Pázmány's Imperial Embassage to Rome in 1632

The last and sensational result of this research is not directly related to the sources of the Vatican.  During the research, the documents of the Roman embassage – kept in Esztergom – that were quoted by Vilmos Fraknói without references and that were neglected by Ferenc Hanuy (who published the Pázmány-documents) were also examined. The omission is a huge philological mistake, since the final, authentic text-versions of the most important documents of the commission can be found here. These documents were corrected by Pázmány himself in many places before they became fair copies. After his Roman commission, he crossed out the addresses and cadences and added titles. Besides this, a fair copy was also made of the labelled text-versions in the following order:

1. Legationis ad Suam Sanctitatem puncta. Oratio ad Summum Ponteficem habita 6 Aprilis 1632 – 2. Oratio ad Suam Sanctitatem 24 Aprilis 1632 – 3. Scriptum Cardinali Barberini exhibitum 3 May 1632 – 4. Scriptum Cardinali Barberini exhibitum 8 May 1632 – 5. Copia Scripti exhibiti Card.li Barberino circa Titulum Legati – 6. Scriptum Suae Sanctitati exhibitum, quod Cardinales possint essere Legati Regum.

What does all of this mean? It means that Pázmány edited the most important documents of his embassage; he compiled the documents that depicted the empire’s situation the best, and then – by dissolving the chronological order – he contrasted them with the documents of the abortive and diversionary debate over his title as a legate. Although the two letters of Cardinal Francesco Barberini written in early May can be found in the preparatory material, they were later dropped from the compilation. These letters had been taken into account at first along with their less relevant content compared to the serious letters of the Hungarian cardinal to demonstrate Rome’s attitude towards the question.144 Pázmány also wrote a preface and an epilogue about the document “Intermittere non possum...” that explained the text’s origin, which were later crossed out and omitted from the fair copy. Finally, the manuscript was not edited and was placed in the primatial archives. 

 

The signature of the here published facsimilia: Archivum Primatiale, Archivum Ecclesiasticum Vetus, n. 154/1–9.

Pázmány's Imperial Embassy to Rome, 1632