Zrinski-Frankopan conspiracy

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The Zrinski-Frankopan conspiracy (Croatian: urota zrinsko-frankopanska; 1664-1670) was a movement in which the Croatian noblemen of the Zrinski and Frankopan families rebelled against their ruler, King Leopold I of the Habsburg family. They felt he disregarded the treaty that he was bound to upon being crowned as the king of the Lands of the Crown of St. Stephen.

The leaders of the conspiracy were Petar Zrinski and Fran Krsto Frankopan, and they were supported by members of Hungarian nobility, namely Ferenc Nadasdy and E. Tatenbach. In Hungarian historiography the conspiracy also named Wesselényi conspiracy after the highest ranking (count palatine) member.

[edit] History

The Zrinski and Frankopan families were two of the most prominent and influental families in Croatia, were related to each other, and owned many castles and estates all over Croatia. By deception, Petar Zrinski and Fran Krsto Frankopan were coaxed to come voluntarily to Vienna where they were placed under house arrest. From Vienna, they were transferred to a prison in the Wiener Neustadt, where they were put on trial and beheaded on April 30, 1671.

The bones of Zrinski and Frankopan were to remain in Austria-Hungary for 248 years, and it was only after the fall of the monarchy that their remains were moved to the crypt of the Zagreb Cathedral.

With the death of Nikola Zrinski began the extermination of the two most influential Croatian families. After his death, at the end of 1664, the succession to the ban passed on to his brother Petar who was convinced that in this way he could continue the struggle for the lost Croatian privileges. But Vienna continued on the course it had charted, to utterly eliminate the families of Zrinski and Frankopan. Their estates were relentlessly pillaged not by the Turks, but by Austrian soldiers. The generalship of Karlovac fell not to Petar Zrinski, but to his bitterest enemy Herberstein.

Although Fran Krsto Frankopan was a prisoner in Venice, good relations with certain eminent dignitaries in that city continued to exist, the Frankopans being especially honored there. Then Zrinski and Frankopan began to negotiate concerning the possibility of a joint resistance against Vienna. For a long time, France had had a personal account to settle with Austria and therefore it was quite natural that Zrinski, through Katarina Zrinski his wife, should try to appeal assiduously to Venice and France.

Vienna had spies all over the empire who kept an eye on Zrinski. At first, it was necessary to discredit Zrinski and Frankopan in the eyes of own people as alleged traitors. They went as far as spreading the rumors that Katarina Zrinski had accepted the Islamic faith, that Zrinski betrayed his nation's blood spilt for liberty and wished to destroy Catholic and Apostolic Austria. They openly instigated soldiers to exterminate the Zrinskis. Seeing all this injustice, Zrinski and Frankopan went to Vienna by order of the emperor to explain to the court and to Leopold I how the names had been abused. They went there believing that by the mediation of the bishop of Zagreb, Martin Borković, and with the letter of safe conduct sent to them from the emperor nothing could happen to them. But they were deceived. They could foresee everything but not what actually happened to them.

In Vienna, both of them were jailed and tortured. During the night, executioners brought to Petar Zrinski the false deposition of Frankopan against him while Frankopan was served likewise. A German military officer, Spankau, broke into Zrinski's estate in Čakovec and finding it defenseless, he and his soldiers pillaged without mercy all that he could lay his hands on. He forced Katarina to enter an Austrian convent where the heroic woman, the symbol of a suffering Croatia, spent the last hours of her husband's and brother's life in tears and grief.

They were sentenced to death for high treason. For Petar Zrinski the verdict was read that: "he committed the greatest sins than the others in aspiring to obtain the same station as his majesty, that is, to be an independent Croatian ruler and therefore he indeed deserves to be crowned not with a crown, but with a bloody sword".

On April 30, 1671, Petar Zrinski and Fran Krsto Frankopan were led to their place of execution.

"Today we have pardoned each other our transgressions. Therefore I ponder this letter and ask you for everlasting forgiveness. If I have mistreated you in some way, or offended you, forgive me. In the name of our Father, I am quite prepared to die and I am not afraid".

So wrote Petar Zrinski in the letter of pardon to his wife Katarina. Frankopanalso wrote a very sensitive letter to his wife.

"My dear Julia, I would lie with all my soul to leave behind a last commemoration of my deepest love, but I am naked and miserable".

Before his death, Petar allegedly tied his hair up in a handkerchief made by his wife, so that the executioner's axe should fall directly on his neck without obstruction. He wanted with his death to show that which he could not with this life, that a Croat]knows how to die courageously. Only on the second blow did the executioner cut off first off Zrinski's head. The same thing happened in the case of Fran Krsto Frankopan. Two of Petar's daughters died in the convent. His son Ivan, after a terrible imprisonment and torture, died mad. So did Katarina, the very symbol of Croatia's destiny.

Nikola's son Adam died struck down in all probability by an Austrian soldier in a battle near Slankamen, twenty years after the decapitation of Petar Zrinski and Fran Krsto Frankopan. Frankopan lost his son who died at a very young age. His family remained without male descendants, something in which only Vienna could triumph. So disappeared from Croatian history, political and cultural life two most illustrious families.

Last Letter of Ban Petar Zrinski to his wife Katarina:

My dear heart;

Do not be too sorrowful and upset on account of this letter. God's will be done. Tomorrow at ten o'clock they will cut off my head and your brother's too. Today we pardoned each other with all our heart. Therefore I ponder this letter and ask you for everlasting forgiveness. If I have mistreated you in some way, or offended you, as well I know, forgive me. In the name of our Father I am quite prepared to die and am not afraid. I hope that the Almighty God who has humiliated me in this world will have mercy on me. I would pray to him and ask him to whom tomorrow I hope to come that we may meet each other in everlasting glory before the Lord. I know nothing else to write to you about, neither our son nor the rest of our poor possessions. I have left this to God's will. Do not be sorry, everything had to be so. In Wiener Neustadt, the day before the last day of my life, at seven o'clock in the evening, April 29th, 1671. May Almighty God bless you together with our daughter Aurora Veronika.