HUNGARY 



2873 



HUNGARY 



With Sigismund (which see) as king of Hun- 

 gary from 1387 to 1437, and for the last twenty- 

 five years of the time Holy Roman Emperor 

 as well, Hungary was brought into close touch 

 with the Empire, and under Albert V, son-in- 

 law of Sigismund, came for a time under the 

 direct sway of the Hapsburgs, the ruling house 

 of Austria. Hunyady, the great national hero 

 of Hungary, though sometimes suffering defeat, 

 held back the Turks from the Danube coun- 

 tries, and his son Matthias became in 1458 king 

 of Hungary. Under this great monarch Hun- 

 gary reached the height of its glory, for no 



liberty. The withdrawal of these privileges 

 and of self-government which had accompanied 

 them led to a rising in which the Hungarians 

 called their century-long enemies, the Turks, 

 to their aid, and in 1683 Vienna was all but 

 forced to surrender to the Moslems. John 

 Sobieski saved it, however, and three years 

 later Buda was also wrested from the Turks. 

 As a punishment, the Hungarians were made 

 to agree that the crown of their country should 

 for all time be heredity in the Hapsburg line. 



In the early eighteenth century, risings in 

 behalf of liberty were frequent among the Hun- 



THE FORMER ROYAL 



reigning monarch of the time could rival 

 Matthias in military genius, love of learning 

 and statesmanlike ability. But with his death 

 in 1490 there began a period of factional strife 

 and anarchy, of which the watchful Turks were 

 swift to take advantage. On August 29, 1526, 

 occurred the great battle of Mohacs Field, in 

 which the Hungarians were completely de- 

 feated, the king and 20,000 of his soldiers fall- 

 ing in the fight. 



As a result, nearly all of the kingdom of 

 Hungary was conquered, Buda, the capital, 

 with its surrounding territory, falling to the 

 Turks, while the Hapsburgs held the western 

 territories. Religious differences were rife, for 

 Hungary had many Protestants and the Haps- 

 burgs were strongly Catholic; and for a time 

 the emperors were compelled to grant religious 



PALACE AT BUDAPEST 



garians, but Maria Theresa, empress of Aus- 

 tria, aroused their feelings of loyalty and they 

 aided her in her struggle against Frederick the 

 Great (see MARIA THERESA). During the later 

 eighteenth and early nineteenth century, how- 

 ever, discontent was constantly growing, and in 

 the years following 1815 Hungary became con- 

 spicuous for the brilliance of its statesmen and 

 authors who worked for reforms and a consti- 

 tutional government. By 1848 a large measure 

 of liberty was gained, but the patriots could 

 now be satisfied only with actual independence, 

 and in 1849 a revolt broke out under the leader- 

 ship of Kossuth (which see). The result was 

 defeat for Hungary, with entire loss of the 

 reforms gained in the previous quarter-century ; 

 and not until 1866, when Austria suffered so 

 sharply at the hands of Prussia, did the Hun- 



