László Hunyadi (1433 –
March 16 1457), was a
Hungarian statesman.
László Hunyadi was the elder of two sons of
János Hunyadi and
Elizabeth Szilágyi. He was the older brother of
Matthias Hunyadi, who would later became the king of Hungary. At a very early age he accompanied his father in his campaigns. After the
battle of Kosovo (1448) he was left for a time, as a hostage for his father, in the hands of
George Brankovic, (1427-1456),
despot of
Serbia. In 1452 he was a member of the deputation which went to
Vienna to receive back the Hungarian king
Ladislaus V. In 1453 he was already ban of
Croatia-
Dalmatia. At the diet of
Buda (1455) he resigned all his dignities, because of the accusations of
Ulrich II of Celje-Cillei and the other enemies of his house, but a reconciliation was ultimately patched up and he was betrothed to Mária, the daughter of the palatine,
László Garai.
After his father's death in 1456, he was declared by his enemy
Ulrich II of Celje (now Captain General of Hungary with significant power), responsible for the debts alleged to be owing by the elder Hunyadi to the state; but he defended himself so ably at the diet of
Futak (October 1456) that
Ulrich II of Celje feigned a reconciliation, promising to protect the Hunyadis on condition that they first surrendered all the royal castles entrusted to them. A beginning was to be made with the fortress of
Nándorfehérvár (now
Belgrade,
Serbia) of which László was commandant. While admitting Ladislaus V and
Ulrich, László excluded their army of mercenaries. On the following morning (
November 9,
1456)
Ulrich II of Celje was killed by Hunyadi's men in unclear circumstances.
The terrified young king, thereupon pardoned Hunyadi, and at a subsequent interview with his mother at
Temesvár swore that he would protect the whole family. As a pledge of his sincerity he appointed László lord treasurer and captain-general of the kingdom. Suspecting no evil, Hunyadi accompanied the king to Buda, but on arriving there was arrested on a charge of plotting against Ladislaus, condemned to death without the observance of any legal formalities, and beheaded on the
16th of March 1457.
He is the protagonist of a popular Hungarian opera,
Hunyadi László by
Ferenc Erkel.
See I. Acsády,
History of the Hungarian Realm , vol. i. (
Budapest, 1904).