Corona Angelica Pannoniae: '...ecce Angelus Domini' (original) (raw)
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THE HUNGARIAN HOLY CROWN, 2020
This book examines the Hungarian Holy Crown, also known in the West as the Crown of Saint Stephen, from an engineer's point of view, with the aim to determine the most probable manufacturing process of the crown along with its manufacturing place and time. The Holy Crown consists of two main parts: the hoop with a diadem and pendants-also called the corona graeca-and the cross straps-also called the corona latina. These two parts were originally believed to have been made independently at different times; and it was assumed that the hoop was older. Here I can demonstrate that the cross straps are older, and the hoop was made later to achieve a complete crown. As a consequence, it becomes evident that the hoop is not older and had not existed before as an independent Byzantine crown. It can be assumed that the cross straps were made in the Trier-Essen workshop before 1000, while the fully functioning crown was assembled for the coronation of Stephen in 1001. These findings are in line with legends from the 11th century, which say that the crown was sent by Pope Sylvester II to King Stephen.
Royal Saints, Artistic Patronage, and Self-representation among Hungarian Noblemen
Vestnik of Saint Petersburg University. History / ВЕСТНИК САНКТ-ПЕТЕРБУРГСКОГО УНИВЕРСИТЕТА. ИСТОРИЯ, 2021
During the 1401–1403 political crisis in the Kingdom of Hungary, the magnates who were hostile to the ruling King Sigismund of Luxemburg and supported instead the Angevin King Ladislas of Naples deployed a wide range of propaganda tools for proving the legitimacy of their political cause. In a previous study published in this journal (Vestnik of SPbSU. History, 2021, vol. 66, issue 1, рp. 179–192), I have focused on the Hungarian noblemen’s anti-royal propaganda through the utilizing of political and spiritual symbols (i. e., the Holy Crown of Hungary and the cult, relics, and visual representations of St. Ladislas), symbolic actions (coronations and oath-swearing on holy relics), and heraldic self-representation (the Árpádian double cross). The present study approaches the same topic of anti-royal propaganda in the troubled political context of the early 15th century, but from the perspective of the elites’ self-representation strategies via the cult of Hungarian royal saints, artistic patronage, and heraldic self-representation. The two leaders of the anti-royal movement, Archbishop of Esztergom John Kanizsai and Palatine of Hungary Detre Bebek, repeatedly commissioned works of art (i.e., seals, stained-glass windows, and wall paintings) which featured prominently the images of the three Holy Kings of Hungary (Sts Stephen, Emeric, and Ladislas) or displayed the realm’s coat of arms (the Árpádian two-barred cross). The reliance of John Kanizsai and Detre Bebek on the cults and images of the patron saints of the country blended harmoniously the commissioners’ personal piety with their political ambitions. In the context of the early-15th century political crisis, the appropriation of the ideal figures of the sancti reges Hungariae became the driving force behind the Hungarian noblemen’s political cause.
"Sancti reges Hungariae" in Mural Painting of Late-medieval Hungary
2009
This research analyzes from an iconographic perspective the mural representations of the three holy kings of Hungary – St. Stephen, St. Emeric, and St. Ladislas – which were depicted as a collective in the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries. Previous scholars have considered that this iconographic theme emerged generally in the Angevin age without an attempt at its precise identification; the meaning of the sancti reges Hungariae iconography has been interpreted as the expression of the national values that the holy kings had embodied since the beginnings of their depiction as a trio. The goal of the thesis is to identify a more precise time for the concept’s emergence, to emphasize the iconographic similarities and differences of the separate and collective depiction of the three holy kings, and to recover the meaning that the frescoes had when they were created. The conclusion is, first, that the occurrence of the holy kings’ trio in the second half of the thirteenth century belongs to the beata stirps Arpadiana context, which also included the female sacred representatives of the dynasty, but the exclusive and politically charged concept of the sancti reges Hungariae is the result of the consistent strategy of King Louis the Great and his influential mother to promote the royal trio around the mid-fourteenth century. Second, I conclude that, although he was only a prince in his real life and separate iconography, St. Emeric finally became king in the sancti reges Hungariae iconography, where he is depicted with the royal dignity’s attributes (crown, scepter, and crucifer orb). Third and most significant, not all extant mural representations of the holy kings of Hungary should be judged as being the result of a political decision despite the common conceptual association of St. Stephen, St. Emeric, and St. Ladislas. As indicated by their dating and extrinsic characteristics (iconographic context and low visibility), the depiction of the holy kings on the pillars of the triumphal arch pre-dates the mid-fourteenth century and has an exclusively theological meaning: it emphasizes the role of St. Stephen as the apostle of the Hungarian Church (sanctissimus rex Stephanus ungarorum apostolus) and St. Ladislas as its defender (columpna milicie christianae). Political aspects began to pervade this type of representation in the first decades of the fifteenth century, when King Sigismund of Luxemburg made St. Sigismund, his personal Bohemian patron saint, the companion of the Hungarian royal saints, St. Stephen, St. Emeric, and St. Ladislas.
Györkös A.: The Saint and His Finger: Dominican Legends and Exempla from Thirteenth-Century Hungary
The implantation of the Black Friars in Hungary (1221) was followed by the emergence of Dominican written culture in Hungary. The major evidence of this activity was undoubtedly the Life of St Margaret (before 1274), but there were other attempts to collect legends or written accounts of miraculous acts from among members of the Order in Hungary. Numerous Vitae Dominici or exempla collections relate stories from the missionary work of the Friars in the Balkans and present the political influence of the Order of the Preachers in the kingdom of Hungary. But most of these legends concern a largely forgotten relic of St Dominic, which, indisputably, was one of his fingers. In this essay, I examine how a Dominican cult emerged around this complex activity of the Preachers in the Eastern frontiers of Western Christendom. I also show how the Hungarian exempla influenced the memory of St Dominic in the thirteenth century. Interestingly, late medieval Hungarian copies of Dominican collections do not include this "Eastern tradition" at all, and they make no mention either of the relic or of the stories inspired in the Hungarian milieu. A tradition is disappearing. In this essay, I make efforts to reestablish some of its elements through an analysis of the corpus of available documents.
Ars et Virtus. Croatia-Hungary: 800 Years Of Shared Cultural Heritage, 2020
The paper deals with examples of the cult of holy Hungarian rulers in the area of the Zagreb diocese in the 17th and 18th centuries. The depictions of Saints Stephen, Emeric and Ladislav consider specific versions of the depictions created in the Zagreb cultural circle, as a result of the cultural-political context and the wishes of the commissioners, Zagreb canons and bishops. Hungarian saints were often worshiped together with the Mother of God as the patron saint, which is a common place with the Hungarian community.