''Anonymus Bele regis notarius'' ("Anonymous Notary of King Bela") or Master P. ( late 12th century – early 13th century) was the notary and chronicler of a

Hungarian king This is a list of Hungarian monarchs, that includes the grand princes (895–1000) and the kings and ruling queens of Hungary (1000–1918). The Principality of Hungary established 895 or 896, following the 9th-century Hungarian conquest of the ...

, probably Béla III. Little is known about him, but his

latinized name Latinisation (or Latinization) of names, also known as onomastic Latinisation, is the practice of rendering a ''non''-Latin name in a Latin style. It is commonly found with historical proper names, including personal names and toponyms, and in ...

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 Hungarian history which has survived for posterity. Its genre is not chronicle, but ''gesta'', meaning "deeds" or "acts", which is a medieval entertaining li ...

'' ("The Deeds of the Hungarians"), written in

Medieval Latin Medieval Latin was the form of Literary Latin used in Roman Catholic Western Europe during the Middle Ages. In this region it served as the primary written language, though local languages were also written to varying degrees. Latin functione ...

around 1200. This work provides the most detailed history of the arrival 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. First of all, the interpretation of the ''"P dictus magister"'' text is unclear. The text may refer to a man whose monogram 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. Most 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 ( hu, magyar király) was the ruling head of state of the Kingdom of Hungary from 1000 (or 1001) to 1918. The style of title "Apostolic King of Hungary" (''Apostoli Magyar Király'') was endorsed by Pope Clement XIII in 175 ...

of fond memory".''Anonymus, Notary of King Béla: The Deeds of the Hungarians'' (Prologue), p. 3. In his 1937 study, historian Loránd Szilágyi identified Anonymus with a certain Peter, a canon, alter provost of the cathedral chapter of

Esztergom Esztergom ( ; german: Gran; la, Solva or ; sk, Ostrihom, known by alternative names) is a city with county rights in northern Hungary, northwest of the capital Budapest. It lies in Komárom-Esztergom County, on the right bank of the river Dan ...

. 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 György Györffy (26 September 1917 – 19 December 2000) was a Hungarian historian, and member of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences ( hu, MTA). Biography Györffy was born in Szucság (Suceagu, today part of Baciu, Romania), Hungary the son o ...

refused 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 Latin writers 13th-century Latin writers Unidentified people 12th-century Hungarian people 13th-century Hungarian people