Notitia hungáriae novae historico geographica (Budapest, 2012)
Vas vármegye
256 VAS COUNTY Consequently it is probable that Bél delayed the editing of this part, simply attaching the relating pages of the letter of the Chancellary to the manuscript; which pages were continuously copied by the maker of copy C, as if it belonged to the description as well. Otherwise it would be hard to believe, that Bél inserted these additions unchanged into the text, and he got made a copy containing the Chancellary’s supplements as its integral part. It is unlikely because the additions are different in their style and structure from the relating parts in Bél’s descriptions - that is the review of the villages -, and also because the already indicated sentence, in which the Chancellary mentioned Bél’s request for supplying the descriptions of villages by districts,* 10 11 was left in copy C along with the other segment relating to the “appointed revisors”, that is, the men who made the additions.11 Undoubtedly Bél would have deleted these sentences in the text, if he really had intended to insert the additions into his work. Besides there are a lot of recurrences in the additions compared to the part written by Bél, because in the additions the towns and castles of the county are also presented (as the parts of the districts), although they were previously described by Bél in the first part. It is impossible that Bél would not have noticed this kind of serious anomalies. 6: Apparently the manuscript itself was made sometime in 1728, and the corrections were certainly inserted after the Chancellary’s letter and appendix had been posted (28th May 1733), and partly in 1743-1744 (see above). [Cane] 1: MOL A 35 Conceptus Expeditionum June 1733 no. 68.12 2: Observationes circa Hystoriam [!] Belianam, in ordine ad Comitatum Castriferrei.13 3: 68 pp. 4: The Hungarian Chancellary’s draft of its letter dating of 28th May 1733 where they state that they send back the descriptions of Vas and Zala counties to Mátyás Bél; observations, additions to the description of Vas county written by Bél. 5: One hand’s work with often recurring posterior corrections, additions. Undoubtedly it was prepared by officials from Vas county. The Chancellary sent it over to Bél on 28th May 1733 and the text later was incorporated into the description’s only known copy (about this see b, C). The antecedent of the accomplished observations is that Lajos Batthyány as lord lieutenant of Vas county had supposedly forwarded the description previously sent to him by Bél to the county authorities in 1729, that consequently set up a committee on their general assembly in July for the accomplishment of the assignment (see b). However this committee did not put the data in writing or at least it was not in 1729 that the data collection gained its final form, since János Foky deputy lord lieutenant (vicecomes) for instance was a member of the committee formed in 1729 but he is mentioned as deceased in the observations.14 It’s more likely that following Bél’s pressing letter in 1732 (see b) the observations were prepared by the county officials summoned by Batthyány who was at that time already vice-chancellor. However it is of absolute certainty that county officials prepared the document since its major part consists of enumerating the landowners of each settlement. It is also likely that the magistrates selected into the committee or their delegates were the data collectors, since the magistrates are often mentioned in the text. Obviously Bél did not receive the draft that subsisted amongst the Chacellary’s documents, that we hereby described, but its fair copy: this is the reason why there are differences between manuscript C and the discussed draft, especially in obviously written by Bél: the observations of the Chancellary and the revisors were added to this part, and they always noted, to which chapter of the original text they intended to attach something. (See [Cane] pp. 1-20.) 10 See note 6., and C p. 320. 11 See note 5. and C p. 382. 12 Published in Bél 1993. nr. 486. 13 On the dorsum of the manuscript: „Reflexiones super Historia Beliana ex parte Comitatus Castriferrei.” 14 „...haeredum Joannis condam Foky V. Comitis Comitatus hujus...” See [Cane] p. 37. About his participation in the committee see b.
