Alexander Karászi

Alexander was the son of a certain Drugh (also Drug or Dorog). Historian Mór Wertner considered that he belonged to the gens (clan) Gutkeled.^[1] According to two charters of Duke Stephen (1267 and 1268, the text of the former was preserved only by a summary in a 14th-century charter), Alexander had served him since the youth of the prince (later king).^[2] Initially, Alexander served as a familiaris of a powerful lord Ernye Ákos.^[3]

Chronologically, he first appeared in contemporary records when, under the banner of Duke Stephen, participated in the royal campaign in the summer of 1253, when King Béla IV launched a war against Ottokar II in Moravia and laid siege to Olomouc. Alexander received five wounds during the siege. He was also present in the Battle of Kressenbrunn on 12 June 1260, when the Bohemian troops routed the Hungarian army and Béla was forced to renounce Styria in favor of Ottokar. Stephen's charter says the Alexander fought "gloriously" in the battle and "remained on his feet" during the clashes, protecting the duke when the vanguard army that Stephen led was surrounded by the Bohemians.^[4][5] When Stephen was made Duke of Transylvania in 1260, Alexander escorted his lord to the province. He fought against the Byzantine Empire with his own army corps in 1263, when Duke Stephen sent reinforcements under the command of Ladislaus Kán to Bulgaria to provide assistance to Despot Jacob Svetoslav.^[4][5][6]

The tense relationship between Béla IV and Stephen – who adopted the title of "younger king" and ruled the eastern part of Hungary – sparked into a civil war at the end of 1264. Around 10 December, brothers Ladislaus and Julius Kán, who defected to the senior king shortly before, invaded Duke Stephen's realm along the valley of Maros (Mureș) river and occupied contiguous lands in southern Transylvania despite the failed efforts of Alexander to regain these territories.^[7] Although Stephen defeated the army of the Kán brothers, the simultaneous attack of his province in Northeast Hungary forced him to retreat as far as the castle at Feketehalom (Codlea, Romania) in the easternmost corner of Transylvania. According to Stephen's charter from 1268, Alexander "left behind his parents, sons, brothers, all of his assets and goods" and joined the weakened retreating army.^[8] He was among the few defenders during the siege of Feketehalom, when the advancing royal army of Béla under the command of Lawrence, son of Kemény began to besiege the fort in the last days of December 1264. The fortress was first attacked by an army vanguard led by Conrad, brother of Lawrence, who tried to break through the castle gate with a rapid advance, but Alexander and his soldiers prevented this.^[8][9] Subsequently, Alexander and his men guarded the stone walls "day and night".^[10] After the arrival of the rescue army, Stephen led his remaining garrison out of the fort. Béla's army was heavily defeated, Alexander captured altogether 18 "notable knights",^[11] whom he brought before the king "like cattle or calves".^[9] Stephen rewarded him with a shield of one of his defeated enemies.^[12] Alexander also participated in the Battle of Isaszeg in early March 1265, where acted as a bodyguard of Stephen on his right, protecting the younger king from the attackers.^[13] Alexander's involvement in the civil war and loyalty to Duke Stephen served as a point of reference in the judicial court of Dowager Queen Elizabeth of Poland almost a century later – in 1353 – concerning the estates of the extinct Edelényi (Karászi) family which returned to the Crown, that already their ancestor Alexander should have been deprived of all his possessions as a result of his rebellion against the rightful ruler Béla IV, so that all their possessions of his descendants, the Edelényis, who died without male descendants, were already illegal.^[14]

Following the civil war and the reconciliation between Béla and Stephen, Alexander served as ispán of Szabolcs County between 1267 and 1268.^[15] After the restoration of the Hungarian rule over the Banate of Severin (Szörény) following Stephen's successful Bulgarian campaigns, Alexander was styled as ban of the province in 1268, but he was replaced by Ugrin Csák in this dignity already in the same year.^[16]

For his loyal service and military merits, Alexander was granted the villages Kazinc (today a borough of Kazincbarcika), Ludna and Harica in Borsod County by Younger King Stephen in 1267. According to the donation letter, Ernye Ákos already donated these settlements to his familiaris Alexander sometime before 1265, and the duke only confirmed and approved this donation with this document. In the next year (1268), Alexander again received a donation from his monarch. He was granted Malka in Szatmár County (which was once owned by his father), Gesztely in Zemplén County and Olán (laid near Edelény) in Borsod County.^[17] After his appointment as Ban of Severin still in that year, Alexander was granted additional possessions in Szatmár County from Duke Stephen: Vasvári, Szalka (today Mátészalka), Szentmárton and Kak (today Mărtinești and Cucu, respectively, parts of commune Odoreu, Romania), while he already owned the village Solymos in the county. Courtesy of Stephen, Alexander also became the owner of Demecser (which he had once possessed but was then confiscated from him) and Kék in Szabolcs County.^[18] Around the same time, he was also granted Bajul (today a borough of Pátroha) and Nyírkarász in the county. In the latter place, he built a motte-and-bailey castle, which became his permanent residence and his descendants were called with the surname "Karászi" for a while thereafter.^[19]