Infamous Lady: The True Story of Countess Erzsébet Báthory (37 page)

The seventh witness, the honorable Gergely Páztory, residing in Bathyfalva, 40 years old, was sworn and interrogated, and said: At the time he was the court judge at Sárvár for E. Báthory, because he had to take care of external affairs, he only very rarely entered the mistress’ house, and when he went in, he never saw cruelty exercised before him; the girls were only slapped by the mistress when something was not done according to her mood. He heard from others, however, that the girls were terribly beaten, and he also heard that a whole row of them had been buried. But later, when he was no longer the court judge, when the mistress visited Füzér, she also took him with her, and while she waited for Mr. Homonnay in Füzér, a young woman from Bratislava named Modl, a shapely (full-figured) housekeeper, remained with her. The Lady Báthory had forced her to act like a girl and to dress up like a young girl. Modl said, pleading for forgiveness, that she could no longer pretend to be a girl, that she already had a husband and also a child. In her anger, the Lady scolded her very much and even called her a whore, and when she then returned to Csejthe, she tied a pot around her neck and stuck a piece of wood against her womb; she let her carry the wood to Csejthe and hold it like it was a child, and there, where they remained over night, she let the woman expose her breast and lay it on the piece of wood as if it were a child suckling. Finally, he heard from others that this young woman named Modl had her breast cut off by her, but he himself had not seen this. Once, at the time of the last parliament meeting, as they traveled Csejthe, so the witness knows, a girl died on the journey, but he had not seen this death. While they were on the same trip, a servant of the mistress named János Ficzkó beat a servant of the witness in Csejthe, after he made Ficzkó very angry. And as he (the witness) became angered in return and wanted to beat him for it, Ficzkó ran to the lady inside to complain, and the mistress called to him (the witness) and said, “Why have you upset Ficzkó?” and thereupon he answered, “Because he is a bad person who hit my servant; if my servant does something wrong, I can punish him for it. I am rather surprised that Your Grace keeps such a bad man in your court. You should have a chat with him about the things he sees and hears around here. Just now he spoke of things, which, if Your Grace knew, would certainly not be good to publicize.” (He had told us that five dead girls would be hidden under the hemp.) The lady said, “Tomorrow I will ask him what he said.” The day after the mistress summoned him, but said not a single word and asked him nothing, but rather talked about other things. Likewise during the war, when we had fled to Sárvár, I saw in the Lady’s house an unsealed crate, and it was said that was where the dead girls would be shut in. And once Mrs. Ilona, who had been burned, was actually taking the box from the castle, when a nobleman from Zopor named Sebestyén Orbán said to her: “What is really in the box, Ms. Ilona?” Whereupon she said: “Ask not, on my soul, your Honor!” The witness heard that even then just such a dead girl was being taken out in the box. When they were traveling and took overnight accommodations, once he saw that a bag was packed with small chains and locks, and when the loaded bag was taken from the carriage and brought into the house, all was silent, and he asked Mrs. Ilona, “For what do we need these chains and locks?” She said that at night, all the girls were put in chains. The witness does not know any more.

The eighth witness, the honorable Jakob Zylvasy, administrator of the castles Léka and Keresztúr, 37 years old, was sworn and interrogated, and said that regarding the atrocities which he saw or heard about from others, he cannnt remember them all, and that he might need a long time to think about and recall all of Erzsébet Báthory’s outrageous deeds, because there were so many of them, like sand on the sea. Nevertheless, he would speak of what came to mind and he certainly knows the following: in 1606, when he was with Erzsébet Báthory in Ecséd, there was an old soldier, accompanied by an innocent girl of thirteen years. He knows neither the name of the old soldier, nor the girl. The girl was in the custody of the old soldier, because he himself was also a relative of the girl. This girl was being brought to be given over to the mistress who, the next thing we saw, was being very loving and very friendly with her, and said even among us, that certainly this little girl might very well win the mistress’ favor and work out quite nicely with her. After a few days, however, we saw that the girl was always weak and run down. The old soldier and his relatives pleaded by the will of God to let the girl be dismissed from the court because she was very weak, and even though Her Grace knew about their request and pleasure to serve, she still refused to release the girl. Thus, the old soldier said he would like to see her and asked at what gate she would be brought out. When they then departed from Ecséd, she brought the girl to the witness’ carriage, and she sat at his feet. The witness saw the burns and the brand marks on the girl and asked her why she was so despondent and what were those marks on her hands? The girl said that papers had been set between all of her fingers, and they had been burned as such. As they began to travel along the street, said the girl: “My dear sir, by God’s will, stop the carriage and give me something to drink, because it is already the fifth day that no one has given me anything to drink.” Meanwhile, cherries were picked, and he said to the girl: “I’ll fetch cherries, if you eat them.” And the girl said: “I’ll eat them, dear sir.” During the trip he came with the girl so far but then, before Eperjes, in a village in Szerderke, she died. Also had the witness heard from others, but not seen himself, that in the hour of her death when the poor girl died, Erzsébet Báthory had stood on her throat, killing her, and that she was then buried. During the same trip, on the way there, two other girls died, whose bodies were taken on board a long way, past Branyica, and finally buried in Sirok. He has also seen how she (the Lady), when she traveled in great cold, had the girls wipe her running nose with their bare hands, tormenting them with the cold. One of these girls who was tormented thus, was found dead in Csejthe when she was arrested. He saw traces of beatings criss-crossed over the girls, but since he did not serve inside the house, and no servant was allowed entry into the inner chambers, he had never been in there: only when he was called. The daughter of the bootmaker died on Füzér the last time they were there. He heard from others that this girl, during his own lifetime, said right to the face of the mistress, "You beast, you notorious whore, Erzsébet Báthory, you'll go to hell, but I know where I’ll be going because I will enter into the kingdom of heaven." The mistress said:"Why do you call me a whore?" "That," said the girl, "is because when you were mistreating and torturing me, you made me come." Regarding the young woman called Modl, says the witness: because she did not want to be like a girl, she made her carry a stick around like a little kid, all the way from Füzér to Csejthe, and then breastfeed it; from another, he has also heard that she had cut out her flesh with a knife and roasted it. He heard that there are two Germans girls he can no longer identify from Regede who died by her, but where and how they died, he knows not. In Csicsva, her body was smashed with a large needle. The other thing seen by the witness, at Keresztúr, was a dead body in the doorway that was secretly wrapped in a rush mat in the early morning dawn. From his housemates he has heard that in the past year the bodies of five dead girls were thrown in a grain pit at Csejthe; indeed, even a derelict recounted how the corpses had been kept for two weeks and were already so rotten that, as the bodies were thrown into the pit, they were falling apart. He has also heard, but did not personally see, that while he was with the Lady at the spa to Pöstyén (Piastány), meanwhile back at Csejthe, the corpse of a dead girl was secretly buried in the flower garden, but because it was not quite buried deeply enough, the dogs came and dug up the head and hands before the eyes of many, and carried them around. He has also seen, when he sometimes entered the Mistress’ house, that all the girls stood naked in front of her and were covered with wounds. Regarding the two German girls, he knows that they died at Csejthe; and they already lay dead, as the Lady Homonnay married, at the time of the wedding. They celebrated the wedding and also held the feast, and then the girls were buried in Kosztolány. When she traveled up to Csejthe for the Homonnay wedding, he had seen with his own eyes that the mistress, staying over at Bratislava, stuck a knife into the body of one of the German girls, who were still alive at the time. All her deeds and misdemeanors were told as soon as they happened, that they were burned at Bitcá because they were around in the house day and night.

The ninth witness, the honorable Stephanus Martonfalvy, Warden (castellan) of Castle Leka, 35 years old, was sworn and interrogated, and said: He had not seen anything further, except that she slapped the girls left and right; after that, he is aware of the many atrocities recounted about her, and that she caused the suffering of many girls who died, such that he no longer wished to serve here and thus left her.

The tenth witness, the noble Janós Deseö, Warden (castellan) of Castle Keresztúr, 47 years old, was sworn and interrogated, and said: that he had a niece named Kata Berényi, the daughter of Mihály Berényi, at the court of Erzsébet Báthory. I learned, he said, that the mistress beat my poor niece severely and went to the old woman to ask that they allow me to see my niece, because I had heard that my Lady was going to travel up to Csejthe; so possibly they would let me speak with her and let me give her a little money. The old woman said, if I valued my head, I should not dare to try this without the knowledge of Her Grace, my mistress. After the mistress had arrived back in Keresztúr, I begged Her Grace that she might allow me to meet with my niece, because Her Grace was going to take her along to Csejthe and no one knew when I would be able to see her again. Also I wanted to give her a certain sum of money.” The Lady said: "You definitely cannot speak with her now, but if you want to see her, you can see her when she climbs into the carriage." Meanwhile, she went down, as if she wanted to burst. There were only two horses fixed, and the mistress ascended the carriage because she believed the horses were already fixed, while there stood my poor niece, dejected, freezing and in tears, and I also could not bear it without crying, so I said: Merciful Lady, please do not take my niece with you! I implore you in the Name of God--not by me alone but on behalf of all my relatives. We indeed see that she does not know how to serve the will of Your Grace. She said: "I certainly will not give her back, because she has already escaped from me three times; all the more will I kill her." And she cried to the coachman that they should hurry on, while I implored her, weeping and begging. She indeed took her away and never brought her back, beating and thrashing her so much that she died. He has also heard that she tormented the one with and pushed the knife into the other, and they were severely tormented, but he himself did not see it because he was the servant of the Lord and did not enter the Lady’s house.

The eleventh witness, the nobleman Janós Zamabory, residing in said Castle Keresztúr, 40 years old, was sworn and interrogated, and said that at Keresztúr, he worked part-time as paymaster and part-time as provost. He knows that they had to bury two girls and also that sometimes they were wrapped in mats and secretly taken out in the night. He only heard from the mistress, Erzsébet Báthory, that he was to make a coffin and bury them. And as far as his memory goes, he buried at least twelve of them, if not more, but as to how they died, he does not know, because at the time when she tormented them, he was not permitted to enter the Lady’s house.

The twelfth witness the honorable Lady Barbara, wife of the upstanding H. Bixi, residing at Castle Keresztúr, 25 years old, was sworn and interrogated, and said that she was the the attendant of the mistress and had been traveling with her the last four months. She had seen those poor girls who had been banished to Bitcá and, at the behest of Mrs. Erzsébet Báthory, were beaten and thrashed, that she cut their bodies, stabbed the unfortunates with needles, put stinging nettles into the girls’ wounds or covered them with nettles, so as to torment them. She did not know their names because, in general, the girls were grabbed from anywhere and brought there. She had also heard that she burned them with a hot fire iron and she also saw the burn wounds on them. Janós Ficzkó has said that typically the girls were grabbed from everywhere and brought there, and they do not even know where they came from, because they had dedicated girl catchers. The girl, who was found at Csejthe during the arrest of the Lady, was also a girl from Zala, but whereshe originated from and what she witnessed, she does not know. She has heard that of the dead girls, five were thrown in a grain pit.

Regarding these confessions and statements of the aforementioned witnesses made faithfully and in accordance with the truth, we certify the report of our Notary of Record, Magister Mózes Cziráky, to our Royal Majesty and that our confirmation is given and completed.

Given under the Jurisdiction of Pinnie (Hungary), on the Saturday after the Feast of the Blessed Maiden and Martyr Lucia (14 December) in the year of our Lord 1611.

Executed by me, Master Mózes Cziráky, Notary of the Excellent Lord Palatine of the Kingdom of Hungary.

Manu propria (with his own hand).

REPORT OF THE COURT OF ÚJHELY

(1 TESTIMONY)

JANUARY 9, 1612

We, Judge and Jury of the City of Újhely on the Riverway, send our greetings, hereby making known what presently occurred at the meeting of our full Advisory Board. Regarding the questions asked by the honorable Mr. Nicolaus Bornemissza, Tricesimator, and András Somogyi, scribe, to our barber (surgeon) Thomas, who answered our call, and said in our presence and under oath regarding the injured girl under the Widow Nádasdy, we herewith submit this honestly as well as reliably and not unwillingly, what was recorded in our presence, under the lesser seal of our city.