Talk:Nikola Zrinski

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1 Name spelling
2 Splitting up
3 Nationality and Name
4 Beware of the pigs!
5 Picture

[edit] Name spelling

FWIW, I've moved the page to the Croatian spelling because there's not much reason to default to the Hungarian one - both are pretty alien to English, and Zrinskis were primarily a Croatian people (evidenced by statements made in the article itself before anyone even edited the EB1911 version). --Shallot 23:59, 29 Feb 2004 (UTC)

Uh. Now, some questions:

what was their mother tongue?

Actually I recall to have read that his mother tounge was Dalmatian.

where were they born? what language people did speak there?
how did they called themselves?
how the world call them (with the memorable exception of Croatians)?
what was in the original 1911 article? what was its title? how did well-respected(?) ecyclopedists called them?

Seems pretty weird to me that you croatian people slowly changed the name of the subjects, their nationality, and finally retitled the article. Not to mention that english wikipedia should use english names, which happen to be the one found in Britannica, which is, accidentally, Zrínyi.

I'm off to holiday now, but till then I wanted to note that. Non-croatian (and non-hungarian, obviously) comments are welcome, too! Thanks for listening. --grin ✎ 23:37, 2004 May 25 (UTC)

From what I read, the grandfather's parents were both Croats, and the grandson's father was Croat while his mother was Magyar. The grandfather's famous battle was fought with two thousand of his subordinates who were Croats, and the grandson was a poet who wrote both in Croatian and in Hungarian. Both were bans of Croatia coming from a Croatian noble family, one split off from the Šubićs because they were undermining the authority of the king of Hungary. In fact, a man from the same family participated in a conspiracy to overthrow Hungarian rule over Croatia even after the second Nikola was gone (can't remember if Petar was his son, grandson or what). Therefore I don't really see any reason for them to be considered primarily Hungarian. EB 1911 was written while the Kingdom of Hungary still existed so it's rather expected that it would prefer the Magyar title. --Shallot 08:52, 26 May 2004 (UTC)

I acknowledge that there are two persons with the same name. From what I've learned by checking around the great-grandfather should be considered Croatian, since both his parents were so, he talked croatian, etc.

However the great-grandson was definitely Hungarian. First, the family was marrying Hungarian nobles, as you've mentioned. (And from then on they became Hungarian nobles, linked to Francis II Rákóczi and beyond [while the Subic family seem to have done the same, becaming the Hungarian noble family Frangepán].)

Err, you mean Frankopan, the family that owned estates on Krk? No less Croatian than any others in the vicinity? :) --Shallot 15:42, 29 Jun 2004 (UTC)

Errr, the same way like the grandfather was given huge estates in Hugary, by King Ferdinand? :)Szlevi 15:41, 22 August 2006 (UTC)

Then he was raised by Péter Pázmány, who was a Hungarian noble. He was fluent in both Croatian and Hungarian [and latin and italian and german], but as you may know he was among the first poets to use Hungarian language as the language of literary texts, used and advised to use Hungarian among the Hungarian nobles who often couldn't read or write. His friends were mostly Hunagrian politicians, poets and writers. On the political side he supported Hungary as a whole (containing Croatia) as far as I know, and it sounds logical that he supported Croatian [and Hungarian] rights against the Austrian empire since that was he was mainly against, apart from the Turkish empire.

Yeah, I agree with the literary observations, he deserves a place among the Hungarian poets because of his. But don't you think that it's a bit strange that the same EB1911 which calls Zrinski Zrinyi (and Krk Veglia, and Korčula Curzola, and ...) says this about him (copy&paste from this article, unchanged compared to e.g. [1]):

In 1646 he distinguished himself in the Turkish war. At the coronation of Ferdinand IV he carried the sword of state, and was made ban and captain-general of Croatia. In this double capacity he presided over many Croatian diets, always strenuously defending the political rights of the Croats and steadfastly maintaining that as regarded Hungary they were to be looked upon not as panes annexae but as a regnum.

Panes annexae would be annexed lands I think, while regnum would be kingdom. Sounds suspiciously pro-Croatian for a primarily Hungarian noble, don't you think? :) He also married a woman named Drašković (spelled Draskovics or Draskoy in Hungarian, too), from the Croatian noble family of the same name (owners of Trakošćan/Trakostyan), so he must have made friends with not only the ethnic Hungarian nobility. On the same note, I googled a bit and found a site called worldroots.com that says that one of the women from the Nadasdy family married into the Drašković family, and then one of her daughters married into the Szechenyi, and another into the Palffy families. At the same time there was a daughter of Eszterhazy marrying with the Pallfys. All of those families with Hungarian names have given bans of Croatia, but none of them have been remembered with relation to Croatia quite so overtly as the Zrinyis were, both in the local-patriotic history books and in the rusty old Britannica, apparently. This can't be without reason. --Shallot 15:42, 29 Jun 2004 (UTC)

(On a side note, a Nadasdy was a conspirator in 1671 and was put to death together with a Zrinski and a Frankopan, and Tat(t?)enbach and Rakoczy and Tökölyi were also involved. The families from various crown lands intermingled, but you can always tell where each of them came from. --Shallot)

(His brother on the other hand was supported everything what was Croatian, and he used mainly Croatian language for his literary works, and I consider him a Croatian, as well as probably you do.)

If you're talking about Peter (son of Gyorgy, brother of Miklos) then yes, certainly - and, let me add this here, he was probably the main reason Croatians think the grandson was mostly Croatian even though he loudly voiced his love towards Hungary in every single piece he wrote during his life - see my notes below about Peter's manipulative Croatian translations... ;)Szlevi 15:41, 22 August 2006 (UTC)

I suggest to keep title of grandfather croatian and revert great-grandson to english/hungarian spelling, both maintaining redirects from the other language. I can expand the article (of great-gandson) using Hungarian references, but it would look rather stupid to talk about his all-Hungarian literature while he have Croatian title. If it is acceptable this way either you can move it back, or I can do it.

Thank you, --grin ✎ 13:19, 2004 Jun 29 (UTC)

Actually I don't think it would look stupid to talk about his Hungarian literature under the name that isn't literally Hungarian. You can make a very graceful transition to such content by providing a nice elaboration on how he came to write Hungarian poetry (the article merely hints at it now) and state clearly how he was known as Miklos Zrinyi because that is the rendering native to his Hungarian colleagues and friends and one that was used in the Kingdom of Hungary's official communication. --Shallot 15:42, 29 Jun 2004 (UTC)

It would certainly look silly, let alone you would harshly ignore Zrinyi's own stance on this. That's one thing that if you check any reference of the world, the grandson is listed with his Hungarian name, under Hungarian literature - because he published his works in Hungarian including his military essays - but he voiced his loyalty to Hungary, the Kingdom of Hungary - including Croatia, of course - all the time. Besides the references and the fact that he was Hungarian by his mother and that he was a strong supporter of the Hungarian Kingdom, opposing Austria and the Ottomans, he also always stated his Hungarian feelings, openly and consistently - instead of longer explanation here's a quote from "Az török Áfium ellen való orvosság" ("The remedy against that Turkish Opium"): "Elfussunk? nincs hová, sohun másutt Magyarországot meg nem találjuk, senki a maga országából barátságunkért ki nem mégyen, hogy minket helyheztessen belé. A mi nemes szabadságunk ez ég alatt sohun nincs, hanem Pannóniában. Hic nobis vel vincendum, vel moriendum est!” [latin, he's paraphrasing Livius here]." My shallow translation: "Shall we run? There's no place. Nowhere else we can find Hungary, nobody would leave his country for our friendship, just to put us there. Our noble freedom under this sky doesn't exist anywhere else, only in Pannonia [latin name of Hungary, given by Roman Empire]. You must win or die here!" It's safe to say it much more sounds like a Hungarian noble, isn't it? It would be very rude to ignore his feelings and call him mainly Croatian, just to please some purist here... And it was just one example... I strongly believe it would be nonsense to list him under Croatian name, to not to revert to Miklos Zrinyi - there's no better evidence for his feelings than his own words. To be honest I think the problem Coratians have here with the grandson was 'born in translation': the grandson's literature work was - mostly, if I'm notmistaken - translated and published in Croatian by Peter Zrinyi/Petar Zrisnki, his brother (also a Croatian Ban). Peter always maintained a staunch pro-Croatian stance, reflected everywhere in his translations, even to such extremes that in the bilinguical publication of "Adriai tengernek Syrenaia"/"Adrianskoga mora Syrena" he consistently replaced every 'Hungarian' references to 'Croatian' in his Croatian translation of the grandson's Hungarian text. It's explained and backed by examples here (in Hungarian): http://www.hik.hu/tankonyvtar/site/books/b10027/ch20s04.htmlSzlevi 15:41, 22 August 2006 (UTC)

I vote for this: keep the grandfather in Croatian (keep his Hungarian name listed, of course, along with all the historical references) but revert the grandson's title to Hungarian (keep his Croatian name listed too, of course, along with all the references) - this would make sense for everybody and would not only reflect the differences between the two but also the famous poet and his voiced citizenry would be in context and respected again. The current listing is way out of the line, of his way of thinking, that's obvious for anybody who ever read few lines from Zrinyi.Szlevi 15:41, 22 August 2006 (UTC)

I agree --V. Szabolcs 18:59, 3 October 2006 (UTC)

I agree. When is this going to happen, and who will do it? Korossyl 17:51, 12 December 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Splitting up

I'm also thinking of moving the first one to Nikola Subic Zrinski but I'll need to investigate whether he was actually a Šubić or if the second surname was introduced just to be able to differentiate them. --Shallot 23:59, 29 Feb 2004 (UTC)

Having two different persons in one article is not very good. I suggest moving the Nikola Zrinski who lived 1508-1566 to a separate article, namely Nikola Subic Zrinski, regardless of whether Subic was his real name. –The Phoenix 08:01, 16 Jun 2004 (UTC)

[edit] Nationality and Name

Actually the above discussion around whether the Zrinskis/Zrinyis were Croatian or Hungarian is based on a false presumption. Nationality as we think of it is a modern invention (it came to prominence as an idea across much of Europe in the 19th century). Many modern nations were "created" in the 19th century and membership of a given nationality was defined by (spurious) ethnic or (accurate but easily manipulated) linguistic considerations. The nobility in the Kingdom of Hungary in the 15th/16th century probably didn't consider itself Magyar/Croatian/Slovak etc. After all they used Latin as an official language and, as the Wikipedia articles show, often spoke numerous other languages. Probably only the peasants could be considered as belonging to a particular "nation" as they were largely monolingual.

Both modern Croatia and Hungary have adopted the Zrinkis and Frankopans as their own, but really it would be more appropriate to regard them as of mixed nationality (we could call them Hungaro-Croatian, for example). In terms of the name, Wikipedia guidelines suggest using the form most commonly used in English. That doesn't help much here as there are few references to the Zrinskis in offline English-language sources. Probably Zrinyi is more common, only because there are more histories of Hungary than of Croatia published in English. Online, Zrinski and Zrinyi both show around 7,000 Google hits (on English Web pages). I would suggest, however, using the English versions of Christian names within the articles, and maybe also for the article titles (with both the Croatian and Hungarian forms given in the first line). Scott Moore 12:38, 12 Nov 2004 (UTC)

Well, if you pick Zrinski, you alienate one half, if you pick Zrínyi you alienate the other, if you use "of Zrin" it's semantically correct but alienates everyone. It's a lose-lose-lose situation, really :) --Joy [shallot] 23:17, 12 Nov 2004 (UTC)

Probably correct. :) On the other hand using English first name is certainly the stupidest way - why would you *rename* them in order to please the remaining - and unaffected, let's not forget - 98% and piss of both Croatians and Hungarians, let alone the rewriting the history?Szlevi 15:32, 22 August 2006 (UTC)

They couldn't possibly be Hungaro-Croatian.

Umm how so? Sure they could. I never heard about such a narrow world view where everybody is pure Coratian or pure Hungarian... Szlevi 15:32, 22 August 2006 (UTC)

Both Zrinskis and Frankopans were Croatian, but were also respected in Hungary.

Actually, to put this into the overall context of Wikipedia: if you pick Zrinksi you alienate the (at a guess) 1% of Wikipedia users who are Hungarian, and if you pick Zrínyi you alienate the 1% who are Croatian. Most of the remaining 98% will probably accept either form (or "of Zrin"). I suggest staying with Zrinski, but using the anglicized versions of the Christian names. Scott Moore 11:08, 14 Nov 2004 (UTC)

I agree. Shouldn't this article be at Nicholas Zrinski then? Olessi 05:19, 8 September 2005 (UTC)

No, because his name was Miklos Zrinyi/Nikola Zrinski.Szlevi 15:32, 22 August 2006 (UTC)

No, because although names used to be translated back then, his name was Nikola Zrinski, and that's were he should be.

Umm no, you're not making any sense: you just said he was *using* his name as Zrinyi (I'm talking about the grandson, and it is a historical fact) - then who are you to rename him? :) I hope now you can see the hypocrisy in your view... I really think Zrinyis should be listed both in Croatian and Hungarian: the grandfather should be listed under his Croatian name (mentioning the Hungarian one below), the grandson - who was a strong and voiceful Hungarian all the time - should be listed under his Hungarian name (mentioning the Croatian one below). Szlevi 15:27, 22 August 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Beware of the pigs!

Wild boards have a particular importance for the history of Carpathian basin. Prince imre, the only son of Saint Stephanus I, founding king of Hungary, also died to a wildboar's tusks. Many people and some historians argue, both him and Zrinyi were killed by austrian assains. Zrinyi actually planned to make a revolt against the Habsburgs, so getting rid of him would seem logical to the Austrian Empire. However, many eye witnesses testified that Zrinyi was indeed wounded in a way consistent with a wildboar. I'd say 75% probable hunting accident, 25% assassination, but we'll never get to know for sure.