Mikó Árpád szerk.: Reneissance year 2008 (A Magyar Nemzeti Galéria kiadványai 2008/1)

PÉTER FARBAKY, ÁRPÁD MIKO, ENIKŐ SPEKNER, KORNÉL SZOVÁK, ISTVÁN TRINGLI, ANDRÁS VÉGH: Matthias Corvinus, the King. Tradition and Renewal in the Hungarian Royal Court, 1458-1490

used to patronise Italian arts and humanists. Having grown up in the Neapolitan court, the Queen was sensitive to the arts and scholarship, and was in close contact with humanists. She also dominated musical affairs in the Buda court and seems to have exercised, by example, a considerable effect on her husband's arts patronage and the development oi his Italian contacts. After Matthias' death, the Queen Dowager set her sights on power on her own account, but was neutralised by the offer of what turned out to be a feigned marriage by the new king Wladislaw II Jagiello. Nonetheless, Beatrice remained in Hungary for another ten years until 1500, never giving up hope of getting close to power. She lived m Esztergom, close to Buda, enjoying her substantial queen's income right to the end and keeping under her wing her nephew, the child Ippolito d'Este, who she installed as Archbishop of Esztergom, the highest (and wealthiest) ecclesiastical seat in Hungary. Beatrice lived in Hungary for a total of 24 years. On her return she died in the Castle Capuano in Naples in 1508. Finances King Matthias' revenues in the early years of his reign were much lower than those of King Sigismund. Only some two hundred thousand florins found their way into the treasury each year. About half of this was salt tax, salt mining and trading being a royal monopoly in Hungary. At the very beginning of his rule, a new post was created, the estate manager (provisor curiae) of Buda Castle, who was put in charge of all royal estates in the kingdom. After the coronation, the treasury was given wide powers, and taxes, customs and coinage were reorganised. Constant warfare and the higher level of royal pomp consumed large sums. In the last decades of Matthias' rule, his annual revenue amounted to 800-900,000 gold florins. A large part of the revenue was from the "extraordinary" tax known as "aid" (subsidium), which was nonetheless levied very regularly, every year. This tax was paid by the tenant peasants and the "single-plot nobles". Then there were taxes on privileged people and towns, and the salt, mining and customs revenues. At the start of Matthias' reign there were three kinds of coin in circulation: two silver — the denar and the obulus, known popularly as coins and half-coins — and the gold florin, rarely used in day-to-day business. The gold florin was minted with unchanging weight and purity, but silver coins depended on current economic policy. In the early 1460s, the treasury issued debased denars, but started to mint new, durable coins in the second half of the decade. This resulted in stable coinage values: one florin was worth 100 denars, and one denar two Cup donated by King Matthias. 1476 Ricti, Tcsoro di Daomo obuli. A fourth com, the garas, which had not been minted in Hungary since Louis the Great, was introduced, worth four denars. This system of coinage survived Matthias and remained in place until 1521. The exterior of the coins also changed: reformed gold and silver coins featured the Madonna, and this remained a constant motif of Hungarian coins for several centuries. Military Affairs Matthias Corvinus was at war with one or other of his neighbours during most of his reign. The army was adjusted to meet varying opponents, and so did not always have the same composition. Along the Ottoman borders, the main task was usually to repel and avenge one or two intrusions a year by semi-regular akinjis, but different sol-