Stephen V of Hungary

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Stephen V of Hungary bigraphy, stories - King of Hungary

Stephen V of Hungary : biography

18 October 1239 – 6 August 1272

Stephen V ( , ) (before 18 October 1239, Buda, Hungary – 6 August 1272, Csepel Island, Hungary), was King of Hungary Stephen V. (2009). In Encyclopædia Britannica. Retrieved July 16, 2009, from Encyclopædia Britannica Online: http://www.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic/565442/Stephen-V from 1270 to 1272.

Struggles with his father

Shortly after the peace, Stephen took over the government of Transylvania again. In 1261, Stephen and his father conducted a joint military campaign against Bulgaria, but their relationship became more and more tense, because the senior king had been favouring his younger son, Duke Béla of Slavonia and his daughter, Anna, the mother-in-law of the King of Bohemia.

Finally, with the mediation of Archbishops Fülöp of Esztergom and Smaragd of Kalocsa, Stephen and his father signed an agreement in the summer of 1262 in Pozsony. Based on their agreement, Stephen took over the government of the parts of the kingdom East of the Danube. However, the two kings’ reconciliation was only temporary, because their partisans were continuously inciting them against each other. In 1264, Stephen seized his mother’s and sister’s estates in his domains, but his father sent troops against him. Stephen’s wife and son were captured by his father’s partisans, and he had to retreat to the castle of Feketehalom. However, he managed to repel the siege and to commence a counter-attack.

In March 1265, he gained a strategic victory over his father’s army in the Battle of Isaszeg. After his victory, he concluded a peace with King Béla IV. Based on the provisions of the peace, he received back the government of the Eastern parts of the kingdom. On 23 March 1266, father and son confirmed the peace in the Convent of the Blessed Virgin on the Nyulak szigete (‘Rabbits’ Island’). Shortly afterwards, Stephen V led his army to Bulgaria and forced Despot Jakob Svetoslav of Vidin to accept his overlordship.

In 1267, the "prelates and nobles" of the Kingdom of Hungary held a joint assembly in Esztergom, and their decisions were confirmed by both Stephen and his father.

To secure foreign support, he formed a double matrimonial alliance with the Angevins, chief partisans of the pope. The first of these was the marriage, in 1270, of his daughter Maria to the future King Charles II of NaplesMaria and Charles became the grandparents of King Charles I of Hungary, who ascended the throne, following a long struggle with his opponents, when the male line of the Árpád dynasty extinguished. The second alliance was the marriage of Stephen’s infant son, Ladislaus to Charles II’s sister Elisabeth.

King of Hungary

After his father’s death (3 May 1270), Stephen inherited the whole Kingdom of Hungary, although the deceased senior king had entrusted his daughter, Anna and his followers to King Ottokar II of Bohemia in his last will, and they had escaped to Prague before Stephen arrived to Esztergom.

Before his (second) coronation, Stephen granted the County of Esztergom to the Archbishop. In August 1270, Stephen had a meeting with his brother-in-law, Prince Bolesław V of Poland in Kraków where they concluded an alliance against the King of Bohemia. In September 1270 he visited the village Miholjanec, where was discovered an unknown ancient castle and a sword, this sword he got as a gift, in which he and his priests acknowledged the "Holy War Sword of the Scythians" and he saw that he was determined to master the world. He attended the place of the find, where he met a hermit who told him: "Scourge of God". Stephen also had a meeting with Ottokar on 16 October on an island of the Danube near Pozsony where they concluded a truce for two years.

However, following smaller skirmishes on the border, the war broke out soon after and the King of Bohemia lead his armies against Hungary. Stephen was defeated in two smaller battles, but finally won a decisive victory on 21 May 1271 over the Czech and Austrian troops of Ottokar II of Bohemia. In the subsequent peace the King of Bohemia handed back the fortresses occupied during his campaign, while Stephen renounced his claim to the Hungarian royal treasury that his sister, Anna had taken to Prague after their father’s death.