Rózsa György: The Palace of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences
IV. The first floor
lós Toldi, attired in red, rises above the King's retinue. An old peasant on the righthand side of the painting is its conceptual centre. The group of clerics listening to his story consists of Anonymus the chronicler, Thomas the archdeacon of Spalato, and János Thuróczy, the historian. On the left, in the foreground, stands, in the company of one of his fellow monks, the Dominican Friar Julian, discoverer of the Hungarians who had remained in their country of origin. The triptych on the opposite wall summarizes the Renaissance and Baroque centuries. Its unity of form is assured by the painted structure of the galleried, open-centred Renaissance hall. The central painting acquires an independent background by book-shelves referring to Matthias Corvinus' world-famous library the Corvina, screened off by a green curtain, with the busts of Homer and Julius Caesar placed on their top bracket. In the still life of the foreground, alongside the books and a printing press, natural science also makes its appearance, represented by a globe. The back of the king's high throne is decorated with the Erdődy-tapestry, a valuable relic of the textile arts of the 15th century. The monarch is dressed in a goldbrocade dolman and a blue velvet cloak. The Italian members of his court stand to his right: Filippo Lippi holding a painting of the Madonna, a group of historians with Luigi Carbo of Ferrara before the antique statue of Hercules, Bonfini just offering his book, with Galeotto Marzio and Ransanus. The Hungarian members of Matthias' court stand on the left. János Vitéz can be identified by his cardinal's garment and the deed of foundation of the Academia Istropolitana of Pozsony (Bratislava), Janus Pannonius by his lilac-coloured frock, while Tamás Bakócz's profile appears in the background. The left-hand side of the foreground is occupied by Baron Péter Apor, the author of Metamorphosis Transylvaniae and István Beythe, the first scholar of botany. The painter's initials and the date are in the bottom left-hand side corner: K. Lotz, 1891. The left-hand side section of the triptych depicts the most important personalities of the Reformation and the Counter-Reformation, with Péter Pázmány in the centre. Miklós Telegdy, bishop of Pécs, and György Káldy, the Jesuit translator of the Bible, stand behind him to the right. The figure of István Verbőczy, a jurist, is on the right-hand side, turning to the right. He wears a yellow dolman and a blue pelisse. Ferenc Foigách, the bishop of Várad, and a historiographer, sits beside him; while the historian, Antal Verancsics, and Miklós Istvánffy stand on the platform. Gáspár Károli, the Protestant Bible translator, sits on the stairs absorbed in his book. The artist, or rather, the commissioners of the work, chose 23
