Countess Dracula (45 page)

The castle of Devín overlooking the Danube, inherited by the Báthorys in the 17th century

Delphine Seyrig playing Elisabeth Báthory in
Le Rouge aux Lèvres, 1971

An imaginary portrait (detail) of Countess Báthory in later life accompanied by her children, by the Dutch artist Erzsébet Baerveldt (1996)

Č
achtice castle in the early 17th century (a 19th-century reconstruction)

The most sincere thanks are due to everyone who joined the author in risking what became known during the preparation of this book as ‘the curse of Erzsébet'. This was the malign influence that, despite the gift from a Brazilian friend of a rosary blessed in turn by a priest and a white witch, must have caused the strange attacks of lassitude and confusion which beset the writer, and led to his near-death in a Caribbean lagoon, followed by an unexplained erasing of computer files just as writing began in earnest. The effects of the curse extended to those who accompanied the writer in his fieldwork, particularly two colleagues and friends without whom the project would scarcely have been manageable. One was the eminent Hungarian historian of the early modern period Dr Gábor Várkonyi, who witnessed the unseasonal snowstorms that came out of nowhere to block the roads at Lockenhaus and again at Deutschkreuz, and who was then marooned with the author in deeper snow beneath the walls of Castle Forchtenstein, and trapped once more, this time by a vast steel shutter, in the underground car park below the Esterházy palace at Eisenstadt. The other was the writer, critic and translator János Széky, who helped to interpret the spirit of Hungary as well as its literature and language, and who found himself at dusk on All Souls' Night locked into the
grounds of Bratislava castle with the author as a red sky darkened and the temperature fell.

Another friend and guide, L'uba Vávrová of the British Council in Bratislava, with Dr Tünde Lengyelová of the Slovak Academy of Science coped bravely with further near-death experiences on the highways to and from
Č
achtice and Byt
č
a. In Vienna the curse conjured up the spirit of ancient female furies, the apparition in the Haus, Hof und Staatsarchiv who glaringly brushed aside a plaintive request for assistance. In the Austrian National Library, the staff could not have been more accommodating, but there, as in the Budapest and British Libraries, key texts – some which had not been consulted for years – mysteriously disappeared from their places on the shelves as soon as they were requested, reappearing magically months later.

All those mentioned above gave most generously of their time and expertise for little or no reward, as did Professor László Péter of the London University School of Slavonic and East European Studies, who provided encouragement from the outset, and Professor Susan Bassnett of Warwick University, to whom thanks for Alejandra Pizarnik. In Budapest the historians Dr Katalin Péter, Professor Ágnes R. Várkonyi, Pël Ritoák, Borbála Benda, Zsuzsana Bozai and Tibor Lukács all provided invaluable and very tangible support, details of which can be found in the chapter notes. Attempts to trace Dr László Nagy were unsuccessful, but his published and broadcast opinions on the Báthory family scandals were enormously helpful. In Slovakia it was Beata Havelská of the Academy of Music and Dramatic Arts in Bratislava, Dr Pavol Štekauer, Dr Štefan Franko and the students of the Faculty of Arts at Šáfárik University who helped translate the great volume of source material, only a small part of which could be reproduced here. Professor Henrich Pifko, the photographer Karol Kallay and the curators of the
Č
achtice Museum and the State Archives at Byt
č
a deserve especial gratitude, also extended to the heirs of Jozo Niž
ň
anský for permission to quote from his work.

Given the deep divisions of opinion on the question of the Widow Nádasdy's guilt and the disagreements – sometimes approaching acrimony – between scholars writing on the case, it was immensely gratifying that the chief proponents of the two main views and the two most important living authorities on the life of Countess Báthory, Dr Jozef Kocis, the former archivist at By
č
a castle, and Dr Irma Szádeczky-Kardoss, lawyer and defender of Elisabeth's good name,
not only were willing to spend long hours answering this author's questions, but gave permission to quote extensively from their published works and even allowed materials from their private archives to be used in the making of this book. Both refused to accept payment. Neither of them is likely to be satisfied by the conclusions reached in this appraisal of the Báthory affair, but perhaps the sincere acknowledgement of a scholarly debt will go some way towards appeasing them.

The author would like to give thanks to the explorer Rob Humphreys, to the British novelist Jennifer Potter for sharing her insights and lending him her memories of C
ă
chtice, and to the Dutch artist Erzsébet Baerveldt, who not only provided new and essential information concerning the portraits of Countess Báthory and her costumes but reminded a distracted writer of the need for emotional empathy in any re-creation of the mysteries of the past.

Thanks must also go to the publishers, Bloomsbury, for their patience in the face of a writer labouring under a curse, and to M.M., who had to live with its daily manifestations.

Tony Thorne
London, 1997

Countess Erzsébet (Elisabeth) Báthory

Count Ferenc (Francis) Nádasdy, her husband

Lady Anna Nádasdy, her elder daughter

Lady Katalin (Kate) Nádasdy, her younger daughter

Lord Pál (Paul) Nádasdy, her son

Count Miklós (Nicholas) Zrínyi, her son-in-law, husband to Lady Anna

Count György (George) Homonnay Drugeth, her son-in-law, husband to Lady Kate

Gábor Báthory, her nephew, Prince of Transylvania

Anna Báthory, her niece

Anna Darvulid, her confidential servant

Dorottya Szentes, known as Dorkó, her confidential servant

Ilona (Helena) Jó, her confidential servant

János Újváry, known as Ficzkó, her manservant and factotum

Katalin (Katherine) Benecká or Beniczky, her servant

Erzsi Majorosné, a witch

Count György (George) Thurzó, Palatine of Hungary

Countess Erzsébet (Elisabeth) Czobor, his wife

Rudolf II, Holy Roman Emperor and King of Hungary

Matthias II, brother and successor to the above

Sir Imre Megyery, tutor to Paul Nádasdy

A note on Hungarian proper names

In Hungary – then and now – names are given in reverse order, so
Báthory Erzsébet.
In this text names are given in ‘English' order and the Christian names of the main protagonists have been anglicized. The family name ending -
γ
or -
i
can be the equivalent of the French
de
or the German
von
when attached to a place-name; the ending
-ffy
originally signified
son of,
and
-falva (of) the village of
. Given the ethnic mixture in eastern-central Europe there are many cases of non-Magyar names which can be represented in a Hungarian spelling or in their original form. Where it is probable that the bearer of the name did not have Hungarian as their first language, the Slovak, Croatian, etc. form has been used here.