The Raven King: Matthias Corvinus and the Fate of His Lost Library

Seizing the Hungarian throne at the age of fifteen Matthias Corvinus the "Raven King was an effervescent presence on the fifteenth-century stage. A successful warrior and munificent art patron he sought to leave as symbols of his strategic and humanist ambitions a strong unified country splendid palaces and the most magnificent library in Christendom. But Hungary invaded by Turkey after Matthiass death in 1490 yielded its treasures and the Raven Kings exquisite library of two thousand volumes witness to a golden cultural age was dispersed first across Europe and then the world. The quest to recover this collection of sumptuously illuminated scripts provoked and tantalized generations of princes cardinals collectors and scholars and imbued Hungarians with the mythical conviction that the restoration of the lost library would seal their countrys rebirth. In this thrilling and absorbing account drawing on a wealth of original sources in several languages Marcus Tanner tracks the destiny of the Raven King and his magnificent bequest uncovering the remarkable story of a life and library almost lost to history.