Matthias Corvinus

And he's like, look, I will fight about this some more.

He goes up against the king of Hungary, who is Matthias Corvinus.

And this results in the Bohemian-Hungarian War of 1468.

This goes on for 10 years, right? By 1512...

Obviously, the Ottoman advance, Hungarian ambition.

So Matthias, as we'll see, King Matthias constantly, constantly going behind his back, wanting to take his land from him.

The Hungarian crown considered Moldavia a vassal state, while Stephen insisted on independence.

Again, he was successful in all this stuff.

Albania resisted until it collapsed in 1479.

So literally the only resistance, I mean, you have the Hungarian Empire, which is Catholic, but in regards to Orthodoxy, all you have is Wallachia, which we consider modern-day Romania, and then St. Stephan in Moldavia.

So King Matthias Corvinus, king of Hungary, was a brilliant Renaissance monarch.

He centralized power, reformed the army, the Black Army, and sought influence in Bohemia, Austria, and the Balkans.

But beyond the city, something extraordinary is happening.

An unlikely coalition is gathering under the command of the Polish king, John III Sobieski, determined to confront the Ottoman Grand Vizier, Korah Mustafa Pasha.

Two powerful

commanders, two enormous armies, and a city whose fate could reshape the balance of power across Europe.

As the relief army approaches through the hills

overlooking Vienna, the stage is set for one of the most dramatic battles of the 17th century.

This is the

story of the Battle of Vienna, 1683.

It's actually very similar to quite a lot of the stories that we've talked about on this podcast, where somebody obviously has beef with her.

And it's none other than the King of Hungary, King Matthias.

Essentially, it turns out that he owes the Bathory family quite a lot of money.

So it's possible that she's not really a vampire, that it's actually the fact that he owes her a lot of money and he just wants to do away with her.

Y las drenaba y decían que se bañaba en una tina y que así rejuvenecía de la misma zona.

Luego, el conde Turso, que fue, era primo de él, fue enviado por un rey que se llamaba Matías Corvino, lo envió para que viera lo que pasaba, porque decía: «Se desaparecen todas las mujeres».

Y dice que cuando abrieron el castillo de Čachtice, que hoy está en ruinas y se puede visitar, y ahí estaba, eh, la residencia de Elizabeth Báthory, cuando abrieron la puerta, el suelo estaba cubierto de aserrín.

Y cuando él corrió el aserrín, solo había líquido hemático por todas partes, coagulado.

Gotcha, gotcha.

Well, the name Corvin, who is derived from Corvinus, is most likely a reference to Matthias Corvinus of Moldavia, who was an ally of Vlad Tepes, the inspiration for Bram Stoker's Dracula.

Wasn't Moldavia one of those fake countries that was used in either several Hallmark films or where the assassination took place on, what was it, Dynasty? Yeah,

it seems familiar.

So he, when he had this clash with the sultan, he reportedly left behind fields of thousands of impaled victims.

It was a scene so horrifying, it sounds more like some kinda haunted attraction that couldn't be real, right? He escaped the sultan that year, only to be captured by Hungarian forces and imprisoned by Matthias I of Hungary.

So, you know, he couldn't get away no matter, like I'm saying, it's like no matter how much tyranny and horror that he put across, he still was at risk for being captured.

Why they didn't kill him at that time, I'm not sure.

The opportunity seemed to have come when Ladislav Posthumus died suddenly at the age of eighteen, leaving vacant the thrones of Hungary and Bohemia and the duchy of Austria.

Frederick eventually secured Austria, but the two kingdoms took each its own line and respectively chose Matthias Corvinus, son of the Hungarian hero John Hunyadi, and George Podiebrad, the leader of the Hussite party in Bohemia and regent during Ladislav's minority.

Under the rule of these two able kings, Hungary and Bohemia became models to the rest of Europe of strong and tolerant government.

Unfortunately, neither of them left a successor.