On 8–9 December 2024, the international conference ANTEMURALE CHRISTIANITATIS. Central Europe and the Western Balkans as the Bulwarks of Christianity was held at the Várkert Bazár in Budapest, with the collaboration of the Fraknói Research Group. Three members of the Research Group delivered papers at the conference.
Gábor Nemes delivered a paper entitled “The ‘Ottoman Policy’ of the Apostolic See.” In his presentation, he examined the evolution of papal diplomacy towards the Ottoman Empire from the 1440s onward, with particular emphasis on the period following the fall of Constantinople in 1453. He demonstrated that resistance to Ottoman expansion became one of the central objectives of papal foreign policy, and that papal legates sent to the Kingdom of Hungary played a decisive role in organising and sustaining anti-Ottoman efforts. Drawing on several historical examples—from Cardinal Giuliano Cesarini’s pivotal involvement in the 1444 campaign to Juan de Carvajal’s contribution to the victory at Belgrade in 1456—he highlighted the legates’ political, military, and financial responsibilities. The lecture also addressed the activities of papal legates during the Jagiellonian period, focusing on their diplomatic missions, the management of papal subsidies, and their attempts to strengthen Hungary’s internal and external position in the face of an imminent Ottoman threat.
Tamás Kruppa presented his lecture “Diplomatic Relations between the Republic of Venice and the Ottoman Empire (1499–1540).” Framing his analysis between two Venetian–Ottoman wars, he explored the complex and multifaceted relationship between the two powers. He emphasised that Venice’s prosperity depended heavily on Levantine trade, which encouraged the Republic to pursue a policy of maintaining the status quo vis-à-vis the rising Ottoman Empire. At the same time, Venice’s mainland possessions drew it into the prolonged Italian Wars from 1494 onward, increasing its vulnerability to pressure from Istanbul. In contrast, Ottoman strategic objectives were clear: to limit Venetian influence in the eastern Mediterranean, particularly in the Balkans and Dalmatia, and to expand territorially by securing key islands in the Aegean–Adriatic region. Kruppa demonstrated how Venetian diplomacy oscillated between cooperation and confrontation, while Ottoman diplomacy combined pragmatism with strategic foresight, seeking simultaneously to avoid a two-front war and to prevent the formation of broader Christian–Muslim coalitions against the Empire.
Tamás Fedeles introduced the ongoing Bishops’ Lexicon (1458–1526) project in his lecture entitled “The Hungarian Ecclesiastical Elite at the Boundary between the Middle Ages and the Early Modern Period.” Beginning with the observation that two archbishops and five bishops perished on the battlefield of Mohács in 1526—representing nearly half of the Hungarian episcopate—he underscored the loyalty and sacrificial commitment of the ecclesiastical elite to the defence of the realm. His presentation outlined the aims and preliminary results of a long-term research programme that seeks to produce modern scholarly biographies of the seventy-five prelates who headed Hungary’s fourteen dioceses between 1458 and 1526, in preparation for the battle’s 500th anniversary. Beyond biographical reconstruction, the project also examines the contemporary condition of the dioceses themselves, supported by cartographic visualisation, and offers a prosopographical analysis of the late medieval Hungarian episcopate, addressing questions of origin, education, careers, patronage networks, and royal appointment policies.
(Pictures: Kálmán Tábori and Viktor Kanász)
