Mikod Kökényesradnót

Mikod (also Mikud or Mykud) was born into the gens (clan) Kökényesradnót,^[1] which initially possessed landholdings in the southeastern part of Nógrád County. According to the 14th-century Illuminated Chronicle, the ancestors of the kindred – Kökényes (Kyquin) and Radnót (Reynold) – were of Hispanic origin, who "came to Hungary with Queen Margaret, the wife of King Béla I of Hungary" in the 11th century. Whereas no such queen is known, the majority of historians considered that the two French or Spanish knights arrived to Hungary with Margaret of France, the second spouse of Béla III of Hungary in the 1180s.^[2]

Mikod (II) was the son of Mikod (I), whose activity is unknown. He also had a brother Emeric, who had a son John and a daughter Catherine, the wife of the influential lord Egidius Monoszló. Mikod had four children from his marriage with an unidentified noblewoman. The eldest one Nicholas was the ancestor of the Dobokai family, while the Bogátis descended from Peter. The third son Demetrius appeared in contemporary records in the period between 1297 and 1305. Mikod's only known daughter Elizabeth married John Aba from the Cente branch of the powerful clan.^[1]

Two donation letters of King Ladislaus IV of Hungary, issued in June and July 1279, preserved details on Mikod's military service from the earlier decades. He participated in Béla IV's royal campaign against the Duchy of Austria in 1250, when the Hungarian monarch made a plundering raid into Austria and Styria in the summer of 1250, in retaliation of a former Austrian incursion into Hungary. Mikod fought during the siege of Kirchschlag in Lower Austria; his right leg was broken when the defenders threw a stone at him and his left leg was pierced with a spear before the king's eyes. Mikod also participated in the royal campaign in the summer of 1253, when King Béla IV launched a war against Ottokar II in Moravia. Béla sent Mikod to besiege and occupy the (now unidentified) castle of "Mynen", which laid along the northern border of Hungary. According to the narration, when Mikod and his soldiers, as part of the vanguard army, tried to break into the fort and to set his own flag inside, Ottokar's defenders severely injured his right hand and rib with a spear.^[3] For his loyal service, Mikod was granted the villages Lövő, Szepene and Bánd in Zala County.^[2]

By the early 1260s, both Mikod and Emeric Kökényesradnót were considered important partisans of Duke Stephen, King Béla's eldest son and heir, who administered his provinces in Styria, then Transylvania. The close confidential relationship is well indicated by that purchase, when Stephen paid Mikod the hefty sum of 100 silver marks for a single horse in 1269.^[4] Sometime before 1262, Mikod and Emeric were granted Szentmiklós in Torda County along the river Aranyos (Arieș) near Torda (present-day Turda, Romania) by Béla IV.^[5] The relationship between Béla IV and Stephen became tense by the beginning of 1261, because the latter accused his father of planning to disinherit him. After a brief skirmish, Stephen forced his father to cede all the lands of the Kingdom of Hungary to the east of the Danube to him and adopted the title of junior king in 1262. Thereafter, the Kökényesradnót brothers were also oriented in Transylvania, establishing a wealth there and roughly abandoning their inherited possessions in Transdanubia, which laid in senior king Béla's domain. Mikod was granted whole Doboka County around 1262, which he governed as perpetual count (or ispán) until 1268.^[6]

Despite the division of the country, the relationship of Béla and Stephen remained tense, which escalated into a civil war by the end of 1264, when Béla IV invaded his son's realm in two fronts. According to the aforementioned charter of Ladislaus IV from July 1279, both Mikod and Emeric took an active part in the fighting, are the only known persons who were present in all battles along the Transylvanian front.^[7][8] Stephen's army – involving Mikod and Emeric – stopped the advance of the royalist Hungarian–Cuman army at the Fortress of Déva (Deva, present-day Romania), where the invaders suffered a heavy defeat.^[9] Simultaneously, Béla IV launched another attack against Stephen's province in Northeast Hungary, while the Cuman vanguard was followed by an army of greater significance led by Lawrence, son of Kemény, which forced the younger king and his accompaniment to retreat to Feketehalom (Codlea, Romania) in the easternmost corner of Transylvania. Mikod and Emeric were among the few dozen defenders during the siege of Feketehalom at the turn of 1264 and 1265.^[10] After their victory in late January 1265, Stephen decided to march into the central parts of Hungary. Somewhere in the Tiszántúl around the second half of February 1265, Stephen's advancing army collided with another royal army commanded by Ernye Ákos, who sent a vanguard of Cuman warriors with its commander, chieftain Menk, which attacked the troops of Mikod and Emeric Kökényesradnót,^[11] which functioned as the vanguard for Stephen's army. The Kökényesradnót brothers routed the Cumans. Mikod and his brother also participated in the subsequent main battle, where Stephen defeated Ernye's army.^[12][13] Subsequently, both of them took part in the decisive Battle of Isaszeg in early March 1265, which resulted Stephen's victory and end of the brief civil war. During the skirmish, Mikod suffered life-threatening injuries.^[8] Whether Stephen subsequently occupied the castle of Buda is uncertain and subject to historical debate, nevertheless an undated charter refers to Mikod as "Mykud comes, rector castri Budensis", which suggests he was temporarily installed as rector of Buda after the civil war, succeeding Henry Preussel, who was executed after the Battle of Isaszeg.^[14]