Ferenc Forgách’s documents: selected political letters and writings (1586–1615)

CLASSIS II
9.
Tamás Kruppa

This volume contains Ferenc Forgách, bishop of Nitra, later archbishop of Esztergom and the cardinal's selected political correspondence. Forgách’s correspondence and his politics started at the same time as István Bocskai’s uprising, which is one of the most contested periods of Hungarian history in the 17th century. Newly published documents shed light on Ferenc Forgách’s personality and his key role in sustenance of Hungarian Catholicism against the Bocskai uprising. The mentioned letters put Forgách’s efforts for Catholic confessionalization in the spotlight. Cardinal Forgách’s life work was the base in successors’ successful Catholic renewal.

The basis of this volume consists of the numerous letters of Forgách that can be found in the fonds of the Vatican Apostolic Archives. The State Archives of Biella is a special place in terms of the reports of Giovanni Stefano Ferreri, the nuncio in Prague. A group of letters are kept in the Hungarica department of the Haus- Hof und Staatsarchiv in Vienna, and in the chamber department of the National Archives of Hungary.