Mary of Hungary

For the Habsburg consort of Louis II of Hungary, later Regent of the Netherlands, see Mary of Austria (1505-1558)

Mary
Queen of Hungary[1]
Reign	1382-1395
Predecessor	Louis I
Successor	Sigismund
Spouse	Sigismund of Luxembourg
House	Angevin (Anjou-Hungary)
Father	Louis I of Hungary
Mother	Elizabeth of Bosnia
Born	1371
Died	17 May 1395

Mary (c. 1371 – 17 May 1395, Buda, Hungary) (in Hungarian and Slovakian: Mária, in Croatian and Bosnian Marija Anžuvinska) was queen regnant of Hungary[2] from 1382 until her death in 1395.

Childhood

She was the second of three, but the eldest surviving daughter of Louis I the Great of Hungary and his second wife, Elizabeth of Bosnia.

After the death of her older sister Catherine, Mary was intended to inherit both of her father's kingdoms, Hungary and Poland, or at least the hereditary kingdom of Poland.

Her father king Louis had arranged marriages for her and her younger sister Hedwig. Ultimately Sigismund of Luxemburg (1368–1437), an heir of the Polish Kujavian dynasty and a member of Bohemian royal family, married Mary in 1385 in Zvolen Castle. William of Habsburg then was to marry her younger sister, who however, after Sigismund was expelled by Poles, where he had been living in Kraków since 1381, unexpectedly became Queen of Poland, William married Mary's relative, the future Queen Joan II of Naples, and Hedwig was married to Jogaila of Lithuania.

Reign

Mary and her mother Elizabeth mourning at the tomb of Louis I

Mary became Queen regnant of Hungary as a ten-year-old child after her father's death in 1382 (her elder sister Catherine having died four years earlier). The country was ruled by her mother, the Dowager Queen Elizabeth and by Palatine Nicholas I Garay. Sigismund, his powerful brother Emperor Wenceslaus and many noblemen of Hungary were opposed to them; some noblemen helped Mary's relative Charles of Durazzo, King of Naples to become briefly the King of Hungary in 1385. Queen Elizabeth and Garai had Charles II assassinated in 1386. Charles's heir was his underage son Ladislas of Naples (d. 1414) who attempted all his life to conquer Hungary, but despite some support in the country, did not succeed.

Magnates of Lesser Poland had been deeply unsatisfied with personal union (1370–82) with Hungary, and despite of decreed succession order, chose the nine-year-old Hedwig as the Queen of Poland in 1384. After a couple of years, Hedwig was compelled to leave Hungary for Poland. Mary and her guardians never managed in governing nor obtaining Poland. Halych, the Ruthenian province recently (1340–66) annexed by Poland, however was taken by Hungary, and only after several years, Poland recovered it.

Marriage issue

Sigismund, his powerful brother king Wenceslaus IV of Bohemia and many noblemen of Hungary were opposed to the formidable Elizabeth and the Palatine. They, on the other hand, were not enthuasiastic about Sigismund reigning together with Mary. Both Sigismund and Mary's relative, Charles of Durazzo, who had gained the Crown of Naples by having his aunt Joan murdered, threatened to invade Hungary; the former intended to marry Mary and reign together with her, while the former intended to depose Mary. Either way, Elizabeth would have lost her power. Thus, in 1384, Elizabeth started negotiating with King Charles V of France about the possibility of his son Louis marrying Mary, notwithstanding Mary's engagement to Sigismund. Louis had already been engaged to Mary's older sister Catherine and was expected to succeed to the throne of Hungary. If Elizabeth had made this proposal in 1378, after Catherine's death, the fact that the French king and the Hungarian king did not recognize the same pope would have represented a problem. However, Elizabeth was desperate in 1384 and was not willing to let the schism stand in the way of the negotiations. Pope Clement VII issued a dispensation which annulled Mary's betrothal to Sigismund and the proxy marriage was celebrated in April 1385. However, the marriage was not recognized by the Hungarian noblemen who adhered to Pope Urban VI.^[1]

Capture and rescue

Nicholas I Garay defending his sovereign Mary and her mother Elizabeth from the Croatians

Elizabeth and Mary were captured in 1386 by the powerful Horvat brothers, Paul Bishop of Machva and Ladislaus, but probably on the orders of Mary's smart but wicked seventeen-year-old husband and King-consort Sigismund.

On the first anniversary of the death of Charles II, January 1387, Elizabeth was strangled before Mary's eyes.

Succession

From 1387, Mary and Sigismund were officially joint rulers of Hungary but in fact the estranged husband Sigismund ruled alone. Mary died on 17 May 1395, the same day as the Battle of Rovine, under suspicious circumstances, while heavily pregnant, but leaving no surviving children. In 1405, probably on Christmas Day, somewhat secretly, Sigismund remarried, or was compelled to marry, Barbara of Cilli, Mary's kinswoman. In 1410, Sigismund was elected Holy Roman Emperor.

Ancestors

References

• Glenda Goss Thompson. Benedictus Appenzeller: Maître de la Chappelle to Mary of Hungary and Chansonnier. Ph.D. diss., Univ. of North Carolina, 1975. 2 vols.
• Glenda Goss Thompson. “Mary of Hungary and Music Patronage.” Sixteenth Century Journal 15 (1984): 401–418.
• Glenda Goss Thompson. “Music in the Court Records of Mary of Hungary.” Tijdschrift van de Vereniging voor Nederlandse Muziekgeschiedenis 34 (1984): 132–173.

Other sources

• (French) Coat of arms of the House of Anjou-Sicily on the French Wikipedia
• (French) House of Anjou-Sicily on the French Wikipedia