Corvinus Family

This short paper referring to a charter dated 1504 draws attention to the fact, that the son of King Matthias, John
Corvinus had also a son called Matthias. This is the only source that mentions his existence. Prince Matthias was born to this world in the last days of his father’s life or maybe even after his death in October, 1504. According to this newly discovered source surely he was born before the middle of December, and some months later, during the turn of the year 1504-1505 he followed his father to the grave. The choosing of the name is symbolic.

The present study examines the internal political situation of the Kingdom of Hungary between 1493 and 1496 through the example of a conflict opposing the two most powerful magnates
of the realm, palatine István Szapolyai, count of Szepes (today Spiš, Slovakia), and János Corvin, illegitimate son of king Matthias and then duke of Liptó. At the root of the conflict between the two
aristocrats lay a promise whereby upon the death of his father (6 April 1490) Corvin, still in the hope of obtaining the royal throne, had engaged himself to reimburse Szapolyai, then captain-in-chief of Austria, for the expenses and damages he had incurred in the defence of Vienna and the Duchy of Austria. Yet reimbursement failed to come along, and thus late in 1493 the count decided to take by way of force the castles of the Duchy of Liptó, which lay in the vicinity of his own estates and had been ascribed to him by the duke as a cover for his debts. The author devotes a separate chapter to the emergence of the Duchy of Liptó. This area in the northwestern corner of the Kingdom of Hungary had originally been held by the Polish Peter Komorowsky from the 1450s, with the comital title after 1468/69, until its confiscation by king Matthias in 1474. By 1479 at the latest Corvin had been accorded the ducal title. The Duchy comprised before all the castles of Likava (today Likavka and Árva (Oravský Podzámok), and the ispánates of Liptó and Árva counties. In the 1480s king Matthias also granted to his son the castles of Szklabinya (Sklabina) and Bajmóc (Bojnice), and the ispánates of Turóc and Nyitra counties that were attached to them. This territory which thus extended to four counties was administered in the name of Corvin by Máté Kiss of Cece as governor of the Duchy until his death in 1490.

Since after 1490 the duke was pressured by the growing burden of his debts into mortgaging three among his castles there to his own retainers, the palatine set about the validation of his claims
by taking Bajmóc in Nyitra county at the turn of 1493/94 in a way described minutiously in the present study. Through an analysis of the consequent events and the baronial groupings which played a role therein the author has come to the conclusion that early in 1493 a strong aristocratic opposition was formed against king Wladislaw II, who aimed to cut short his dependence from the
old barons of Matthias. The new coalition was headed at first by István Báthori, who had been removed from the voevodship of Transylvania at the beginning of 1493, and, after his death in June
1493, by Szapolyai himself, whose strongest allies were duke Lõrinc Újlaki and the renowned captain of king Matthias, Pál Kinizsi, then ispán of Temes. Under intense pressure from his baronial oppponents, the king’s rule ushered in a crisis in 1493–1494, one of the symptoms of which was the series of private wars which were fought then. This lay in the background of the secret treaty that Wladislaw II entered into with his own brother, the king of Poland, in the course of the Jagiellonian summit held at Lõcse (April-May 1494), which was directed in general against their respective disobedient subjects, but probably more concretely targeted at Szapolyai, whose lands lay along the
border between the two kingdoms. In order to buttress his own position at home, the king launched a brief campaign against the Ottomans in the autumn of 1494, and, upon hearing the news of
Kinizsi’s death, turned his army against the southern castles of duke Lõrinc Újlaki, the closest ally of palatine Szapolyai (November 1494–March 1495). The defeat inflicted upon the duke left palatine Szapolyai completely isolated, and with no other choice than to make peace with the king, which in fact happened in May 1495. The domestic political situation was consolidated thereby, and the palatine remained faithful to the ruler until his death in 1499.

Although in May 1495 the king did acknowledge the acquisitions and claims of Szapolyai with regard to the Duchy of Liptó, Corvin, who back in the summer of 1494 had been forced to ascribe the
castles of the Duchy to Szapolyai, profited from the weakening position of the palatine to withhold the castles of Likava and Árva. In the second half of 1495, fearing that the palatine would take the
two castles by assault, Corvin recruited mercenaries in Poland to thus strengthen his castles. Yet in the ensuing conflict the king took sides with Szapolyai, and launched an expedition against the ducal castles in Liptó on account of the induction of the Polish mercenaries. The expedition was led by the palatine himself, whose troops joined battle with the Poles sometime before 2 March 1496. Although the palatine emerged victorious, the castles continued to be garrisoned by Polish soldiers. Since in
the meantime duke Corvin had begun to intrigue against the royal court in Croatia, Wladislaw decided to suspend the operations in the north, and soon entered into a temporary settlement with
Corvin. Consequently, the two castles did not pass onto the hands of Szapolyai. The Polish mercenaries were eventually indemnified and paid by two retainers of Corvin, András and Mihály Horvát of Lomnica, who thereby retained the two castles by right of pledge. Likava and Árva were finally redeemed from the Horvát brothers by the widow and sons of István Szapolyai after the death
of Corvin and with the permission of his widow, Beatrix Frangepán, after 1505.

The study presents the county authorities of Hunedoara (Hungarian: Hunyad) county from the beginning of the 14th century until 1526. In each of the seven counties of the medieval Transylvania county authorities were composed of the comes (comes comitatus) and two noble magistrates (iudex nobilium). The comes was appointed by the voivode of Transylvania, who was a high dignitary of the Hungarian Kingdom selected by the king to be ruler of Transylvania, while the two noble magistrates were elected by the county nobility. In several cases the comes was not a local nobleman. All of the voivodes came from outside of Transylvania, and occasionally, they brought with them their familiares from Hungary. The voivode appointed from among these latter or from among Transylvanian noblemen the comes, who was mentioned as vicecomes in the charters (the voivode was regarded by the contemporaries as the „Supreme” comes of all seven Transylvanian counties). However, the comes sometimes appointed an assisstant, who was also called vicecomes. The comites of Hunedoara county were in the 14th century (from their first mention in 1333) and until the middle of the 15th century castellans of Deva (Hung.: Dşa), a royal castle administered by the voivode. In the 15th century the comites of Hunedoara county were sometimes also castellans of two other royal castles in that same county: of Haţg (Hung.: Hászeg) and of Hunedoara (Hung.: Vajdahunyad). Somewhen before 1444, the castle of Hunedoara was donated by the king of Hungary to John of Hunedoara (Hunyadi János), voivode of Transylvania (1441–1446), and from that time on the owner of this castle also became its castellan and the comes of Hunedoara county. The owner of the castle had the right to appoint an assistant instead of himself, who thus became comes of the county and castellan of Hunedoara castle. The noble magistrates of Hunedoara county were the representatives of the county nobility, and most probably were elected by them annually. They were without excep-tion local noblemen with smaller landed properties in Hunedoara county. County authorities performed mainly juridic tasks. The most important scene of their actions was the county court, the sedes iudiciaria, which was convoked probably at fortnightly intervals; between 1333–1390 on Wednesdays, and between 1395–1524 on Tuesdays. In Hunedoara county the county courts took place in Deva, Bârcea (Hung.: Barcsa) and later on in Băcia (Hung.: Bácsi). The county court had jurisdic-tion over noblemen only in matters of smaller interest (thievery, movable properties, tolls). Lawsuits for the division of landed properties could be initiated there, although the county court could not judge in the matter as such cases belonged to the noble as-semblies (congregatio generalis) led by the voivode. On the other hand, it was exactly this voivodal court which served as the appeal instance for the county court. Commis-sioned by the voivode or the vicevoivode, the county often participated in matters of interrogation of witnesses regarding landed properties and violent trespasses. Besides their jurisdictional functions, the county authorities operated as places of authentication (loca credibilia): they were authorized to draw up allegations known as „confessions” (fassio) about matters of smaller interest, like the procuratory (procuratoria), testamentary arrangements, the exchanging or the mortgaging of land-ed properties, settlement of smaller debts, agreements, objections. Only a few more than 60 documents issued by the county authorities have been preserved from the period preceding 1526. These documents were usually confirmed with the seal of the comes and of the two noble magistrates, although in 1490 an own seal of the county was produced, which is most probably the first county seal in the medieval Hungarian Kingdom. An appendix attached to the study lists the name of the comites, vicecomites and noble magistrates from the above mentioned period, as well as the time limits of their office holding.