The nomadic Magyars took a fancy to the Visegrad Mountain at first sight. Perhaps she reminded them of the Urals, where their ancestors made sacrifices to their gods. Or Altai, whence their forefathers descended from time immemorial.
The Magyars were brought to the Visegrad Mountain by their shamans. But they did not erect any cult buildings here. There was no such custom among the Magyars. They hid their sacred places from prying eyes. And only those who were marked with a special gift - to talk with otherworldly forces - were initiated into mediators between the world of people and the world of spirits, mountains and forests.
The mysterious power of the mountain attracted to itself at all times. Long before the Magyars came to these places, somewhere within its borders, the Huns buried their formidable leader Attila. His grave has not yet been found. The mountain knows how to keep secrets.
BLOODY KING
In the XI century, the Hungarian king Andrash settled in Visegrad with his wife Anastasia, the daughter of Yaroslav the Wise. From this marriage, their only son was born, who was given the name Shalamon. He should have inherited the throne. But after the death of the king-father, the throne was taken by his younger brother, who has his heirs - three daring princes. So Shalamon turned out to be a prisoner of the tower of the Visegrad Castle, where he spent a year and a half in captivity. Miraculously, he managed to break free. The mountain probably helped.
After a long struggle, Charles I of Anjou ascended the Hungarian throne. Visegrad began to grow rapidly. Noble nobles considered it a great honor for themselves if their daughters were taken into her retinue by Queen Elizabeth, the king's third wife, who finally gave him heirs. She also wrote, perhaps, the bloodiest page in the history of the mountain.
And the fact is that the queen's brother Casimir, for her misfortune, liked the young maid of honor Clara Zach. At the instigation of her brother, the insidious queen arranged so that in her bedchamber Casimir took possession of the girl. Having learned from the disgraced daughter who was the offender and who helped to make the mockery, Felician Zach, Clara's father, became so angry that he rushed to the queen with a drawn sword to kill her.
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However, faithful servants used daggers. Mortally wounded, Felician only managed to cut off four of the queen's fingers. The royal couple's revenge was terrible. The entire ancient family of Zach was destroyed at the root, and the unfortunate Clara suffered a painful death.
In horror, the people of the kingdom turned away from the bloodthirsty king and his wife. But Charles I was an intelligent and far-sighted ruler. In the same year, his troops, sent to Serbia, returned with a victory, land was added, several successful agreements with neighbors strengthened the country's position, and wealth flowed like a river.
Having invited mining masters from the Czech Republic, Karl began mining gold in numerous mines and mines in the nearby mountains, and soon in Hungary, up to one and a half thousand kilograms of pure gold began to be mined annually. And the golden Hungarian forint became appreciated throughout Europe. Citizens, merchants, nobles quickly grew rich. The terrible villainy was somehow forgotten by itself.
According to legend, Vlad Tepes spent some time in the Visegrad castle, who became the prototype of Count Dracula. According to some chroniclers, Vlad spent about 12 years in prison and was released only by marrying his cousin Matthias.
According to others, the king would never give his sister for a prisoner, which means that Vlad was released after 4 years, but he remained to live in the castle as a guest, because the Visegrad castle was called "earthly paradise" at that time. There were luxurious halls, gardens, fountains, a library and a playground for knightly tournaments. Taking advantage of all these amenities, Dracula lived with his wife and children in the Shalamon tower. Which of them is right and who is not - now no one will know. The mountain jealously guards its secrets, not revealing them to anyone.
MOUNTAIN VENUE
After the death of Charles, his middle son, Lajos, ascended the throne, who went down in history as a king-knight. Tradition tells that once, out of nowhere, two brothers came to him and asked permission to conduct some kind of excavation in the mountain, promising generous receipts for this to the royal treasury. After a while, the treasury was indeed replenished with gold and expensive stones.
However, it is said that those strange brothers entrusted truly untold riches to the grief itself. Until now, that treasure is stored in its depths. Woe is all the same whose secret to keep. Therefore, she did not spare Lajos himself when he wished to find out what underground passages were being dug with his permission in his hunting grounds.
In the prime of his years, the king was struck by a terrible disease, like leprosy, his brothers died, God did not give sons, and with the death of his daughter Mary, who fell from a horse when she carried in the womb of the future heir, the entire Anjou dynasty was cut short.
TIME TO FLOWER
At the time of a new, hitherto unprecedented prosperity, Visegrad entered in 1458, when Matthias Hunyadi, nicknamed Corvin, or the Raven, became king. The hanging gardens on the side of the mountain seemed a miracle to contemporaries: numerous galleries, courtyards, stairs and marble fountains turned into a magnificent ensemble in the Renaissance style, unmatched in Europe.
The architects considered it an honor to serve the beautiful Beatrice of Aragon, the king's wife. The best musicians of Europe delighted the royal couple's ears. In libraries and laboratories, astronomers, astrologers and alchemists, doctors and naturalists, historians and writers pored over their tomes. Esoteric knowledge flourished.
The Matthias Library was the largest in Europe, second only to the collection of the Pope. In the scriptoriums, handwritten codex books were created of unsurpassed beauty, named by the Corvinas after the king's family nickname.
SHELTER OF ADEPTS OF SECRET SCIENCES
The 15th century was a time of revival of interest in occult knowledge. It is believed that the secret center of the mystics at this time was somewhere in Europe. Much says that it was Visegrad that became a haven for adherents of secret sciences during the reign of King Matthias - the patron saint of scientists, mystics and magicians who came under his wing from all over the world. The brilliant and at the same time secluded Visegrad was perfect for the role of the ark for the occult.
The mystic king was well aware that difficult times could come and the reserved Visegrad would be at the mercy of enemies. Therefore, he made sure that the fruits of painstaking research were hidden in hiding places where they would not be subject to the enemy and time. The mountain took these secrets under its protection.
The predicted dashing times came during Matthias's lifetime. He had to break away from his rare manuscripts and set off to conquer Vienna, where he died a few years later. The deserted palace began to decay, decay and collapse and soon turned into ruins, mystically reminiscent of the palace of Catherine II in Tsaritsyno: the same red stone walls, graceful colonnades, pointed arches and aspiration upward, a wondrous ligature of mysterious signs and a secret language of symbols in carving on white marble. But no one has ever lived in the Tsaritsyn Palace. About Visegrad, we can say that it was built not only from stone, but also from the fate of people.
CASTLE OF WANDERING POETS
Troubadours often came to Visegrad, to the court of Matthias. One of them was named Gauselm Faidit. This name is translated as "a noble Occitan lord, whom the crusaders deprived of his possessions and doomed to wandering and the life of a wandering knight." Of course, this Gauselm was no crusader. Most likely, he took the name of one of the most famous troubadours, who lived in the 13th century and belonged to the Cathar order.
The Cathar troubadours were brilliant virtuosos of the dark style, when a love poem at first glance was actually an encrypted message, which was about loyalty to the teachings of the Albigensian Cathars and their church, for belonging to which an inevitable bonfire was relied on in the 13th century.
The wandering poets expelled from Occitania found shelter in Hungary. Visegrad struck them by its resemblance to the famous Monsegur, the secret temple of the Sun and the last stronghold of the heretic Cathars.
Evgeny LAZAREV, “Steps. Secrets and Mysteries , №19 September 2016