The Holy Crown of St. Stephen had adorned all the Hungarian Kings’ heads since the coronation of the first king of Hungary in 1000. The Hungarians believed no king was legitimate without being crowned with the Holy Crown of St. Stephen.
Kotanner’s memoir, Denkwurdigkeiten (“Reminiscences”), describes how she and two male accomplices, at the behest of Queen Elizabeth of Luxemburg, broke through the locks to the treasury in Visegrád Castle, to steal the crown on February 20, 1440. She wrote:
“The queen’s request frightened me, for it meant great danger for me and my little children. And I weighed the matter in my mind, wondering what to do, and there was no one I could ask for advice except God alone. I said to myself that if I did not do it and something evil happened as a result, then I would have sinned against God and the world.”
Hidden inside a red velvet pillow, Helene delivered the crown back to Queen Elizabeth. The cross atop the crown is still askew from being stuffed inside the pillow. Many think the memoir aimed to remind the ten-year-old Ladislaus of her role in making him king. The theft caused a decade-long civil war in Hungary.
Wadislaus III of Poland pressed his claim to the throne, causing Queen Elizabeth and her son to flee. By 1442, Elizabeth was dead from poison. Ladislaus became a pawn in the politics of East Central Europe. Just before he was to marry at age seventeen, he died of leukemia.
Each of the scholars who have studied Kottanner focus on different characteristics of what was a complex personality. Maya Bijvoet Williamson described her as “a smart, trustworthy, common-sense, energetic, courageous, quick-witted woman.” Sabine Schmolinsky felt Kottanner didn’t write an autobiography, but rather, a history of the political events offering insight on “psychological and mental history of the time.” Albrecht Classen considered the memoirs as autobiography. Stealing holy crowns seems to be frowned upon by the heavens.
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