Johan Zápolya
Fyrste af Siebenbürgen. Valgt til konge over magyarerne (Ungarn), med støtte af den tyrkiske sultan Suleiman II. Blev fordrevet i 1528 af den tysk-romerske ærkehertug Ferdinand.
Zapolya, Johan (1487-1540), fyrste af Siebenbürgen og konge af Ungarn, blev efter Ludvig II.s død 1526 valgt til ungarsk konge, men måtte kæmpe med Ferdinand af Habsburg. Ifølge freden 1538 skulle Zapolya beholde kongetitlen og landet til højre for Theiss, men efter hans død skulle hele Ungarn tilfalde Ferdinand. Med Zapolyas søn, der herskede i Siebenbürgen, uddøde slægten 1571. (HK9/1925)
JOHN (ZAPOLYA)
(1487-1540), king of Hungary, was the son of the palatine Stephen Zapolya
and the princess Hedwig of Teschen, and was born at the castle of Szepesvar.
He began his public career at the famous Rakos diet of 1505, when, on
his motion, the assembly decided that after the death of the reigning
king, Wladislaus II., no foreign prince should be elected king of Hungary.
Henceforth he became the national candidate for the throne, which his
family had long coveted. As far back as 1491 his mother had proposed to
the sick king that his daughter Anne should be committed to her care in
order, subsequently, to be married to her son; but Wladislaus frustrated
this project by contracting a matrimonial alliance with the Habsburgs.
In 1510 Zapolya sued in person for the hand of the Princess Anne in vain,
and his appointment to the voivody of Transylvania (1511) was with the
evident intention of removing him far from court. In 1513, after a successful
raid in Turkish territory, he hastened to Buda at the head of 1000 horsemen
and renewed his suit, which was again rejected. In 1514 he stamped out
the dangerous peasant rising under Dozsa (q.v.) and the infernal torments
by means of which the rebel leader was slowly done to death were the invention
of Zapolya. With the gentry, whose hideous oppression had moved the peasantry
to revolt, ne was now more than ever popular, and, on the death of Wladislaus
II., the second diet of Rakos (1516) appointed him the governor of the
infant king Louis II. He now aimed at the dignity of palatine also, but
the council of state and the court party combined against him and appointed
Istvan Bathory instead (1519). The strife of factions now burnt more fiercely
than ever at the very time when the pressure of the Turk demanded the
combination of all the national forces against a common danger. It was
entirely due to the dilatoriness and dissensions of Zapolya and Bathory
that the great fortress of Belgrade was captured in 1521, a loss which
really sealed the fate of Hungary. In 1522 the diet would have appointed
both Zapolya and Bathory captains-general of the realm, but the court
set Zapolya aside and chose Bathory only. At the diets of Hatvan and Rakos
in 1522, Zapolya placed himself at the head of a confederation to depose
the palatine and the other great officers of state, but the attempt failed.
In the following year, however, the revolutionary Hatvan diet drove out
all the members of the council of state and made Istvan Verboczy, the
great jurist, and a friend of Zapolya, palatine. In the midst of this
hopeless anarchy, Suleiman I., the Magnificent, invaded Hungary with a
countless army, and the young king perished on the field of Mohacs in
a vain attempt to stay his progress, the contradictory orders of Louis
II. preventing Zapolya from arriving in time to turn the fortunes of the
day. The court party accused him of deliberate treachery on this occasion;
but the charge must be pronounced groundless. His younger brother George
was killed at Mohacs, where he was second commander-in-chief. Zapolya
was elected king of Hungary at the subsequent diet of Tokaj (Oct. 14),
the election was confirmed by the diet of Szekes-fehervar (roth of November),
and he was crowned on the following day with the holy crown.
A struggle with the rival candidate, the German king Ferdinand I., at
once ensued (see HUNGARY: History) and it was only with the aid of the
Turks that king John was able to exhaust his opponent and compel him to
come to terms. Finally, in 1538 by the compact of Nagyvarad, Ferdinand
recognized John as king of Hungary, but secured the right of succession
on his death Nevertheless John broke the compact by bequeathing the king
dom to his infant son John Sigismund under Turkish protection John was
the last national king of Hungary. His merit, as a statesman, lies in
his stout vindication of the national indepen dence, though without the
assistance of his great minister Gyorg} Utiesenovich, better known as
" Frater George" (Cardina Martinuzzi q.i'.), this would have
been impossible. Indirectl>
le contributed to the subsequent conquest of Hungary by .dmitting the Turk as a friend.
Johan (ung.
Janos) Z a p o l y a, konungar af
Ungern och furstar af Siebenburgen:
1. J. Zapolya,
son till Istvån Zapolya och
furstinnan Hedvig af Teschen, f. omkr. 1487,
d. 22 juli 1540 i Mtihlbach vid Hennannstadt,
ansåg sig med stöd af sin rikedom, som 1504 ökats
med konungasonen Johan Hunyadis besittningar,
och sitt furstliga möderne berättigad att ega
konung Vladislavs dotter, men lyckades ej i
sin sträfvan. 1511 utnämndes han till vojevod
(furste) af Siebenburgen och intog därefter plats
som ledare af ett stort parti. Undertryckandet
af ett bondeuppror under Georg Dözsa, hvarvid
han vid Temesvår (1514) rasade med skoningslös
grymhet, gjorde honom mycket populär i magnat-
och adelskretsar, och stödd på dessa kunde
han intaga en allt mäktigare ställning emot
hofpartiet. Man beskyller honom - med hvad rätt
må lämnas därhän - för att ha vållat Belgrads
fall (1521) genom att lämna det utan understöd
och att för sent ha inträffat på Mohåcz'
slagfält (1526), där konung Ludvig II föll i
kamp emot turkärna. Efter honom valdes J. af sina anhängare
till Ungerns konung och kröntes i nov. 1526 i
Stuhl-weissenburg. Men ett annat parti utsåg
i dec. s. å. Ludvig II :s svåger, Ferdinand
af Österrike, till konung, och emellan de två
konungarna började under turkisk inblandning
en för Ungern högst olycklig strid (se vidare
Ungern, historia). Med sin gemål Isabella
(förmäld i febr. 1539, d. 1559), dotter
af hans svåger Sigismund I och dennes andra
gemål, Bona Sforza, hade J. en son (se J. 2). -
2. J. Sigismund Zapolya, furste af Siebenburgen,
(titulär-)konung af Ungern, den föregåendes son,
f. 6 juli 1540, d. 14 mars 1571, utnämndes 1541
till turkisk vasallfurste af Siebenburgen emot
en årlig tribut af 10,000 guldgyllen, stod
under sin moders förmynderskap och begaf sig
med henne till Polen, då genom fördrag af 1551
Siebenburgen tillerkändes konung Ferdinand I, men
återkallades 1556 af furstendömets ständer. Han
nödgades på grund af förhållandena föra en
mycket
vacklande utrikespolitik för att upprätthålla
ett af Österrike och Turkiet i möjligaste
måtto oberoende välde i Siebenburgen (se vidare
Ungern, historia). J. var den siste af sin ätt.
J. Th. W.*