AZ ORSZÁGOS SZÉCHÉNYI KÖNYVTÁR ÉVKÖNYVE 1959. Budapest (1961)

IV. Könyvtár- és művelődéstörténeti tanulmányok - Summaires

part of that immense collection of manuscript source-material, now lost or lying hidden, on the basis of which Istvánffy wrote his work "Historiarum de rebus Hungaricis libri XXXVIII"

', printed by Antonius Hieratus in Cologne in 1622. The author draws conclusions from the humanist way of life of the Istvánffy family and of Miklós Istvánffy himself: his education at the court of great Hungarian humanist prelates, his studies at the universities of Padova and Bologna, his activity at the court and chancellery of the Emperor Rudolph in Prague over several decades; all that contributed to his erudition and bibliophilism, and to the formation of his library. The second part of the study presents the results of the author's research. Ever since the beginning of the 18th century, the existence of a sometime Istvánffy library has been recorded by historical literature, but it had never been attempted to clear up its destiny. Investigating the holdings of historical material in the great Hungarian libraries, the author succeeded in discovering five other manuscript volumes besides the three mentioned above, which undoubtedly belonged to Istvánffy'?, library. Two of them turned up in the National Széchényi Library itself: a volume containing copies of source-material (Fol. lat. 2275), formerly part of the collection of Count Ferenc Széchényi, and an autograph portion of Istvánffy's great work "Historiarum

. . ." (Quart. Lat. 2316), coming from the former library of the Counts Apponyi in Nagyappony. The other three volumes are: a colligation of Greek patrological works in the Budapest University Library (F. 28), an autograph book of poems with Istvánffy's own verses in the library of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences (M. írod. írók 4-r. 241), and a so-called stylionarium, used by Istvánffy during his activity in the chancellery, now in the library of the Archdiocese at Eger (Y. IV. 55). Only traces of further four Istvánffy codices (the manuscripts of Ferenc Forgách: Rerum Hungaricarum sui temporis commentarii, Giovanni Michele Brutus: Magyar história, János Decsi (Decius) de Baranya: Magyar história, Antonio Bonfini: Rerum Ungar

icarum decades) were discovered, the volumes themselves could not be found. The manuscript of Forgách's work disappeared from the library of the Dukes Esterházy in Eisenstadt probably only as late as World War II. Not even traces were left of the numerous manuscript volumes used by Istvánffy for writing his great work, which, in all certainty, formed part of his library. Yet it was surely no small collection. The volumes containing only copies of documents could be put at two hundred at least. The situation is the same with the printed books of Istvánffy's library. One can point to the works on the basis of*which he composed his history, but not one of the books turned up so far. We have evidence of the purchasing by Istvánffy of certain clas-' sical romances (the works of Heliodorus and Achilleus Tatios respectively), but these books, too, could not be traced. The author states that Istvánffy's library was probably located on Croatian territory, in the castle of Vinica, county Varaádin, that having been the centre of the vast family estates; though it is possible that the library or part of it was housed in another manor, in Paukovec, county Zagreb. The famous library was broken up after the possessor's death in 1615. Having no male inheritor, he bequeathed most of his collection (probably all the printed books, and the theological manuscripts) to the Jesuit college of Zagreb; and it seems, he left the historical manuscript source-material to his three daughters and his sons-in-law. The discovered codices mentioned above came into our national collections by way of the successors of Croatian and Hungarian aristocratic families, such as the Draskovics, Keglevich, and Lipcsey families. Finally, it is stressed that the task of reconstructing the Istvánffy library is still far from being complete. Yugoslav and Hungarian researchers will have to continue following up tracks indicated so far. 404