Sarolt
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Sarolt (c. 950 – after 997), wife of Géza, High Prince of the Magyars.
She was a daughter of Gyula of Transylvania, and was probably educated in the Eastern Orthodox faith. She was married to Géza, the son of Taksony, High Prince of the Magyars, who succeeded his father before 972.
Sarolt exerted a powerful influence on her husband and through him on the government[1]. The Catholic missionaries were watching her suspiciously[2]. The chronicles accused her of drinking insatiably and even of commiting manslaughter.
After her husband's death, in 997, one of his distant cousins Koppány, who declared his claim to the leadership of the Magyars against her son, Stephen (Vajk), wanted to marry Sarolt, referring to the Hungarian tradition. Koppány, nevertheless, was defeated, and shortly afterwards Sarolt's son was crowned as the first King of Hungary.
Her name (šar-oldu) is of Turkic origin and means "white weasel". She was also called "Beleknegini" by her Slavic subjects that means "white queen"[3].
[edit] Marriage and children
# before 972: Géza, High Prince of the Magyars (c. 945 – 997)
- Judith (? – after 988), wife of the future King Boleslaw I of Poland
- Margareth (? – after 988), wife of the future Tsar Gavril Radomir of Bulgaria
- King Stephen I of Hungary (967/969/975 – 15 August 1038)
- Unnamed daughter (? – after 1026), wife of Otto Orseolo, Doge of Venice
- Gizella (? – ?), wife of the future King Samuel Aba of Hungary
[edit] Sources
- Kristó Gyula - Makk Ferenc: Az Árpád-ház uralkodói (IPC Könyvek, 1996)
- Korai Magyar Történeti Lexikon (9-14. század), főszerkesztő: Kristó Gyula, szerkesztők: Engel Pál és Makk Ferenc (Akadémiai Kiadó, Budapest, 1994)
[edit] References
- ^ "In these days, he [Saint Adalbert] sent [a letter] to the High Prince of the Magyars, or rather to his wife who had been holding the whole country in her power with a hand of a man, and who had been governing everything owned by her husband" (Bruno of Querfurt: Sancti Adalberti Pragensis episcopi et martyris vita altera).
- ^ "Christian faith made its start under her direction, but the sullied religion mingled with paganism, and this idle and faint Christianity was turning worse than barbarism" (Bruno of Querfurt: Sancti Adalberti Pragensis episcopi et martyris vita altera).
- ^ Thietmar of Merseburg: Chronicon
