John Hunyadi

John Hunyadi (Latin: Ioannes Corvinus, Hungarian: Hunyadi János, Romanian: Iancu (or Ioan) de Hunedoara) (c. 1387 - 1456) was a statesman and soldier of the Kingdom of Hungary.

Biography

Origins

John was born into a Vlach (Romanian) noble family in 1387 (or 1400 according to some sources) as the son of Vojk (alternatively spelled as Voyk or Vajk in English, Voicu in Romanian, Vajk in Hungarian), who in turn was the son of a Vlach Knyaz from Banate of Severin (Szörény in Hungarian). Most reliable sources state his paternal lineage was Vlach and his mother was Hungarian. Some unfounded speculation suggests he had Cuman ancestry, but this was likely an attempt at propaganda by his enemies. Though widely respected in Europe, he was not without rivals and certainly hated by the Ottoman Turks. Vlach lineage was common in many Hungarian noble families of Transylvania, but Cuman blood would have been considered a stain on their reputation.

What is certain is that Vojk took the family name of Hunyadi when he received the estate of Hunyad Castle (now Hunedoara in Romania, Vajdahunyad in Hungarian) from King Sigismund in 1409. John's Hungarian mother Elizabeth (Erzsébet in Hungarian) is thought to be from the Morzsinay family. The epithet Corvinus was first used by the biographer of his son Matthias, but is sometimes also applied to John.

Ascension

Hunyadi has sometimes been confused with an elder brother John (Romanian: Ioan Corvin de Hunedoara), also Ban of Szörény (Severin). The elder John died while defending Hungarian suzerainty about 1440.

While still a youth, the younger John Hunyadi entered the service of Sigismund, who appreciated his qualities and borrowed money from him. He accompanied the monarch to Frankfurt in his quest for the imperial crown in 1410, took part in the Hussite Wars in 1420, and in 1437 drove the Ottoman Turks from Semendria. For these services he received numerous estates and a seat in the royal council. In 1438 King Albert II made Hunyadi Ban of Severin. Lying south of the defensible southern frontiers of Hungary, the Carpathians and the Drava/Sava/Danube complex, the province was subject to constant harassment by Ottoman forces.

Upon the sudden death of Albert in 1439, Hunyadi, feeling Hungary needed a militaristic king, lent his support to the candidature of young King Władysław III of Poland (1440), and thus came into collision with the powerful Ulrich III of Celje, the chief supporter of Albert's widow Elizabeth and her infant son, Ladislaus V. He took a prominent part in the ensuing civil war and was rewarded by Władysław with the captaincy of the fortress of Nándorfehérvár (Belgrade) and the governorship of Transylvania. He shared the latter dignity his rival Mihály Újlaki.

The burden of the Turkish War now rested entirely on his shoulders. In 1441 he delivered Serbia by the victory of Semendria. In 1442, not far from Hermannstadt (Sibiu), on which he had been forced to retire, he annihilated an immense Turkish host, and recovered for Hungary the suzerainty of Wallachia and Moldavia; and in July he vanquished a third Turkish army near the Iron Gates. These victories made Hunyadi's name terrible to the Turks and renowned throughout Christendom, and stimulated him in 1443 to undertake, along with King Władysław, the famous expedition known as the "long campaign". Hunyadi, at the head of the vanguard, crossed the Balkans through the Gate of Trajan, captured Niš, defeated three Turkish pashas, and, after taking Sofia, united with the royal army and defeated Sultan Murad II at Snaim. The impatience of the king and the severity of the winter then compelled him (February 1444) to return home, but not before he had utterly broken the sultan's power in Bosnia, Herzegovina, Serbia, Bulgaria, and Albania.

No sooner had he regained Hungary than he received tempting offers from the Pope, represented by the legate Cardinal Cesarini, from Đurađ Branković, despot of Serbia, and Gjergj Kastrioti, prince of Albania, to resume the war and realize his favourite idea of driving the Ottomans from Europe. All the preparations had been made when Murad's envoys arrived in the royal camp at Szeged and offered a ten years' truce on advantageous terms. Both Hunyadi and Branković counselled their acceptance, and Władysław swore on the Gospels to observe them.

Two days later Cesarini received the tidings that a fleet of Venetian galleys had set off for the Bosporus to prevent Murad (who, crushed by his recent disasters, had retired to Asia Minor) from recrossing into Europe, and the cardinal reminded the king that he had sworn to cooperate by land if the western powers attacked the Ottomans by sea. He then, by virtue of his legatine powers, absolved the king from his second oath, and in July the Hungarian army recrossed the frontier and advanced towards the Black Sea coast in order to march to Constantinople escorted by the galleys.

Branković, however, fearful of the sultan's vengeance in case of disaster, privately informed Murad of the advance of the Christian host, and prevented Gjergj Kastrioti from joining it. On reaching Varna, the Hungarians found that the Venetian galleys had failed to prevent the transit of the sultan, who now confronted them with fourfold odds, and on the 10th of November 1444 they were utterly routed in the Battle of Varna, Władysław falling on the field and Hunyadi narrowly escaping.

Regent of the Kingdom of Hungary

At the diet which met in February 1445 a provisional government consisting of five captain-generals was formed, with Hunyadi receiving Transylvania and four counties bordering on the Tisza, called the Partium or Körösvidék to rule. As the anarchy resulting from the division became unmanageable, Hunyadi was elected governor of Hungary on June 5 1446 in the name of Ladislaus V and given the powers of a regent. His first act as governor was to proceed against the German king Frederick III, who refused to release Ladislaus V. After ravaging Styria, Carinthia, and Carniola and threatening Vienna, Hunyadi's difficulties elsewhere compelled him to make a truce with Frederick for two years.

In 1448 he received a golden chain and the title of prince from Pope Nicholas V, and immediately afterwards resumed the war with the Turks. He lost the two-day Second Battle of Kosovo (October 7th-10th 1448, owing to the treachery of Dan, Hospodar of Wallachia, and of his old enemy Đurađ Branković, who intercepted Hunyadi's planned Albanian reinforcements led by Skanderbeg, preventing them from ever reaching the battle. Branković also imprisoned Hunyadi for a time in the dungeons of the fortress of Smederevo, but he was ransomed by his countrymen and, after resolving his differences with his powerful and numerous political enemies in Hungary, led a punitive expedition against the Serbian prince, who was forced to accept humiliating terms of peace.

In 1450 Hunyadi went to the Hungarian capital of Pozsony to negotiate with Frederick III the terms of the surrender of Ladislaus V, but no agreement could be reached. Several of Hunyadi's enemies, Ulrich of Celje, accused him of conspiracy to overthrow the king. In order to defuse the increasingly volatile domestic situation, he relinquished his regency and the title Governor. On his return to Hungary at the beginning of 1453, Ladislaus named him count of Beszterce and captain-general of the kingdom.

Meanwhile the Turkish question had again become acute, and it was plain, after the fall of Constantinople in 1453, that Mehmed II was rallying his resources in order to subjugate Hungary. His immediate objective was Belgrade. Hunyadi arrived at the siege of Belgrade at the end of 1455, after settling differences with his domestic enemies. At his own expense he restocked the supplies and arms of the fortress, leaving in it a strong garrison under the command of his brother-in-law Mihály Szilágyi and his own eldest son László. He proceeded to form a relief army and assembled a fleet of two hundred corvettes. His main ally was the Franciscan friar, Giovanni da Capistrano, whose fiery oratory drew a large crusade made up mostly of peasants. Though relatively ill-armed (most were armed with farm equipment- scythes, pitchforks, and the like) they flocked to Hunyadi and his small corps of seasoned mercenaries and mounted knights.

On July 14 1456 the flotilla of corvettes assembled by Hunyadi destroyed the Ottoman fleet. On July 21 Szilágyi's forces in the fortress repulsed a fierce assault by the Rumelian army, and Hunyadi pursued the retreating forces into their camp, taking advantage of the Turkish army's confused flight from the city. After fierce but brief fighting, the camp was captured, and Mehmet raised the siege and returned to Istanbul. With his flight began a 70 year period of relative peace on Hungary's southeastern border. Unfortunately, plague broke out in Hunyadi's camp three weeks after the lifting of the siege, and he died August 11. He was buried inside the (Roman Catholic) Cathedral of Alba Iulia next to his elder brother John.

Legacy

John Hunyadi has often been regarded as a hero by all of the local nationalities; each in its own way has claimed him as their own. It is commonly said that he fought with his head rather than his arm. Among his more progressive qualities, he was among the first to recognize the insufficiency and unreliability of the feudal levies, instead regularly employing large professional armies. His notable contribution to the development of the science of European warfare included the emphasis on tactics and strategy in place of over-reliance on bravery (or foolhardiness) in battle. Though he remained illiterate until late in life (something not uncommon during the age he lived in), his natural diplomatic, strategic, and tactical intelligence allowed him to serve his country well. Although other leaders of the time were credited in their own right with having fended off the Ottoman invasion of Europe in the 15th century, such as Vlad III Dracula and Skanderbeg, none were quite as successful as Hunyadi.

Names in other languages: Croatian: Ivan Hunjadi, German: Johann Hunyadi, Serbian: Sibinjanin Janko, Slovak: Ján Huňadi

References

• J Teleki, The Age of the Hunyadis in Hungary (Hung.), (Pesth, 1852-1857; supplementary volumns by D Cs~inki 1895)
• Gyorgy Fejer, Genus, incunabula et virtus Joannis Corvini de Hunyad (Buda, 1844)
• J de Chassin, Jean de Hunyad (Paris, 1859)
• A Pcr, Life of Hunyadi (Hung.) (Budapest, 1873)
• V Fraknói, Cardinal Carjaval and his Missions to Hungary (Hung) (Budapest, 1889)
• P Frankl, Der Friede von Szegedin und die Geschichte seines Bruches (Leipzig, 1904)
• RN Bain, "The Siege of Belgrade, 1456" (Eng. Hist. Rev., 1892)
• A Bonfini, Rerum ungaricarum libri xlv, editio septima (Leipzig, 1771).

This article incorporates text from the 1911 Encyclopædia Britannica, a publication in the public domain.