4
ANJOU:
The Hungarian Connection (1370-1386)
The conduct of the great ruling dynasties of medieval Europe can only be prop-
erly compared to that of the modern multinational corporations. Formed
in obscurity in some remote, provincial backwater of France or Germany, the
Hautevilles, Hohenstaufen, Luxembourgs, Angevins, Habsburgs, and
Bourbons, gradually spread their tentacles into every corner of the continent. By
the skilful use of war, diplomacy, marriage, and money, and by the judicious
diversification of their interests, they acquired and relinquished lands, thrones,
and titles with the same unerring sense of self-aggrandizement that drives the
great business empires of today to deal in shares, assets, and companies. Their
operations transcended the boundaries of political authority, and could usually
override the objections of local rulers or competitors with impunity.
Of all the dynastic enterprises of the age, none was more extensive than that
of the House of Anjou. One branch of the family rose to prominence in 1154
through the accession of Henry Plantagenet, Count of Anjou, to the throne of
England. As Henry II, he was the father of Richard Coeur-de-Lion and of John
Lackland, and the forebear of all the English kings of the next two and a half
centuries. But their most spectacular adventures began in 1165, when Charles of
Anjou, brother of St. Louis, set out from France for the conquest of Sicily.
Thanks to papal support, this second branch of the Angevins contrived not only
to occupy the throne of Naples, but also, after the collapse of their Sicilian
realm, to be elected as kings of Hungary. From there, through the labyrinthine
workings of diplomacy and inheritance, they were only one step removed from
the neighbouring Kingdom of Poland. As it happened, the Angevins' connection
with Poland lasted for less than twenty years. In the history of the dynasty it rep-
resented only a minor episode of temporary importance. But in the history of
their Polish and Hungarian subjects, it marked the forging of a link which far
outlasted the memory of any dynastic machinations.
The irruption of the Magyars in the tenth century had changed the face of
Central Europe. They were the last of the nomadic colonists from the east, and
were quite unrelated to any of the peoples among whom they settled. Their
recent origins lay in the middle of the Pontic steppes, and their more distant
roots in the depths of Central Asia. Their agglutinative language, of the Finno-
Ugrian family, was totally incomprehensible to all their neighbours. In the year