that he should marry her after Sigismund’s demise, and thus unite the dominions of the king of Hungary with Poland. The arrangement was nearly concluded when these intrigues were discovered by Sigismund. He deprived his wife once more of her liberty, and hastened from Bohemia to Hungary to prevail upon the Estates to accept Albert’s succession, and then to turn his steps towards Transylvania to put down the rebellion that had broken out there. The peasantry of Transylvania, having a leaning towards the teachings of Huss, were exposed to constant persecutions. They were also oppressed by burdensome taxes, and finally, goaded on by their unhappy condition, they rose in arms against their tyrants. The massacred nobility and burning villages bore witness to the exasperation of the peasantry. Fate prevented Sigismund from either meeting the estates or quelling the Transylvanian rising. He was overtaken by death at Znaym, in Moravia, in December, 1437. His dead body and the captive queen arrived in Hungary one week later. His remains were conveyed from Presburg to Grosswardein to be placed there by the side of his first wife, Mary, and at the feet of St. Ladislaus. It is rather saddening to reflect that, after a reign of fifty years, his funeral procession should have been lighted by the glare from the burning villages of Transylvania, set on fire by her own peasantry.

CHAPTER IX.
JOHN HUNYADI (HUNIADES), THE GREAT CHAMPION OF CHRISTIANITY.
1456.

Very little, if any thing, is known of the father of John Hunyadi, or of the pedigree of his family; indeed, the very circumstances of his birth are shrouded in dim legendary light, and yet he looms up all at once in the proud position of governor of Hungary, the adored idol of his country, and the admiration of all Christian Europe. It was owing to his exertions that his family became great, rich, and powerful, but, at the same time, he guarded Hungary against the evils of domestic war, and saved her from Moslem rule. He served his country in the capacity of a brave soldier, an eminent general, and a cautious and energetic statesman, lending her the aid of his strong arm, his undaunted courage, and his clear understanding.