Notitia hungáriae novae historico geographica (Budapest, 2012)

Zala vármegye

INTRODUCTION

I. Stemma of the manuscripts

II. Creation process of the county description

Bél found a data collector for Zala county quite early - probably at the beginning of the 1720’s, perhaps even sooner - who was Sámuel Rotarides, Lutheran pastor from Kapolcs (at that time Kapoks belonged to Zala coutny). Rotarides, whom Bél apparently found by the means of Church connections, noted information regarding the county ([R]) based on Bél’s supposed questionnaire that might have been closely identical - as it appears from the answers - with a subsisting questionnaire dating of 1718 (see also [R]). Another data collector’s “observations” has also subsisted, these were written some time in 1727-1733, but Bél used them only to a small extent ([O]). Bél, according to his own words, sent the description already in 1728 to Lajos Batthyány (a1) who, as vicarious lord lieutenant, presumably forwarded it to “censors” in Zala county for revision - precisely as he did in the case of Vas county’s description. The text provided with additions by the censors (a2) was returned to Bél in 1733, who presumably made it transcripted, then in 1736 sent it to the Locotenential Council asking for forwarding it to the county authorities for revision and completion (b). The county assembly duly accomplished its observations by the end of 1737, however the manuscript, together with the observations by the county authorities, got lost during the post delivery; in vain had the chief postmaster himself initiated an investigation, he could not retrace the documents (even the Chancellary dealt with the case). There is no evidence of Bél’s preparing a new text and sending it to the county authority. This is also proven by the late and deficient transcript (C), that might have been copied based on the draft of the manuscript sent to the county authorities, as can