Bethlen, Gábor

BETHLEN, GÁBOR. - Prince of Transylvania, b. in 1580 into a very ancient Hungarian family, d. in 1629. He spent his youth at the court of Sigismund Báthory and later became one of the most trusted counselors of Gabriel Báthory. After the latter's flight, with the support of Turkey he was elected prince of Transylvania. He carried the independence of that country to such a point that at the beginning of the Thirty Years' War he was able to ally himself with the Bohemians in order to fight Hungary, on the pretext that the Catholics were preparing to march against the Protestants. A fervent Calvinist and a declared opponent of the Habsburgs, he marched resolutely against northern Hungary, where Protestantism was losing more and more ground through the work of Cardinal Peter Pázmány. B.'s captain, Rákóczy, succeeded in occupying the fortress of Kassa, slaughtering there, among others, the canon Mark Crisinus and the Jesuits Stephen Pongrácz and Melchior Grodecz ("the Martyrs of Cassovia"). In the diet held immediately afterward at Beszterczebánya, B. was elected king of Hungary, but he did not accept the crown. In this same diet the secularization of ecclesiastical property and the expulsion of Pázmány and the Jesuits from Hungary were decided. Since, however, the Bohemian allies had been defeated, B. was forced to sue for peace. In compensation for renouncing the crown of Hungary, he obtained an increase in the territory of Transylvania and the title of prince of the Holy Roman Empire. In the course of the Thirty Years' War he took the field twice more against Hungary, but without notable results. Under him Transylvania enjoyed a notable economic, artistic and cultural development. He founded numerous Protestant schools, which, however, never rose to the level of those of the Jesuits. He ended by admitting a Catholic vicar episcopal into the country.

Alessandro Alessandrini