Anonymus (notary Of Béla III)
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''Anonymus Bele regis notarius'' (/aˈnɔ.ni.mus ˈbeː.le ˈreː.ɡis noˈtaː.ri.us/) ("Anonymous Notary of King Bela") or Master P. ( late 12th century – early 13th century) was the notary and chronicler of a Hungarian king, probably Béla III. Little is known about him, but his
latinized name Latinisation (or Latinization) of names, also known as onomastic Latinisation (or onomastic Latinization), is the practice of rendering a ''non''-Latin name in a modern Latin style. It is commonly found with historical proper names, including p ...
began with ''P,'' as he referred to himself as ''"P. dictus magister".'' Anonymus is famous for his work ''
Gesta Hungarorum ''Gesta Hungarorum'', or ''The Deeds of the Hungarians'', is the earliest book about Kingdom of Hungary, Hungarian history which has survived for posterity. Its genre is not chronicle, but ''gesta'', meaning "deeds" or "acts", which is a medie ...
'' ("The Deeds of the Hungarians"), written in
Medieval Latin Medieval Latin was the form of Literary Latin used in Roman Catholic Church, Roman Catholic Western Europe during the Middle Ages. It was also the administrative language in the former Western Roman Empire, Roman Provinces of Mauretania, Numidi ...
around 1200. This work provides the most detailed history of the
Hungarian conquest of the Carpathian Basin The Hungarian conquest of the Carpathian Basin, also known as the Hungarian conquest or the Hungarian land-taking (), was a series of historical events ending with the settlement of the Hungarians in Central Europe in the late 9th and early 10t ...
. Most of his attempts to explain the origin of several Hungarian place names are unsupported by modern etymology.


Identity

The identity of the author of the ''Gesta'' has always been subject to scholarly debate. Although the first words of the opening sentencean initial ''"P"'' followed with the words ''"dictus magister ac quondam bone memorie gloriosissimi Bele regis Hungarie notarius"''describe him, they cannot be interpreted unambiguously. Primarily, the interpretation of the ''"P dictus magister"'' text is unclear. The text may refer to a man whose
monogram A monogram is a motif (visual arts), motif made by overlapping or combining two or more letters or other graphemes to form one symbol. Monograms are often made by combining the initials of an individual or a company, used as recognizable symbo ...
was P or it may be an abbreviation of the Latin word for "aforementioned" ''(praedictus)'' in reference to a name on the title page which is now missing. Many scholars accept the former version, translating the text as "P who is called magister, and sometime notary of the most glorious Béla,
king of Hungary The King of Hungary () was the Monarchy, ruling head of state of the Kingdom of Hungary from 1000 (or 1001) to 1918. The style of title "Apostolic King of Hungary" (''Magyarország apostoli királya'') was endorsed by Pope Clement XIII in 1758 ...
of fond memory".''Anonymus, Notary of King Béla: The Deeds of the Hungarians'' (Prologue), p. 3. However, sentence beginnings with "predictus" appear very frequently in the work, which could support the reading "aforementioned magister". The abbreviation sign that would normally appear when "pr(a)e" is shortened to "p" could well have been omitted in this case as the P was richly decorated as an initial. In his 1937 study, historian Loránd Szilágyi identified Anonymus with a certain Peter, a canon, alter provost of the cathedral chapter of
Esztergom Esztergom (; ; or ; , known by Names of European cities in different languages: E–H#E, alternative names) is a city with county rights in northern Hungary, northwest of the capital Budapest. It lies in Komárom-Esztergom County, on the righ ...
. Several authors shared his view until 1966, when literary journal ''Irodalomtörténeti Közlemények'' published the papers of János Horváth, Jr. and Károly Sólyom, who claimed Anonymus was identical with Peter, Bishop of Győr. The renowned historian György Györffy refuted their theory in 1970 and considered authorship of a Peter, who served as provost of Buda, despite the fact that there is no data on the existence of such a person.


References


Sources

*''Anonymus, Notary of King Béla: The Deeds of the Hungarians'' (Edited, Translated and Annotated by Martyn Rady and László Veszprémy) (2010). In: Rady, Martyn; Veszprémy, László; Bak, János M. (2010); ''Anonymus and Master Roger''; CEU Press; . * * * * * * * * *


External links


Text of the Gesta Hungarorum
{{Authority control Hungarian chroniclers Hungarian writers 12th-century writers in Latin 13th-century writers in Latin Unidentified people 12th-century Hungarian people 13th-century Hungarian writers 13th-century Hungarian historians Year of birth unknown