Abaújvár

Abaújvár
This coat of arms was granted to the Village of Abaújvár by the Genus Aba Family Foundation to commemorate the 700-year anniversary of the Battle of Rozgony.
Abaújvár Location of Abaújvár
Coordinates: 48°31′35″N 21°18′56″E / 48.52642°N 21.31545°E / 48.52642; 21.31545Coordinates: 48°31′35″N 21°18′56″E / 48.52642°N 21.31545°E / 48.52642; 21.31545
Country	Hungary
County	Borsod-Abaúj-Zemplén
Subregion	Metro Inter-Mountain
Government
• Mayor	Pál Csuha (Independent)
Area
• Total	7.32 km2 (2.83 sq mi)
Population (2001)
• Total	330
• Density	45.08/km2 (116.8/sq mi)
Time zone	CET (UTC+1)
• Summer (DST)	CEST (UTC+2)
Postal code	3898
Area code(s)	46

Abaújvár is a village in northeastern Hungary, next to the Slovak border. It lies 72 km (45 mi) northeast of Miskolc, and 18 km south of Košice (Kassa), Slovakia.

In addition to Gyöngyöspata in Heves County, from the 11th–14th centuries Abaújvár Castle was the main place of residence for the Aba family, the second ethnic royal house of Hungary and one of the most important Hungarian families of the time. The first known written record pertaining to Abaújvár dates back to 1046, but presumably an earth castle stood here much earlier. The new stone castle was built by King Samuel Aba.

In the years that followed the bloodiest battle of the Medieval Hungary, the Battle of Rozgony, the castle of Abaújvár became more or less a place of bad memories for the Aba family. June 15, 1312 fell on a Thursday, so during the following two days all efforts were made to make certain that the wounded and the bodies of the dead be brought from the Rozgony battlefield, some 18 km away, to Abaújvár for care and burial before Sunday, the Lord's day. By the end of the month some eight hundred bodies were buried within the inner yard of the castle grounds. Perhaps it was because of this that the new king, Charles Robert of Anjou, had a very hard time to find a new master for the place. Shortly thereafter the story of the haunted castle developed into a legend.

In 1345, King Charles Robert’s Sicilian supporters, Nicholas, Philip, and William Drugeth, gave Abaújvár to the Augustinians Friars. However, since the Drugeth brothers never owned the property in the first place, the property was taken away from the Augustinians in 1351, and during the same year, with the approval of the king, the Augustinian Order received the village Monyhád in Sáros County (Mochnya, present-day Slovakia).

In 1394, the castle and the surrounding land was given by Sigismund, Holy Roman Emperor into a trust and the care of a minor local aristocratic family under the condition that they would finance additional fortification of the Abaújvár Castle. While the Perényi family gained local importance after the Battle of Rozgony by giving their support to King Charles Robert of Anjou against the Aba, unfortunately even several decades later they were not in a financial position to carry on with needed fortification. Eventually King Sigismund’s treasury allocated some funds for the fortification of the castle; however, the Perényi used the money to build for themselves a family chateau on their own estate. This mistake proved to be dear for the realm itself. In 1441, when Jan Zizka, a Czech Hussite warlord seized Abaújvár for ransom, the Perényi family could not raise even a small portion of the 24,000 gold ducats demanded by Hussite rebels.