Renaissance humanism in the age of the Jagiellonian kings in Hungary (1490–1526)

Abstract

The present study offers a re-evaluation of literary production in Hungary under the Jagiellonian kings Wladislas II and Louis II. Traditionally, the literary works produced in this period have been contrasted to the blossoming of humanist literature under King Matthias, and disregarded in many respects. The aim of this study is to make a survey of the main authors and other agents of the literary culture of this period and to stress that this age experienced an unseen growth and expansion in late medieval and humanist scholarly and lay culture. While János Horváth called the authors of this period “humanists with party allegiances”, I argue that their stronger “party allegiance” is, in fact, the direct result of the steady growth in the number of intellectuals with a modern, humanistic educational outlook, and of a less centralized state.