John Zápolya

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This article is about the elder John Zápolya. For his son, see John Zápolya II.

John I Zápolya (Hungarian: János Zápolya or Szapolyai, Croatian: Ivan Zapolja) (1487–July 22, 1540), was a pretender to the throne (with Ferdinand I) of Hungary between 1526 and 1540 Brit-JZ.

On 29 August 1526, at Mohács, Sultan Suleiman's army inflicted a decisive defeat on the Hungarian forces. Hungary's youthful king, Louis II (Jagiello), fell in battle, as did many of his soldiers. The Ottomans proceeded to invest and ransack the royal capital of Buda and occupied the Szerémség, then withdrew from Hungary. The last three months of the year were marked by a vacuum of power: political authority was in a state of collapse, yet the victors chose not to impose their rule.

Two candidates stepped into the breech. One was John Szapolyai, Transylvania's voivode, and Hungary's most prominent aristocrat; the other, the Austrian Archduke Ferdinand Habsburg, who was the late king's brother-in-law and the brother of the Holy Roman Emperor, Charles V. Their contest for power would determine the course of Hungary's history, and that of Transylvania as well, for the region's fate was intimately tied in these crucial decades to that of the mother country.

The majority of Hungary's ruling elite backed Szapolyai, who for fifteen years had been playing a leading role in Hungarian political life. Part of the aristocracy acknowledged his leadership, and he enjoyed the enthusiastic support — not always reciprocated — of the lesser nobility. Most of his opponents succumbed at Mohács: the Hungarian branch of the Jagiello dynasty became defunct, and its pro-Habsburg following was decimated.

A small minority of aristocrats sided with Ferdinand. The German dynasty's main argument — one that many historians would judge to be decisive — was that it could assist Hungary against the Ottomans, although, in 1526, the promise rang empty. Hungary had been fighting the Ottomans for over a century, during which time the German Empire and the Habsburg dynasty had offered much encouragement but no tangible help. The likelihood of assistance was further reduced by the conflict of Ferdinand's older brother, Emperor Charles V and the French King Francis I that once again flared into open war in the summer of 1526. This circumstance led the voivode to discount the threat lurking behind the Habsburgs' candidacy: that Hungary would have to contend not only with the Ottomans, but also with an attack from the west.

Thus Szapolyai took no notice of his rival's protests, nor of those voiced by the few Hungarians who rallied to Ferdinand. On 10 November 1526, Szapolyai had himself proclaimed king by the diet at Székesfehérvár, and he was duly crowned the next day.

Profiting from nine months of relative calm, King John I strove to restore state authority. He drew on his vast private wealth, the unconditional support of the lesser nobility, and the assistance of some aristocrats to impose his policies in domestic affairs. However, in the crucial sphere of foreign relations, success eluded him. He sought an entente with the Habsburgs, proposing to form an alliance against the Ottomans, but Archduke Ferdinand, who had himself elected king by a rump diet in December 1526, rejected all attempts at reconciliation. Hungary's envoys fanned out across Europe in quest of support. Only in France did they find a positive response, but even that was ineffective since Francis I was intent not on reconciling Hungary and the Habsburgs, but on drawing Hungary into a war against Charles V and his family.

Europe's political balance underwent a major shift in the summer of 1527, when, in a somewhat unplanned operation, mercenary forces of the emperor occupied Rome and drove the Pope, one of France's principal allies, to capitulate. This development freed Ferdinand — who also acquired the Czech throne in late 1526 — from the burden of assisting his brother. By then, Ferdinand had developed a Hungarian policy that was fully in keeping with the interests of his realms. He judged that if Hungary, unable to resist the Ottomans, took action independently of Austria and Bohemia, it might well enter into an alliance with the preponderant Ottoman empire against its western neighbours. It was therefore in the interest of the Austrian hereditary provinces and of the Czech crown lands that the Habsburgs gain control of Hungary, by force if necessary.

In July 1527, an army of German mercenaries invaded Hungary. The moment was well chosen, for the forces of King John I were tied up in the southern counties, where Slavonic peasants, incited by Ferdinand, had rebelled; the revolt was led by the 'Black Man', Jován Cserni. In one sweep, the invaders captured Buda. Szapolyai hurriedly redeployed his army, but on 27 September, near Tokaj, it suffered a bloody defeat.

He is widely regarded as a hero in his native Hungary, despite the association with the Ottomans which tainted him at the time. In 1538, by the treaty of Varad, Ferdinand was designated as Zápolya's successor, after his death. After Zapolya's death, his son John II Sigismund Zápolya succeeded him as Hungarian King and Ottoman vassal. He is also well-known among the Turks, who consider him as a loyal friend of Suleiman the Magnificent.

Zápolya's wife Isabella Jagiełło (Izabella in Hungarian) claimed the throne after John's death in the period of 1556–1559.