The Eighth Tribe, 1979 (6. évfolyam, 1-12. szám)

1979-04-01 / 4. szám

Page 8

THE EIGHTH TRIBE

April, 1979

Aurel Raskó: Portrait of Colonel Commandant Michael Kováts de Fabricy.

Just as the Great Cumaniau Plains are open and easily discernible, its people are straightforward, fearless and outspoken. By Royal Decree every Cumanian enjoyed the privileges of noblemen. In his checkered life, Kováts, no matter in what position, never forgot to mention that he was a nobleman and a Hungarian. One of his military reports in Prussia is signed: “v. Kováts, i.e., von Kováts,” adding the accent in accordance with Hungarian orthography. In the reports of the Military High Command of Buda he is listed as Major “noble” Kováts without a predicate. However, he signs his June 13, 1777 letter to Benjamin Franklin as: Michael Kováts de Fabricy. The genealogical books known to us register only one Kováts de fabricy family who hails from Zemplén county and write their name with “cs” at the end. The authenticity of the predicate is still a matter of further research.

Kováts probably received the same education as the other young noblemen of his time. The letter drafted in excellent Latin to Franklin demonstrates that not only did he study Latin for a long time, but he must have spoken it frequently, for otherwise he

would have been unable to retain this extremely difficult language at the level displayed in the letter. This was not really unusual because the official language of the diets and the counties had remained Latin in Hungary as a means of protesting the Germanizing policies of Vienna.

We have no original painting or drawing of Kováts. His colorful and adventurous life inspired the imagination of many artists, but the pantings, statues and plaques depicting him are products of artstic fantasy. Alexander Finta, the American Hungarian sculptor, spent considerable efforts in trying to recreate Kováts’ picture, for both of them came from the same Hungarian Plains and were excellent horsemen. He devoted a large brass plaque, a small rider’s statue, and a few other plaques to him. It is questionable, however, that Finta’s typically Hungarian face was similar to Kováts! The same is true of Aurel Raskó’s artistic painting portraying a re-Alexander Finta: Bronze relief of Kováts in Trenton, NJ.