Századok – 2012

KÖZLEMÉNYEK II. RÁKÓCZI GYÖRGYRŐL - Szabó András Péter: „De profundis". Nemzeteszmék az 1657 utáni évek erdélyi válságában V/1085

1160 SZABÓ ANDRÁS PÉTER „DE PROFUNDIS" CONCEPTS OF NATION IN THE CRISIS OF TRANSYLVANIA IN THE YEARS AFTER 1657 András Péter Szabó Abstract In the present study we attempt to have a closer look, on the basis of the results offerred by the modern theories of nationalism, at the communal ideologies which emerged in the Kingdom of Hungary and the Principality of Transylvania in the 17th century. The inquiry focuses on the period of Transylvanian crisis (1657-1663/1664) which began with the Polish campaign of prince György Rákóczi II, and which set off important changes in the field of political conceptions. We have succeeded in identifying two distinctive national ideologies, a noble one couched in baroque rethorics, transconfessional but restricted to the order of nobility, which occasionally emphasised the role of the Hungarian language, and a Calvinist concept of nation, using a language based on the Old Testament, which spanned all social layers, was pedominantly Hungarian ethnically, and whose characteristic means was biblical mythicising. From the 1660s the two ideologies partially merged, creating what was to be the official national ideology of the Rákóczi revolt (1703-1711), theoretically at least transcending confessional and social boundaries. In a wider context we have been able to detect the survival of both 17th-century national ideologies into the 19th century, which seems to show that the process of creating the modern nation leant heavily on the already existing communal ideologies and views of history. This, on the other hand, gives support to the hypothesis elaborated by Anthony D. Smith with regard to the ethnic core of nations.