Sigismund of Luxembourg

Sigismund of Luxembourg (Hungarian: Luxemburgi Zsigmond, German: Sigismund von Luxemburg, Croatian: Žigmund Luksemburški, in Czech: Zikmund Lucemburský) or also frequently referred to as Sigismund of Hungary (in Hungarian: Zsigmond magyar király; Nuremberg, 15 February 1368 - Znojmo, December 9, 1437) was elector of Brandenburg from 1378 to 1388 and again from 1411 to 1415, king of Hungary and Croatia from 1387 to 1437, of Bohemia from 1419, and Holy Roman Emperor from 1433 to 1437; He was the last emperor of the House of Luxembourg. He was also king of Italy from 1431, and king of Romans from 1411. He was the son of Emperor Charles IV of Luxembourg and his fourth wife, Elizabeth of Pomerania. He led a European Crusader army against the Turks, who had invaded Serbia and Bulgaria, but was soundly defeated at Nicopolis in September 1396, barely escaping capture. Sigismund was one of the driving forces behind the Council of Constance which ended the papal schism, but which ultimately also led to the Hussite wars that dominated the last period of Sigismund's life.

During his reign he set the center of his empire at the Hungarian court of Buda (present-day Budapest), from where he ruled Bohemia and the Holy Roman Empire in his final years. He was buried in Nagyvárad (now called Oradea, in Romania) next to the tomb of King Saint Władysław I of Hungary.

Biography

Sigismund, Margrave of Brandenburg

He was the second son of Emperor Charles IV and was born in Nuremberg or Prague,. He was margrave of Brandenburg in 1378 at the age of 10, succeeding his father, until 1388 when he resigned in favor of his cousin Jobst of Moravia. After his death in 1411, Sigismund once again became margrave of Brandenburg until 1415, when he gifted the territory of this brand to Frederick I of Nuremberg, giving rise to the Brandenburg branch of the Hohenzollern.

Sigismund, king of Hungary

Ascension to the Hungarian throne

To strengthen the already close political relations, King Louis I of Hungary and the German Emperor Charles IV of Luxembourg decided to commit their two children to marriage. The emperor's son, Sigismund of Luxembourg, was sent at the age of 11 to the court of Louis I in 1379, where he learned the Hungarian language and soon fell into the rhythm of court life, considering himself Hungarian. In 1382, Louis I made his final decision to leave the young 14-year-old Sigismund and his future wife Mary, daughter of the Hungarian king, as his absolute heir of Hungary, leaving them as co-kings. A few months after the death of Louis I, the succession of events did not unfold as the late Hungarian king or Sigismund himself had planned.

First the young Queen Mary ascended the throne alone, advised and protected by her mother Elizabeth of Bosnia, the widow of Louis I. However, Charles II of Hungary, a distant relative of the Anjou of Naples, was called to the kingdom by a faction of the Hungarian nobility and was crowned Hungarian king. His reign lasted very little and, after he was assassinated by loyalists of Queens Elizabeth and Mary, a civil war broke out in the Hungarian kingdom, which was appeased by Sigismund giving enormous areas of territory and government positions to the discontented nobles. At this time the kingdom finally became the nation with large estates that will continue to exist for almost half a millennium. Sigismund's marriage to Queen Mary I of Hungary, daughter of the late Louis I of Hungary, ensured his stability on the throne, and he soon had his wife renounce royal rights, pushing her into the background around 1388. One of The conditions for maintaining the throne were that Sigismund should always be surrounded by Hungarian nobles and all public offices should be held by Hungarians, which happened in this way. The king already felt more comfortable among the Hungarians than among the Germanic people, and every time he had the opportunity he showed off his command of the language and wore royal Hungarian clothes.

The Hungarian king against the invading Turks

In 1389, the Ottoman Turks defeated the coalition of South Slavic states, and Serbia became a vassal state of the Turks. This changed the vicinity of the kingdom of Hungary, placing the Ottomans as a very close threat. In 1390, Turkish incursions into the southern Hungarian territories began, and not satisfied with this, Sigismund had to face in 1391 those Hungarian nobles, who, despite having received territories, felt excluded from the government. The nobles placed the son of the late King Charles II of Hungary, Władysław I of Naples, at the head of their movement, to avenge the death of his father and claim the Hungarian kingdom for someone from the same dynasty as the late King Louis I..

Later, in 1392, Sigismund led a victorious campaign against the Turks in Hungarian territory, repelling them into southern Serbian regions, and in 1395 he fought against them in Wallachia and Moldavia. On the other hand, Queen Mary died in 1395 after falling from her horse during a hunt, leaving King Sigismund a widower, and in this way absolute Hungarian power was concentrated in the monarch. Sigismund had the body of his deceased wife taken to the city of Great Varadino, where she was buried next to the tomb of King Saint Ladislaus I of Hungary, whose cult had great importance in the kingdom, as he was the example of the knight, king and ideal saint. Since he was a child, Sigismund had adopted the cult of Saint Ladislaus (very popular at the court of King Louis I) and on many occasions he made donations to the monastery, as well as ensuring that several statues were erected in honor of the holy Hungarian knight king.

The Turkish threat continued to advance, so the Hungarian monarch decided to call a crusade war, which French troops attended and gathered near present-day Bulgaria. John of Kanizsa, the archbishop of Strygonia, Nicholas Garai the Younger and many others loyal to Sigismund advanced with their armies in 1396 to Nicopolis. However, a hasty move based on the strategies of Duke John I of Burgundy resulted in the final defeat of the Christian armies against the Ottomans of Sultan Beyazid I in the Battle of Nicopolis (being recorded, according to many chroniclers, by the imprudence of the French who did not want to listen to the suggestions of the Hungarian king). Sigismund managed to escape thanks to the assistance of one of his commanders, the Polish nobleman Stibor de Stiboricz, who was also a personal friend of the monarch and voivode of Transylvania. Shortly thereafter, a faction of still disaffected Hungarian nobles, now frustrated by the defeat at Nicopolis, rose up again against Sigismund in 1401, arresting him and then taking him to Siklós Castle. There the League of Siklós will be formed, where Nicholas Garai the Younger and Armando II of Celje will free the king, securing him the crown and themselves receiving great power from the monarch. These two nobles will also manage to become related to King Sigismund, committing the Hungarian monarch to Barbara of Celje, daughter of Armando, and Nicholas Garai the Younger to Anne of Celje.

In 1403, a new faction called Władysław I of Naples to the kingdom, trying to replace Sigismund, since he was a member of the House of Anjou, son of King Charles II of Hungary who had been assassinated in 1386 and was related to King Louis I of Hungary. Władysław of Naples was illegitimately crowned in the southern Hungarian territories, but soon left, fearing the wrath of Sigismund, and without having ruled or being recognized by Hungarian historians as king. Sigismund continued in power for the next forty years without any kind of succession obstacle.

Among his closest allies was the young Florentine Filippo de Ozora, who, skillfully handling numbers and accounts, soon rose to the group of the most powerful nobles of the Hungarian kingdom, also standing out as an efficient military commander. To create a strong league where the vassal monarchs of Hungary showed their commitment in the fight against the Turks, Sigismund founded the Order of the Dragon in 1408, and later in 1409 and 1410 he faced the Germanic Teutonic Order. After the death of King Robert of the Holy Roman Empire (who had never been named emperor), Sigismund was elected king of the Romans in 1411, from which time he fought until 1413 against Venice. In 1419 the Czech King Wenceslas of Luxembourg died, and his younger brother, Sigismund of Hungary, inherited his throne. In 1424, renovations were completed on Sigismund's palace in Buda, his royal seat. But the Ottomans would not give him a chance to rest, because in 1427 they attacked and occupied the fortress of Galambóc on the banks of the Danube in southwest Hungary.

From 1430 onwards, the Hungarian nobleman John Hunyadi (father of the future King Matthias Corvinus of Hungary) began to serve Sigismund, becoming a knight of his court from 1433 and inseparably accompanying him in his next battles against the Protestant Hussites in Bohemia. He also traveled to the Council of Basel with the Hungarian king, and later when he was elected Germanic emperor, the Hungarian nobleman was present at the coronation of Sigismund (after the death of the monarch, Juan Hunyadi continued to support the new King Albert of Hungary, son-in-law of the deceased king).

Having only had one daughter, Elizabeth of Luxembourg, at an advanced age, Sigismund decided to resolve the succession problem, naming Albert of Habsburg as his heir, who had taken the young Hungarian princess as his wife in 1421.

Sigismund, crusader king

He contracted a second marriage in 1406 with Barbara of Celje. Two years later he founded the enigmatic Order of the Dragon, whose objective was "to defend the Holy Cross and fight against the enemies of Christianity", although it rather served to keep Sigismund in power. To this order belonged, among other nobles, Prince Vlad III of Wallachia (present-day Romania), from whom Bram Stoker's character, Dracula, would later emerge.

Sigismund reigned in Bohemia from 1419, succeeding his brother Wenceslas. However, he was forced to confront the religious movements of the Hussites for fifteen years, and was not recognized by most Czech factions until 1437.

Holy Roman Emperor

After the King of Romans Robert died and after a complicated election, he was elected King of Romans in the year 1410. His opponents were Wenceslas of Bohemia, who had not accepted his deposition as king ten years earlier, and Jobst of Moravia, who He was elected a month later and died a few months later. Wenceslas resigned in favor of Sigismund, allowing him to be unanimously recognized as emperor.

During the years of Sigismund's reign as Germanic emperor, political decisions concerning the Empire were made from Hungary. Faced with the other hostile Germanic princes, Sigismund himself would have said even in 1429: "Let them, if they please, choose for themselves a new king, for me Hungary will be enough. There would be bread for me until the day I died."

Sigismund died in Znaim, on December 9, 1437, and according to his designs he was buried in the city of Great Varadino, next to the tomb of King Saint Ladislaus I of Hungary. After his death, his daughter Elizabeth of Luxembourg (1409-1442), married to King Albert of Hungary, succeeded him on the throne - as had been planned.

Importance of their reigns

During the five years of Sigismund's reign as emperor, the Reichstag (imperial assembly) was held for the first time outside the borders of the Holy Empire, in the city of the Kingdom of Hungary of Bratislava (during the Middle Ages the territories of the present-day Slovakia were within the Hungarian kingdom). Thus, with the creation of the Order of the Dragon, Sigismund's court seat and political center in Buda, Hungary rose to a prominent position in central and eastern Europe. The defense of Europe against the Ottomans focused on it and slowly changed the inclination of the Bohemian monarchs, who subsequently increasingly desired to take over the Hungarian throne, this being a symbol of prestige (all subsequent foreign monarchs who obtained the Hungarian crown They immediately moved to the royal city of Hungary and ran their kingdoms from there (e.g. Albert of Hungary, Władysław I Jagiellon, Władysław II Jagiellon and Louis II of Hungary).

Ancestors

Succession

Predecessor: Wenceslao	Elector of Brandenburg 1378-1388	Successor: Jobst de Moravia
Predecessor: Maria I	King of Hungary and Croatia 1387-1437 (together with Mary until 1395)	Successor: Alberto de Hungary
Predecessor: Jobst de Moravia	Elector of Brandenburg 1411-1415	Successor: Federico I
Predecessor: Roberto del Palatinado	King of Romans 1410-1433	Successor: Alberto II
Predecessor: Carlos IV	Emperor of the Holy Germanic Roman Empire 1433-1437	Successor: Federico III
Predecessor: Wenceslao IV	King of Bohemia 1419-1437	Successor: Alberto I