C. Tóth Norbert: Az esztergomi székeskáptalan a 15. században III. rész. Az ún. 1397. évi esztergomi székeskáptalani egyházlátogatási jegyzőkönyv - Subsidia ad historiam medii aevi Hungariae inquirendam 13. (Budapest, 2021)
The Cathedral Chapter of Esztergom in the Fifteenth Century. Illrd Part
278 The Cathedral Chapter of Esztergom in the Pifteenth Century. Illrd Part As mentioned above, the book seeks to answer two basic questions: when was the text of the canonical visitation compiled, and what are its constituent parts. In his preface to the edition, Ferenc Kollányi wrote that „the copied manuscript is not a contemporaneous register of the results of the 1397 church visitation. This is revealed by the handwriting itself. Thus, as far as we can know, it is only a copy of the original register that is preserved by the chapter's archives. We have no idea as to who prepared this copy, and when. All that is certain is that the register was copied into the booklet some time in the second half of the fifteenth century".1351 - Thus far, we cannot but agree with him. But not with the way he continues. For Kollányi departed from the - faulted - premise that the volume in question is a copy of the 1397 canonical visitation register, and consequently he did not even consider the possibility that the volume might not contain the text of only one visitation, and only tried to answer the question of when the copy was made. According to him, „this can be exactly defined. ... In the last, 49th article the bishop inquires whether the chapter has any statutes; and in the 48th, which chapter dignitaries have houses of their own? Having accounted for these houses, immediately thereafter a chapel prebend is mentioned. It is evident at the first sight that this cannot belong to the visitation register, for in this case the chapel should have been mentioned under the 5th article. But even if this is left out of consideration, the wording itself clearly proves that this section was put to writing after the visitatio. We also read there that there exist other rectorates as well, which were postea - thereafter - founded by pious members of the chapter, for the salvation of their souls. This can only be so interpreted that these prebends were created after the visitation had taken place. Leafing through the manuscript, one will find that whenever persons are mentioned who are not living anymore at the time of writing, the word „late" (quondam) is regularly attached to their names. On this premise, and keeping this in mind, we can at least approximately determine the date when the manuscript was made."1352 After the faulted premise indicated above, Kollányi drew the correct conclusion as to the time when the text (manuscript) was prepared: „for in the description of the abovementioned prebend, that is, the rectorate of the St Jerome chapel, we read that this chapel of St Jerome was built and beneficed in the northern part of the cathedral by the lector Mihály Kesztölci. ... Since in this description the name of Kesztölci is mentioned twice without the additional quondam, one cannot but conclude that at the time of writing he was still alive. And we do know that Mihály Kesztölci occurs as 1351 Kollányi F.: Visitatio 72. 1352 Uo. 72-73.
