Szilágyi András (szerk.): Ars Decorativa 14. (Budapest, 1994)

TOMPOS Lilla: Legenda és valóság; Esterházy László „páncélinge"

LILLA TOMPOS LEGEND AND REALITY THE JUPON OR COAT-ARMOUR OF LÁSZLÓ ESTERHÁZY The tragic battle was fought in the afternoon of August 26, 1652, at Vezekény. Four young Esterházys died there: László, Captain of the town Pápa, the second son of the Palatine, Miklós; and three of his cousins: Ferenc, Captain of Gyarmat, Tamás, Vice-Captain of Léva and the youngest one, Gáspár. According to the monumental ceremonial order of the Palatine, György Thurzó, the burial took place three months later, on November 25, at Nagyszombat. In the procession which started from Sempte, twelve mounted troops escorted the doubles of the four young men, taking with them their armour and their horses covered with a funeral pall. The coffins and carts were covered with blood-coloured, red cloth as a symbol of the young men's valiance, and the troops carried red banners. They were followed by the crowd of the mourners, some five thousand people altogether.

1 All the four lay in state under a Castrum doloris which stood on twisted columns decorated with arms and coats-of-arms symbolizing the deceased. After the drawing of Hans Rudolf Müller, Mauritz Lang made a copper engraving of both the ceremony and the temporary edifice. The memory of the deceased is immortalized by full-size portraits which are to be seen at the portrait gallery of ancestors at Franko castle. The event and its protagonists were condensed in a single work of art on the thesis sheet of Mihály Benyovszky, a student at Nagyszombat. The sheet was dedicated to Pál Esterházy, student at the same university, and published for the 1654 examination, engraved after an unknown model by Melchior Russell, an Augsburg master.

2 In the early eighteenth century, the ceremonial hall of Fraknó castle was decorated by scenes of battles against the Turks at Érsekújvár, Lakompak and Vezekény alike. The young Pál Esterházy who, - at the age of 18, following the death of his brother became the head of the family, - together with his wife, Orsolya Esterházy had a silver ornamental plate and can made in the memory of László. The can is of the shape of the hero's mounted statue, whereas the plate - today in the Budapest Museum of Applied Art - depicts the tragic battlescene and the death of the hero falling off his horse. The inscription held by putti contains the date and the names of the commissioners: 1654, C. (ornes) P. (aulus) E. (sterházy) - C. (omitissa) V. (rsula) E. (sterházy). The hallmark suggests that the piece is the work of two famous Augsburg masters, Philipp Jakob Drentwett and Abraham Drentwett. Beside objets ci'art, several literary works also remember the heroes. One is by the poet and military leader Miklós Zrínyi, a close friend of László Esterházy; another, more than a hundred years later, in 1797, by Dániel Berzsenyi. In his rousing poem to Prince Miklós Esterházy he held up the death of the four yong men as an example for his contemporaries.

3 Art history deals amply with the artistic and literary relations of the battle, we thus mention only two literary works which have hitherto been omitted from relevant essays. The almost contemporary chronicler of the Kuruts folk poetry tells about the beaten Turkish army, the victory over the pagans and the gloriuos death of the four Esterházys in his poem in Slovak:

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