Oldal 11 [11]
modern period, the Viennese court decided on a communication tactic where they
posited that the Hungarians were Christian only thanks to the Austrians, and
were somewhat cultured at best. Ihe history of the Corvina — created moreover by
a king who had conquered Vienna and had imperial ambitions as well — could thus
(if the Habsburg court created its unity) have been appropriated to the benefit of
Vienna as a provider of culture. This view can also be observed in the attitude of
the Transylvanian Saxons towards the Corvina. In the debate with the Szeklers
(Hungarians living in Transylvania) — about who has the more ancient culture,
the idea was put forward that they, the Saxons were the successors of the Buda
court and the Corvina; but alas, at the end of the 17th century the Buda collection
along with the valuable Saxon heritage, which had been evacuated to Brassé, was
destroyed by fire.
Nevertheless, the Corvina is the achievement of the Renaissance humanists.
Responsible scholars, or even mischievous adventurers, but above all intellectuals
who loved books worked hard to enrich the Buda library. The desired aim, gather¬
ing the near-complete ancient corpus of texts in one place, is indeed something
worth getting excited about. Furthermore, it is also an ideal basis for excellent
cultural policy and academic affairs: the leaders of the Hungarian Kingdom in
the last third of the 15th century made use of this opportunity. It is not surpris¬
ing, therefore, that the humanists of Europe were mourning the loudest over the
disintegration of the Corvina. They saved what they could, preparing those texts
for publication which had only one manuscript copy. In addition, the great King
Matthias Hunyadi, who financed this miracle, was commemorated everywhere;
the intellectual always praises the one who pays for the realisation of their dreams.
‘This is how the reputations of King Matthias, the Corvina, and the Hungarian
Kingdom were linked. In the early modern age, “Matthias Corvinus” and “Bib¬
liotheca Corvina" became such everyday terms similar to "puszta", “goulash”, or
“Tokaj wine” today. They are still relevant even if, by 2022, they are slowly vanish¬
ing terms due to the communication of hateful political groups (and the economic
mafias behind them). In the 16th and 17th centuries, whenever the word Hun¬
garia was mentioned in a book, regardless of genre, the name of the Raven King
and Corvina appeared, in histories, itineraries, historical chronologies, or even in
collections of sermons for daily religious practice. But above all in scholarly pub¬
lications. Especially in those that published a better and increasingly manuscript¬
based collection of ancient ¢extus. This brings us to the scholarly research of the
18th century, which combined the themes of Aistoria litteraria, historia bibliothe¬
carum, and historia Hungariae. Research on the history of the Bibliotheca Corvina
also began at this time. A contemporary description of the library by Naldo Naldi
(1436-1513) and a near-contemporary commemoration of Johannes Alexander
Brassicanus (1500?-1539) and Miklés Olah (1493-1568) were published. The
sources of the history of the codices were enumerated, just as research on the his¬
tory of the Hungarian Kingdom shifted to concentrating on sources. This is how