Editing Charles I of Hungary (section)

=== Consolidation and reforms (1323–1330) ===

[[File:Coa Hungary Country History Charles I (1310-1342).svg|thumb|150px|Coats of Arms of Charles I of Anjou, King of Hungary]]

As one of his charters concluded, Charles had taken "full possession" of his kingdom by 1323.{{sfn|Engel|2001|pp=144,391}} In the first half of the year, he moved his capital from Temesvár to Visegrád in the centre of his kingdom.{{sfn|Engel|2001|p=132}}{{sfn|Solymosi|Körmendi|1981|p=198}} In the same year, the [[Duke of Austria|Dukes of Austria]] renounced [[Pressburg]] (now Bratislava in Slovakia), which they had controlled for decades, in exchange for the support they had received from Charles against [[Louis IV, Holy Roman Emperor]], in 1322.{{sfn|Engel|2001|p=136}}

Royal power was only nominally restored in the lands between the [[Carpathian Mountains]] and the [[Lower Danube]], which had been united under a [[voivode]], known as [[Basarab I of Wallachia|Basarab]], by the early 1320s.{{sfn|Sălăgean|2005|p=149}} Although Basarab was willing to accept Charles's suzerainty in a peace treaty signed in 1324, he refrained from renouncing control of the lands he had occupied in the [[Banate of Severin]].{{sfn|Sălăgean|2005|p=149}} Charles also attempted to reinstate royal authority in Croatia and Slavonia.{{sfn|Fine|1994|p=213}} He dismissed the [[Ban of Slavonia]], [[John Babonić]], replacing him with [[Mikcs Ákos]] in 1325.{{sfn|Fine|1994|p=213}}{{sfn|Engel|2001|p=145}} Ban Mikcs invaded Croatia to subjugate the local lords who had seized the former castles of Mladen Subić without the king's approval, but one of the Croatian lords, [[Ivan I Nelipac]], routed the ban's troops in 1326.{{sfn|Fine|1994|p=213}} Consequently, royal power remained only nominal in Croatia during Charles's reign.{{sfn|Fine|1994|p=213}}{{sfn|Engel|2001|p=135}} The [[House of Babonić|Babonići]] and the Kőszegis rose up in open rebellion in 1327, but Ban Mikcs and Alexander Köcski defeated them.{{sfn|Engel|2001|p=135}} In retaliation, at least eight fortresses of the rebellious lords were confiscated in Slavonia and Transdanubia.{{sfn|Solymosi|Körmendi|1981|p=199}}

Through his victory over the oligarchs, Charles acquired about 60% of the Hungarian castles, along with the estates belonging to them.{{sfn|Engel|2001|pp=149–150}} In 1323, he set about revising his previous land grants, which enabled him to reclaim former royal estates.{{sfn|Engel|2001|p=150}} During his reign, special commissions were set up to detect royal estates that had been unlawfully acquired by their owners.{{sfn|Engel|2001|p=149}} Charles refrained from making perpetual grants to his partisans.{{sfn|Engel|2001|p=150}} Instead, he applied a system of "office fiefs" (or ''[[Honour (feudal barony)|honors]]''), whereby his officials were entitled to enjoy all revenues accrued from their offices, but only for the time they held those offices.{{sfn|Kontler|1999|p=89}}{{sfn|Cartledge|2011|p=34}} That system assured the preponderance of royal power, enabling Charles to rule "with the plenitude of power", as he emphasized in one of his charters of 1335.{{sfn|Kontler|1999|p=89}}{{sfn|Engel|2001|p=140}} He even ignored customary law: for instance, "[[Prefection|promoting a daughter to a son]]", which entitled her to inherit her father's estates instead of her male cousins.{{sfn|Engel|2001|pp=140, 178}} Charles also took control of the administration of the Church in Hungary.{{sfn|Engel|2001|p=143}} He appointed the Hungarian prelates at will, without allowing the [[cathedral chapter]]s to elect them.{{sfn|Engel|2001|p=143}}

[[File:FlorenKarlaRobertazAnjou.jpg|thumb |left|alt=A golden coin depicting a lily  |A gold forint of Charles, based on the Italian [[Florin (Italian coin)|florin]] made popular by the [[Republic of Florence]] in the 13th century]]
He promoted the spread of [[chivalrous]] culture in his realms.{{sfn|Boulton|2000|p=29}} He regularly held [[Tournament (medieval)|tournaments]] and introduced the new ranks of "page of the royal court" and "knight of the royal court".{{sfn|Boulton|2000|p=29}}{{sfn|Engel|2001|pp=146–147}} Charles was the first monarch to create a secular [[order of knighthood]] by establishing the [[Order of Saint George (Kingdom of Hungary)|Order of Saint George]] in 1326.{{sfn|Boulton|2000|p=27}}{{sfn|Cartledge|2011|p=35}} He was the first Hungarian king to grant helmet [[Crest (heraldry)|crests]] to his faithful followers to distinguish them from others "by means of an ''insignium'' of their own", as he emphasized in one of his charters.{{sfn|Boulton|2000|p=29}}{{sfn|Engel|2001|p=147}}

Charles reorganized and improved the administration of royal revenues.{{sfn|Kontler|1999|p=90}} During his reign, five new "chambers" (administrative bodies headed by German, Italian or Hungarian merchants) were established for the control and collection of royal revenues from coinage, monopolies and custom duties.{{sfn|Engel|2001|p=154}} In 1327, he partially abolished the royal monopoly of gold mining, giving one third of the royal revenues from the gold extracted from a newly opened mine to the owner of the land where that mine was discovered.{{sfn|Engel|2001|p=156}} In the next few years, new gold mines were opened at [[Körmöcbánya]] (now Kremnica in Slovakia), [[Nagybánya]] (present-day Baia Mare in Romania) and [[Aranyosbánya]] (now Baia de Arieș in Romania).{{sfn|Kontler|1999|p=90}}{{sfn|Engel|2001|p=155}} Hungarian mines yielded about {{convert|1400|kg|lb}} of gold around 1330, which made up more than 30% of the world's total production.{{sfn|Cartledge|2011|p=34}} The [[Mint (coin)|minting of gold coins]] began under Charles's auspices in the lands north of the Alps in Europe.{{sfn|Engel|2001|p=156}} His [[florin]]s, which were modelled on the gold coins of Florence, were first issued in 1326.{{sfn|Engel|2001|p=156}}{{sfn|Kontler|1999|p=91}}

[[File:Zach Felician merenylete.jpg|thumb |right |alt=An elderly bearded man holding a sword is stabbed in the neck by a young man |The attempt of [[Felician Záh]] on the royal family, depicted in the ''[[Illuminated Chronicle]]'']]
Internal peace and increasing royal revenues strengthened the international position of Hungary in the 1320s.{{sfn|Kontler|1999|p=92}}{{sfn|Engel|2001|p=134}} On 13&nbsp;February 1327, Charles and [[John of Bohemia]] signed an alliance in [[Nagyszombat]] (present-day Trnava in Slovakia) against the [[Habsburgs]], who had occupied Pressburg.{{sfn|Bartl|Čičaj|Kohútova|Letz|2002|p=38}} In the summer of 1328 Hungarian and Bohemian troops invaded Austria and routed the Austrian army on the banks of the [[Leitha River]].{{sfn|Solymosi|Körmendi|1981|p=200}} On 21 September 1328, Charles signed a peace treaty with the three dukes of Austria ([[Frederick the Fair]], [[Albert II, Duke of Austria|Albert the Lame]], and [[Otto the Merry]]), who renounced Pressburg and the [[Muraköz]] (now Međimurje in Croatia).{{sfn|Engel|2001|p=136}}{{sfn|Solymosi|Körmendi|1981|p=201}} The following year, Serbian troops laid siege to Belgrade, but Charles relieved the fortress.{{sfn|Engel|2001|p=135}}

Alliance with his father-in-law, [[Władysław I the Elbow-high]], [[King of Poland]], became a permanent element of Charles's foreign policy in the 1320s.{{sfn|Engel|2001|p=136}} After being defeated by the united forces of the [[Teutonic Knights]] and John of Bohemia, Władysław&nbsp;I sent his son and heir, [[Casimir III the Great|Casimir]], to Visegrád in late 1329 to seek assistance from Charles.{{sfn|Knoll|1972|pp=51, 54}} During his stay in Charles's court, the nineteen-year-old Casimir seduced [[Clara Záh]], who was a [[lady-in-waiting]] of Charles's wife, [[Elisabeth of Poland]], according to an Italian writer.{{sfn|Knoll|1972|p=54}}{{sfn|Dümmerth|1982|p=341}}{{sfn|Engel|2001|p=139}} On 17&nbsp;April 1330, the young lady's father, [[Felician Záh]], stormed into the dining room of the royal palace at Visegrád with a sword in his hand and attacked the royal family.{{sfn|Engel|2001|p=138}} Záh wounded both Charles and the queen on their right hand and attempted to kill their two sons, [[Louis I of Hungary|Louis]] and [[Andrew, Duke of Calabria|Andrew]], before the royal guards killed him.{{sfn|Kristó|2002|p=40}} Charles's revenge was brutal: with the exception of Clara, Felician Záh's children were tortured to death; Clara's lips and all eight fingers were cut before she was dragged by a horse through the streets of many towns; all of Felician's other relatives within the third degree of kinship (including his sons-in-law and sisters) were executed, and those within the seventh degree were condemned to perpetual serfdom.{{sfn|Kristó|2002|pp=40–41}}{{sfn|Engel|2001|p=139}}