The story of Hungary 20

The story of Hungary 20

The power and territory of Matthias Csák extended from the Northwestern

Carpathians to the Theiss and Danube. The castle of Trencsén was the

seat of this petty king. From this fortified castle on the Vág, built

on a rocky eminence near the commercial road leading from Silesia to

Hungary, he was in the habit of sending his marauders to devastate the

neighboring country. He pounced like a bird of prey from his rocky nest

upon the unwary merchants who were passing with their ships below, and

the poor traders esteemed themselves fortunate if they got safely off

by leaving a portion of their wares in the freebooter’s hands. The

plunder thus got together enabled him to display royal pomp, and such

was the dazzling sumptuousness and luxury exhibited at his castle that,

compared to it, the king’s palace seemed to be but a poor hut. Csák had

his own palatine treasurer and other officers of high rank, and when he

went about he was attended by an escort of several thousand armed men.

It was only after a good deal of solicitation that Csák consented to

receive the Pope’s legate, Cardinal Gentilis, and even then the legate

had to meet Csák at the place specified by the latter, who wished this

church dignitary to understand that he should feel highly honored by

being permitted to shake his hand.

 

In the beginning, Csák seemed to submit to Charles, and, swearing

fealty to the king, he consented to be represented at the third

coronation. In order to win Csák’s friendship and support, Charles made

him the _Guardian of the Land_. But this new honor did not prevent him

from very soon becoming weary of his subordinate position, and when a

law had been passed ordering the restitution of the royal castles and

domains which had come into the possession of subjects or strangers,

his wish to be independent became even greater than before. An armed

contest soon ensued between the king and his powerful subject. It

was preceded, however, by a papal excommunication of Csák and his

adherents, extending even to the dead, but the impious rebel retorted

by laying waste the lands of the neighboring high prelates. Csák’s

power stood at that time at its height. He was the master of a domain

containing over thirty fortified castles, which, to this day, is called

by the people, after him, Matthias Land, and it was quite natural that

the king was reluctant to beard the lion in his own den. The king’s

troops first entered the territory of Szepes, hoping to find there the

weak point of the antagonist, but they were compelled to retreat before

the captains of Csák. The decisive battle took place in 1312, north of

the town of Kassa. The engagement was sharp and bloody, and terminated

in the defeat of Csák’s men. The ancestors of the Báthorys, Tökölyis,

Drugets, and Széchenyis, who were amongst the most powerful families

in Hungary, fought on this occasion by the side of the king. Although

humbled, Csák’s power was not greatly impaired, for we find him, a few

years later, strong and bold enough to attack John, king of Bohemia,

and take from him the fortified castle of Holics.

 

Charles Robert then turned his attention to his other rebellious

subjects, reducing them to submission, one by one, leaving Csák to be

dealt with by Providence. He had not, however, to wait very long, for

in 1321 this great lord died. The manner of his death is described

to have been frightful. Worms generated by his own body consumed him

slowly. There was no one after his death to inherit his vast estates

and with them his great power. Matthias Land was divided up in smaller

sections, and distributed amongst the king’s favorites. The subjects of

Csák, amongst them his palatine Felician Zách, submitted at once to the

king.

 

The king’s attention was too much engaged by this domestic warfare to

allow him, while it lasted, to display the energy which marked the

subsequent years of his reign, an energy which was destined to make

Hungary an influential power in Central Europe. During these days of

civil strife he had his seat in Temesvár, and his household was so

little befitting royalty that its poverty frequently elicited the

complaints of the higher clergy. But matters quietly changed when

Charles transferred his residence to Visegrád, the royal palace to

which cling so many fond and sad national memories, and which in our

days still, though in ruins, looms up on the right bank of the Danube

as a monument of Hungary’s ancient power and glory. Charles was full of

ambitious schemes to raise his family to the greatest possible power,

and the extension of the power of Hungary was deemed by him to be the

readiest means of accomplishing this aim. First of all he stood in need

of money and soldiers, but his genius enabled him to procure both. He

exploited the rich mines of the country, and raised the commerce and

industry of the realm to a flourishing condition, and the wealth of the

people increased to such an extent that he felt warranted in levying

direct taxes, a mode of taxation which had before been entirely unknown

in Hungary. The manner in which he created an army bears witness to his

ingenuity. The county system had become so loose and disorganized that

no soldiers could be expected from that source. He had to look for them

in another quarter. Charles knew, very well, the chivalrous disposition

of the nation, which, in the matter of display, had still preserved its

Oriental character; he knew, too, from history, that those who appealed

to the vanity of the Hungarian were never disappointed, and he laid his

plans accordingly. He transplanted into Hungary one of the graceful

institutions of Western Europe, that of chivalry. Knights there were

in the country, but they were not numerous and had not proved to be

enthusiastic adherents of the king. Charles understood how to win

the affections of the great lords; he distributed coats-of-arms and

founded orders. In the wide courts of the castle of Visegrád, knightly

tournaments became frequent, and the new knights, with their fresh

heraldic devices, had an opportunity of meeting each other in armed

combat in the presence of their foreign king. The king’s court came to

be the resort of noble youths, and boys of noble descent became the

playmates of the royal princes. In order to rouse the warlike spirit

of his great nobles, he allowed those of them who joined in a campaign

with a certain number of soldiers, to lead their men under banners

bearing their own armorial devices.

 

An event, however, of most tragic issue, which has furnished a

fruitful theme to Hungarian poets and artists, almost overthrew the

effect of the king’s wise policy and endangered his life. The scene

of the occurrence, which took place on the 17th of April, 1330, was

the magnificent palace of Visegrád. The former palatine of Csák,

Felician Zách, had become one of the king’s chief councillors, and he,

with his daughter Clara, one of the queen’s maids of honor, a lady

of extraordinary beauty, resided in the king’s palace. Casimir, the

King of Poland, and the queen’s brother, was at the time a guest at

Visegrád, and during his stay there, behaved improperly towards Clara

Zách. The infuriated father, on learning this, broke in upon the royal

family sitting in the dining-hall, and intent upon avenging the affront

offered to his daughter, threatened every one in his way. He fell with

sword drawn upon the royal children and their parents. The children

remained unhurt, but the king was seriously wounded, and the queen had

four of her fingers cut off. John Cselényi, the queen’s treasurer,

finally rushed to the rescue and felled the exasperated father with

his bronze pole-axe to the ground, and the alarmed servants, who had

meanwhile hastened to the hall, gave the miserable man, in presence

of the royal family, the _coup de grace_. A frightful and most cruel

punishment was inflicted, for her father’s bloody act, on the unhappy

Clara and all the members of the Zách family. The maiden’s ears, nose,

lips, and hands were cut off, and in this condition she was tied,

together with her brother, to a horse’s tail, and dragged through

the land until both died a miserable death. The Zách family were

exterminated to the third degree, and the remoter kinspeople doomed to

slavery. Such a sentence upon those who had committed no crime was a

most vindictive and savage one, and the people saw the avenging finger

of God in the results of the unhappy campaign of that year against the

Wallachians. One of the chronicles, referring to the disastrous issue

of the war, says: “The king had hitherto sailed under favorable signs,

and cut, according to his heart’s desire, through the stormy waves with

the ship of his fortune. But changeable fortune had now turned her

back upon him. His army had been defeated, and he himself is suffering

tortures from his gouty hands and feet.”

 

Ban Michael Bazarád, then the ruler of Wallachia, dared to ignore

his dependence on the crown of Hungary. Charles eagerly seized the

opportunity to punish the traitorous vassal, and hoped, at the same

time, that the indignation of the people against him for his cruelty

would subside at the news of a victorious campaign against the

Wallachians. Declining the offers of peace made by the repentant ban,

Charles boldly advanced, with his spirited knights, over the impassable

and unfamiliar roads of Wallachia. He had penetrated so far into the

land that his further advance was rendered impossible by the absence

of any road, and he was determined to retrace his steps. The Hungarian

army was led astray by the Wallachian guides, and in retreating found

itself quite unexpectedly hemmed in between steep and towering rocks

from which there was no outlet. A shower of stones descended on their

heads; the Wallachians who occupied the heights sent down dense volleys

of rocks and arrows upon the doomed Hungarians. Charles himself owed

his escape to the generous devotion of Desiderius Szécsi, one of his

men, with whom he changed dresses. This brave warrior sealed his

devotion with his life. The enraged Wallachians, mistaking him for the

king, attacked him from every side, and after valiantly resisting, he

finally fell on the battle-field. His sovereign escaped in safety, and

Wallachia maintained her independence.

 

Charles, upon his return home, once more busied himself with the

carrying out of his ambitious schemes for the aggrandizement of

his family, and the results of his efforts gave ample proof of his

political sagacity. He acquired for his family both Naples and Poland,

although as yet on paper only. Poland became only under his son Louis

the undoubted possession of the Hungarian king, while Naples never came

under his control. In 1335 Visegrád resounded incessantly with the din

of feasting and merrymaking; never before nor afterwards were so many

royal guests harbored within its stately walls. There were Casimir,

become King of Poland, the last descendant of the Piast family; John,

the adventurous King of the Czechs, who subsequently died the death of

a hero on the field of Crécy; his son Charles, the Margrave of Moravia,

and subsequently Emperor of Germany; three knights of the first class

belonging to the order of German Knights; the dukes of Saxony and

Liegnitz, and numerous church and lay magnates. The entertainment of

so many distinguished guests constituted a heavy draft on the royal

treasury. A contemporary chronicler states that “fifteen hundred loaves

of bread and one hundred and eighty flasks of wine were needed daily

for the court of the king of Poland.” Whilst the guests were feasting,

Charles employed all his ingenuity in shaping the destinies of Eastern

Europe. His negotiations with Casimir, the King of Poland, resulted in

an agreement that Poland should descend, after his death, to Louis,

the son of Charles. Two years later Charles had the satisfaction of

learning that the Polish nation had confirmed the private arrangement,