"}},"i":0}}]}" id="mwRw">
[...] He [Stephen] was nurtured and educated as son of the king of Hungary. But when he reached manhood, he wished to usurp by guile his grandfather’s title and estate; but the grandfather [sic, his great-uncle Azzo] was stronger, and banished him to remote parts. Stephen fled into Spain to the court of James, king of Aragon, who had married Stephen's aunt [Violant], the daughter of King Andrew of Hungary. After he had stayed there some time, he returned to Italy and was elected podestà by the citizens of Ravenna. Fleeing that town, he came to Venice. Here a certain Venetian [Michele Sbarra Morosini], one of the most powerful and wealthy citizens of the city, knowing of certain that he was the son of the king of Hungary, gave him his daughter [Tomasina] in marriage and made him partner in all his riches. By this wife Stephen had a son, whom he called Andrew after his father.
Stephen became orphan at the age of nine. Pope Innocent continued to his financial support, according to a papal letter from 25 February 1250 after the aforementioned 35 monasteries were reluctant to pass on their revenues to Stephen following Beatrice's death. [10] According to a 16th-century chronicle, Stephen became acquainted with the political and social conditions of his place of origin, when Franciscan friars from Hungary visited Azzo's court. [11] The 15th-century Humanist historian Antonio Bonfini claimed that Stephen's features alluded to royal descent and were particularly reminiscent of his father Andrew II. Meanwhile, the marquis had no legitimate male descendants after the death of his son, Rinaldo I d'Este in 1251. Thereafter, Stephen was considered a presumptive heir to the lordship of Ferrara as the closest male relative, but Azzo VII adopted his grandson Obizzo, the natural son of Rinaldo and declared him as his heir. Obizzo was legitimated by Pope Innocent IV in 1252. [12]
Sometime around 1252, Stephen left Azzo's court and traveled to the Kingdom of Aragon, where his half-sister Violant was the queen consort, but died in the autumn of 1251. Nevertheless, Stephen enjoyed the hospitality of his brother-in-law King James I of Aragon and his family. There, Stephen was also recognized as a legitimate member of the Árpád dynasty. [13] Sometime later in the first half of the 1250s, Stephen returned to Italy and departed for his great-uncle's rival Pietro II Traversari, who served as Podestà of Ravenna – while Azzo was considered the leader of the Guelph forces in the March of Ancona, the Traversaris (as Ghibellines) supported the efforts of the Holy Roman Emperors in Romagna. Stephen resided the upcoming decade there; according to Ludovico Antonio Muratori, Stephen married Pietro's daughter Isabella in 1262 (they had been engaged before), the widow of local patrician Tomaso de Foliano. Stephen was also admitted to the Traversari family and was authorized to bear their surname. A son, Stephen, was born from the marriage, but soon both Isabella and the infant had died sometime around 1263. [14]
Shortly thereafter, Stephen left Ravenna for the Republic of Venice, [8] where he represented the Traversaris' political and business interests. There, Stephen married Tomasina Morosini around 1264, a daughter of a wealthy Venetian patrician Michele Sbarra Morosini. With this marriage, Stephen acquired large wealth and political influence, the Morosini family were one of the most prominent political dynasties in Venice. [15] The marriage produced a son, Andrew, who was born around 1265. According to the Illuminated Chronicle, Stephen was elected podestà by the citizens of Ravenna, during the internal war between the Traversari and the da Polenta families (the latter ultimately expelled their enemies from the city in 1275 during a revolt). Stephen cooperated with the influential archbishop Filippo da Pistoia. After the death of Azzo VII, Guelph leaders elected Obizzo II as the next lord ( signore ) of Ferrara in February 1264, Stephen lost his last faint chance of inheritance. Stephen unsuccessfully tried to look for allies against Obizzo, for instance Charles I of Anjou around 1267. [16]
Béla IV died in May 1270. His son Stephen V (Stephen the Posthumous' nephew) succeeded him as king of Hungary. When Ottokar II of Bohemia invaded Hungary in the spring of 1271, the Bohemian monarch contacted Stephen and intended him to use his person as a claimant to the Hungarian throne against Stephen V. However, the Hungarians won a decisive victory in May 1271. The two kings' envoys reached an agreement in Pressburg on 2 July. [13] In the document, Ottokar II, among others, promised to renounce the support of Stephen the Posthumous as claimant to the Hungarian throne. [8] [13]
Stephen the Posthumous, who was ailing, compiled his last will and testament on 10 April 1271. Stephen resided the Morosinis' San Giuliano Palace in Venice. He was styled himself as "Duke of Slavonia" and "the son of the late King Andrew" in the document, but his claim to the crown of Hungary was not mentioned in the testament. He declared his minor son Andrew as his heir to his claims in Hungary and Italy (Slavonia and Este, respectively), and nominated his wife's two kinsmen, her brother Albertino Morosini and brother-in-law Marino Gradenigo, as Andrew's guardians. Stephen also mentioned his two natural sons without specifying their name and age, who he financially and hypothetically took care of from the incomes of Slavonia and Este, after his heir Andrew takes possession of these two estates. [17]
Stephen died shortly after making his will, plausibly already before the treaty of Pressburg. He was buried in the namesake church of the San Michele Island in Venice within the tomb of the Morosini family. [17]
After failed attempts in 1278 and 1287, his son Andrew successfully acquired the Hungarian throne in 1290, becoming the last monarch of the Árpád dynasty. [18]
Historian Dániel Bácsatyai identified a certain Aimery or Emeric (Aimericus) as one of the illegitimate sons of Stephen, who began his journey from the court of James II of Aragon to Hungary in August 1291 in order to receive a share of the property of the acquired Slavonia in accordance with his father's above-mentioned last testament. Consequently, this Aimery was born in the early 1250s to Stephen and his unidentified concubine. [19]
Stephen's second natural son comes Tralusius (or Tralusio) also arrived to Hungary. He was made castellan of Visegrád sometime after 1294. According to a complaint from 1301, "former" castellan Tralusius arbitrarily and unlawfully relocated the population of Kékes to Szentendre, causing a damage to the Diocese of Veszprém. It is possible that Tralusius also bore the title of ispán of Pilis County simultaneously. [19]
Andrew II, also known as Andrew of Jerusalem, was King of Hungary and Croatia between 1205 and 1235. He ruled the Principality of Halych from 1188 until 1189/1190, and again between 1208/1209 and 1210. He was the younger son of Béla III of Hungary, who entrusted him with the administration of the newly conquered Principality of Halych in 1188. Andrew's rule was unpopular, and the boyars expelled him. Béla III willed property and money to Andrew, obliging him to lead a crusade to the Holy Land. Instead, Andrew forced his elder brother, King Emeric of Hungary, to cede Croatia and Dalmatia as an appanage to him in 1197. The following year, Andrew occupied Hum.
Stephen V was King of Hungary and Croatia between 1270 and 1272, and Duke of Styria from 1258 to 1260. He was the oldest son of King Béla IV and Maria Laskarina. King Béla had his son crowned king at the age of six and appointed him Duke of Slavonia. Still a child, Stephen married Elizabeth, a daughter of a chieftain of the Cumans whom his father settled in the Great Hungarian Plain.
Ladislaus IV, also known as Ladislaus the Cuman, was King of Hungary and Croatia from 1272 to 1290. His mother, Elizabeth, was the daughter of a chieftain from the pagan Cumans who had settled in Hungary. At the age of seven, he married Elisabeth, a daughter of King Charles I of Sicily. Ladislaus was only 9 when a rebellious lord, Joachim Gutkeled, kidnapped and imprisoned him.
Béla I the Boxer or the Wisent was King of Hungary from 1060 until his death. He descended from a younger branch of the Árpád dynasty. Béla's baptismal name was Adalbert. He left Hungary in 1031, together with his brothers, Levente and Andrew, after the execution of their father, Vazul. Béla settled in Poland and married Richeza, daughter of Polish king Mieszko II Lambert.
Béla IV was King of Hungary and Croatia between 1235 and 1270, and Duke of Styria from 1254 to 1258. As the oldest son of King Andrew II, he was crowned upon the initiative of a group of influential noblemen in his father's lifetime in 1214. His father, who strongly opposed Béla's coronation, refused to give him a province to rule until 1220. In this year, Béla was appointed Duke of Slavonia, also with jurisdiction in Croatia and Dalmatia. Around the same time, Béla married Maria, a daughter of Theodore I Laskaris, Emperor of Nicaea. From 1226, he governed Transylvania as duke. He supported Christian missions among the pagan Cumans who dwelled in the plains to the east of his province. Some Cuman chieftains acknowledged his suzerainty and he adopted the title of King of Cumania in 1233. King Andrew died on 21 September 1235 and Béla succeeded him. He attempted to restore royal authority, which had diminished under his father. For this purpose, he revised his predecessors' land grants and reclaimed former royal estates, causing discontent among the noblemen and the prelates.
Emeric, also known as Henry or Imre, was King of Hungary and Croatia between 1196 and 1204. In 1184, his father, Béla III of Hungary, ordered that he be crowned king, and appointed him as ruler of Croatia and Dalmatia around 1195. Emeric ascended the throne after the death of his father. During the first four years of his reign, he fought his rebellious brother, Andrew, who forced Emeric to make him ruler of Croatia and Dalmatia as appanage.
Andrew I the White or the Catholic was King of Hungary from 1046 to 1060. He descended from a younger branch of the Árpád dynasty. After he spent fifteen years in exile, an extensive revolt by the pagan Hungarians enabled him to take the throne from King Peter Orseolo. He strengthened the position of Catholicism in the Kingdom of Hungary and successfully defended its independence against the Holy Roman Empire.
Béla the Blind was King of Hungary and Croatia from 1131 to 1141. He was blinded along with his rebellious father Álmos on the order of Álmos's brother, King Coloman of Hungary. Béla grew up in monasteries during the reign of Coloman's son Stephen II. The childless king arranged Béla's marriage with Helena of Rascia, who would become her husband's co-ruler throughout his reign.
Stephen II, King of Hungary and Croatia, ruled from 1116 until 1131. His father, King Coloman, had him crowned as a child, thus denying the crown to his uncle Álmos. In the first year of his reign, Venice occupied Dalmatia and Stephen never restored his rule in that province. His reign was characterized by frequent wars with neighbouring countries.
Levente was a member of the House of Árpád, a great-grandson of Taksony, Grand Prince of the Hungarians. He was expelled from Hungary in 1031 or 1032, and spent many years in Bohemia, Poland and the Kievan Rus'. He returned to Hungary, where a pagan uprising was developing around that time, in 1046. Levente remained a devout pagan, but did not hinder the election of his Christian brother, Andrew I as king.
Ladislaus II or Ladislas II was King of Hungary and Croatia between 1162 and 1163, having usurped the crown from his nephew, Stephen III.
Andrew III the Venetian was King of Hungary and Croatia between 1290 and 1301. His father, Stephen the Posthumous, was the posthumous son of Andrew II of Hungary although Stephen's older half brothers considered him a bastard. Andrew grew up in Venice, and first arrived in Hungary upon the invitation of a rebellious baron, Ivan Kőszegi, in 1278. Kőszegi tried to play Andrew off against Ladislaus IV of Hungary, but the conspiracy collapsed and Andrew returned to Venice.
Beatrice d'Este was Queen consort of Hungary as the third wife of King Andrew II of Hungary.
Tomasina Morosini was a 13th-century Venetian noblewoman and member of the powerful Morosini family. She was the mother of Andrew III, the last king of Hungary from the Árpád dynasty. After his son's accession to the throne, she moved to Hungary in 1292, where she served as Duchess of Slavonia until her death.
Géza was a Hungarian royal prince and the youngest son of the King Géza II of Hungary. Prince Géza was brother to the Kings Stephen III and Béla III of Hungary. He was a pretender to the Hungarian throne against Béla III, but he was imprisoned from 1177 to 1189. He traveled to the Holy Land during the Third Crusade with an army of 2,000 Hungarian warriors.
Ladislas the Bald was a member of the House of Árpád, a grandson of Taksony, Grand Prince of the Hungarians. He is the only known brother of Vazul, a rebellious duke who was blinded on the order of their cousin, King Saint Stephen I of Hungary in 1031 or 1032. Medieval chroniclers, in their effort to conceal that the Kings of Hungary were descended from a prince condemned by the saintly first king, wrote that instead of Vazul, Ladislas was the Hungarian monarchs' forefather. Ján Steinhübel and other modern Slovak historians write that he was Duke of Nyitra under Polish suzerainty, but this theory has not been universally accepted by historians.
Béla was the youngest and favorite child of King Béla IV of Hungary. His father appointed him Duke of Slavonia in 1260, but he only started to govern his duchy from 1268. He died childless.
Andrew of Hungary was Prince of Galicia–Volhynia between 1227 and 1230, and between 1231 and 1234, and Prince of Zvenyhorod in 1226.
Andrew, Duke of Slavonia was the youngest son of King Stephen V of Hungary and his wife, Elizabeth the Cuman. Two rebellious lords kidnapped him in 1274 in an attempt to play him off against his brother, Ladislaus IV of Hungary, but the king's supporters liberated him. He was styled "Duke of Slavonia and Croatia" in a 1274 letter. Years after his death, two adventurers claimed to be identical with Andrew, but both failed.
Lampert from the kindred Hont-Pázmány was a Hungarian powerful lord at the turn of the 11th and 12th centuries, who was related to the ruling Árpád dynasty by his marriage. He was one of the richest aristocrats of the kingdom during that time. He founded a Benedictine abbey near Bozók.