Szilágyi András (szerk.): Ars Decorativa 24. (Budapest, 2006)

István SIMONYI: Questions and answers. An attempt at defining the so-called „Bethlen-Násfa"

The princely wedding held at Kassa in 1626 - to which tradition associates these násfas - is known in several details. The envoys of the Transylvanian prince (fig.

3) had sued for the hand of the daughter of the Elector of Brandenburg (fig.4) in the spring of the previous year. The planned marriage was also to serve windowed Bethlen's foreign political goals including an emerging anti-Habsburg alliance during the Thirty Years War. Preparations for the luxurious reception of the princely bride were made. Out of the contemporaneous accounts the autobiography of János Kemény, later prince of Transylvania, provides intriguing details: "When he received his princely bride, even his coachmen, outriders, couriers were dressed in purple velvet." 8 Despite a number of similar details, as well as the surviving schedule of ceremonies and various data of purchases and inventories

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, no mention of the wedding násfas can be found anywhere. Nor is it detailed anywhere what the Morgengabe included on the ritual agenda meant. The unavoidable "morning gift" most often meant some valuable jewels presented by the bridegroom to the bride on the morning of the wedding. It is interesting that there is a hiatus of information concerning this present, which together with the wedding gifts, was probably meant to be widely publicized. Defectiveness of sources, however, does not disprove the one-time existence of the "Bethlen-/ídí/ös". What was this actual role? A násfa, pendant - the "number one" piece of that-time jewellery - was always the gift of the bridegroom to his beloved. It could be an engagement gift or a Morgengabe. As is known, Gábor Bethlen only exchanged rings with Catherine during the engagement in Berlin, and that via his envoys, too. As for a Morgengabe, it is rather unlikely that the six, or perhaps more, "Bethlen-ras/as" played this role in the ritual of the wedding. There must have been a unique choreography of ceremonies composed for this individual occasion, which deviated from the customary ritual of the aristocrats. The prince clearly laid great weight on expressing richness and luxury in external appearance as well, through the impact of the unified appearance of his retinue, the grandezza. It may easily have contributed to this grandezza that "six pages and the prince himself were wearing such násfas". It is hard to imagine, however, that the princely bride was left out of this company and conception. I have only recently managed to resolve this contradiction when I was faced with the "flying heart" násfa preserved in the Grünes Gewölbe

's collection in Dresden."

1 (fig.5/a,b) Hungarian scholarship has practically ignored this piece until now, although its relation to the "Bethlen-/íós/ös" in Hungary is more than probable. The iconographie elements in the jewel cross, anchor, wings, pair of doves, princely crown, foliage with winding serpent, skull and first of all the hands holding a heart - as well as their arrangement adjust to an individual programme. These motifs were often used in 16

,h -17"

1 century jewels one by one or in certain customary combinations; especially the hands holding a heart were popular as wedding jewels. However, I know of no other jewel in any public collection in the world that is so closely related to the "Bemlen-n<£s/as" in Hungary. (There may still be some, but I am going to touch on this question later.) Compared with the specimens in Budapest, the decisive differences derive from this násfa being made of gold: the cast and mainly white enamelled ornaments are attached to a light frame, as was customary in jewel making in the age. The harmony of the composition, the details, the subtle forming of champlevé enamels are of high quality, executed by a first-ranking master. Comparing the Dresden násfa with item 13 of the 1884 catalogue - a gold násfa owned by count Antal Zichy at that time and latent since then - which tradition attributed to prince Bethlen as his wedding násfa, the similarity is striking. There are correspondences that could not be found in the rest of the silver-gilt specimens. In the 1884 description an openwork enamelled net covered the heart (such a motif is also found in the Dresden piece) and black carved enamel embellished the narrower wing