The Hungarian Society in the Middle Ages
(seminar)

The course surveys the major characteristic features of the medieval Hungarian society from the conquest until the beginning of the 16th century. The seminar – applying the lecture-form too – provides an overview of the structure of the Hungarian society, by tracing the development and functioning of the social strata.

DateTopic
2011. 02. 01. Introduction
2011. 02. 08. The Early Hungarians/Magyars (reading)
2011. 02. 15. The Realm of St Stephen (reading)
2011. 02. 22. The emergence of the aristocracy (reading)
2011. 03. 01. The lesser nobility (reading)
2011. 03. 08. Iobagiones (reading)
2011. 03. 15. --
2011. 03. 22. The honor-system and its consequences
2011. 03. 29. The fourteenth-century society (reading)
2011. 04. 05. -- (Spring break)
2011. 04. 12. New rules and directions: Sigismund of Luxembourg (reading)
2011. 04. 19. King Matthias (reading)
2011. 04. 26. Mobility in the 15th century (reading)
2011. 05. 03. Diets, laws, politics: Jagiellonian rule in Hungary (reading)
2011. 05. 10. Conclusions/Discussion

Readings

• Bak, János, et al. The Laws of the Medieval Kingdom of Hungary. Decreta Regni Meaievalis Hungariae, 1000–1490. 3 vols. Bakersfield: Charles Schlacks Jr., 1989–1997.
• The Customary Law of the Renowned Kingdom of Hungary: A Work in Three Parts Rendered by Stephen Werbőczy, DRMH 5. ed., tr. and with a critical apparatus by János Bak, Péter Banyó and Martyn Rady, Schlacks and CEU, 2005.
• Veszprémy, László and Frank Schaer, eds. and tr. Simon of Kéza, The deeds of the Hungarians . Budapest: Central European University Press, 1999.
• Glossary
• Vocabulary (Hungarian-Latin-English)

Secondary literature

• Bak, János. "Louis I and the Lesser Nobility in Hungary." In S. B. Vardy, Géza Goldschmidt and Leslie S. Domonkos, eds. Louis the Great, King of Hungary and Poland. Boulder, 1986, 67–80.
• Engel, Pál. The Realm of St Stephen. A History of Medieval Hungary, 895–1526. London–New York: I.B. Tauris, 2001.
• Engel, Pál. "Honor, castrum, comitatus. Studies in the Government System of the Angevin." Questiones Medii Aevi Novae 1 (1989): 91–100.
• Fügedi, Erik. "Kinship and Privilege," History & Society in Central Europe 2/Medium Aevum Quotidianum 29 (1994): 53–72.
• Fügedi, Erik. The Elefánthy. The Hungarian Nobleman and His Kindred. ed. Damir Karbić. Budapest: Central European University Press, 1998.
• Fügedi, Erik. Castle and Society in Medieval Hungary (1000–1437). tr. János M. Bak, Budapest: Akadémiai Kiadó, 1986.
• Fügedi, Erik. Kings, Bishops, Nobles and Burghers in Medieval Hungary. ed. János M. Bak. London: Variourum Reprints, 1986.
• Hunyadi, Zsolt. "Maiores, optimates, nobiles: Semantic questions in the early history of the Hungarian nobility." Annual of Medieval Studies at the CEU 1996/1997 (1998): 204–211.
• Mályusz, Elemér. „Hungarian Nobles of Mediveal Transylvania." History & Society in Central Europe 2/Medium Aevum Quotidianum 29 (1994): 25–53.
• Rady, Martyn. Nobility, Land and Service in Medieval Hungary. Basingstoke and New York: Palgrave, 2000.
• Rady, Martyn. "Rethinking Jagiełło Hungary 1490–1526." Central Europe 3 (2005): 3–18.
• Solymosi, László, "Liberty and servitude in the Age of Saint Stephen." In Saint Stephen and His Country: A Newborn Kingdom in Central Europe, ed. Attila Zsoldos, Budapest, 2001, 69–79.
• Váczy, Péter. "Some Questions of Early Hungarian History and Material Culture." Antaeus. Communicationes ex Instituto Archaeologico Academiae Scientiarum Hungaricae 19-20 (1990-1991): 257-329.
• Virágos, Gábor. "Noble residences in the Middle Ages: Pomáz and its owners (A case study)." Annual of Medieval Studies at the CEU 1996/1997 (1998): 245–251.
  

• Bak, János, and Béla K. Király, From Hunyadi to Rákóczi. War and society in late medieval and early modern Hungary. Brooklyn: Brooklyn College, 1982.
• Duggan, Anne J., ed. Nobles and Nobility. Woodbridge: The Boydell Press, 2000.
• Fügedi, Erik. "Some characteristics of the medieval Hungarian noble family." Journal of Family History 7 (1982): 27–39.
• Györffy, György. King Saint Stephen of Hungary. Boulder: Social Science Monographs, 1994.
• Held, Joseph. "Fifteenth-century peasant life in Hungary in Hungary." In Ferenc Glatz, ed. Modern Age – Modern Historian: In Memoriam György Ránki, Budapest, 1990, 19–39.
• Housley, Norman. "Crusading as a social revolt? the Hungarian peasant rising of 1514." Journal of Ecclesiastical History 49 (1998): 1–29.
• Kontler, László. Millennium in Central Europe. A History of Hungary. Budapest: Atlantisz, 1999, 41–136.
• Kosztolynik J. Zoltan, The dynastic policy of the Árpáds, Géza I to Emery (1074–1204). Boulder, 2006, 34–60, 157–166, 191–195.
• Kristó, Gyula, Hungarian History in the Ninth century. Szeged: Szegedi Középkorász Műhely, 1996.
• Rady, Martyn. Medieval Buda: A Study of Municipal Government and Jurisdiction in the Kingdom of Hungary. Boulder, 1985.
• Rady, Martyn. "The Daughters’ Quarter in Medieval Hungarian Law." in Balázs Nagy and Marcell Sebők, eds. …The Man of Many Devices, Who Wandered Full Many Ways… Festschrift in Honor of János M. Bak, Budapest: CEU Press, 1999, 422–431.
• Rady, Martyn. "The Title of New Donation in Medieval Hungarian Law." Slavonic and East European Review, 79 (2001): 638–652.
• Rady, Martyn, ed. Custom and Law in Central Europe. Centre for European Legal Studies, Cambridge, 2003.
• Róna-Tas András. Hungarians and Europe in the Early Middle Ages. An Introduction to Early Hungarian History. Budapest: Central European University Press, 1999.
• Szabó, István. "The praedium: studies on the economic history and the history of settlement in early Hungary." Agrártörténeti Szemle 5 (1963): Suppl. 1–24.
• Szűcs, Jenő. "The three regions of Europe: an outline." Acta Historica Academiae Scientiarum Hungaricae 29 (1983): 131–184.