Bibliotheca Corviniana [antikvár]

An unparalleled achievement of Hungarian Renaissance culture was the library of King Mattliias Corvinus (1458-1490). It was worthy to rank with the highest contemporary manifestations of European culture, and north of the Alps at that time its üke was nowhere to be found.'- How did Buda, the court of the Hungarian king, come to be the place where a sovereign founded the first great humanist library in the world outside Italy? Did the king merely wish to display his power or was his motive a love of pomp? Was the library of Buda the result of chance, did it come into existence through the inteUigence, the will or perhaps the whim of a single outstanding individual? Did these precious manuscripts, fascinating rather by their outward splendour than by their contents, constitute a carefuUy guarded collection of works of art, created almost in a moment out of nothing, and then after a brief life passing out of existence without having exerted any noticeable influence? Or was perhaps the library no more than an obUgatory feature of a court formed after the Italian model to please the queen, Beatrice of Aragon, who came from Naples in 1476? The explanation given by the facts of history is quite different. The Corvinian Library is an integral part of the history of Hungarian cultural development, of the history of Himgarian books and libraries. When we trace previous and contemporary causes and motives in their logical connection, we find that the Bibliotheca Corviniana was very far from being some lifeless museum of books; it was, on the contrary, a library whose founder aspired to collect the supreme achievements of the human mind. The volumes were sought for the value of their contents, of which the bindings and the covers were to be worthy in their beauty and magnificence. It was about A.D. 1000 when the first Hungarian library of a few dozen books was established in a modest niche at the St. Martin Monastery of Paimonhalma;^ it was in 1489 that the Florentine humanist Bartolomeo deUa Fonte declared that Lorenzo de'Medici had been inspired to found his Greek and Latin library by the example of the Hungarian king.^ Durkig the intervening period of nearly five centuries book culture followed a similar path in Hungary as in other European countries.^ Increasing numbers of manuscripts were required for the use in churches, convent schools and chapters, and in monastic life. Hungarian undergraduates became familiar with books on philosophy, theology, and law while studying at foreign universities, but the Hungarian universities and colleges (Pécs, Veszprém, Óbuda) could not be left without books either. From the time of the Anjou kings in the fourteenth century, splendid manuscripts have come down to us, proving the Hungarian court illuminators to have been in every way the equals of the artists of other countries.® When writing became general in the management of affairs, the royal chancellery and other offices needed an adequate number of scribes proficient in reading and writing Latin, and who could also copy manuscripts. Thus by the beginning of the fifteenth century any earlier differences in the standard of books between Hungary and the western coimtries had disappeared. This only showed, however, that the soil was favourable for future growth. That a humanist concern with books manifested itself earlier in Hungary than in other countries was the result of a fortunate combination of circumstances. One such contributory cause was the fact that between Italy and Hungary in the fourteenth century there was not a mere occasional contact, but a dose, permanent and many-sided relationship. Not only did new incentives and impulses reach the country again and again through the relatives of the Neapolitan Anjous and as a result of the Italian campaigns of Louis the Great (1342-1382), but in the south-western parts of the medieval Hungarian monarchy, in Dalmatia and Slavonia, the doors were flung wide open to ItaUan influences.® It was therefore no accident that the leading personalities of the early period of Hungarian humanism, the founders of the first libraries, came from these south-western regions. The period of Sigismund, king of Himgary and sovereign of the Holy Roman Empire, and the Council of Constance, which was held during his reign, were both highly significant. It was at this time that Buda became the permanent capital of Hungary—sometimes, it seemed, for occasional 13