Észrevételek a csíksomlyói búcsú eredettörténetéről
Observations on the Origins of the Csíksomlyó Pilgrimage

Summary/Abstract: This article was inspired by Tamás Mohay’s (1959) earlier work (A csíksomlyói pünkösdi búcsújárás. Történet, eredet, hagyomány. [The Pentecost Pilgrimage in Csíksomlyó. History, Origin, Tradition.] Budapest 2009) and most recent work (The Shrine and Pilgrimage of Csíksomlyó in the second half of the Twentieth century – Academic Doctoral Dissertation, 2021), which convincingly revealed that the Battle of Hargita was a late-eighteenth century construction in the vein of invented traditions. However, more recent publications have started to suggest that the event might actually have happened. This article provides a detailed account of the events that unfolded in the Prince’s environment in the spring of 1567, based on a previously ignored source, a letter from the Italian captain Giovanandrea Gromo (1518–1567?). On the basis of this source, it is safe to say that the idea that the battle really took place is physically impossible. The second part of the article offers an analysis of the first texts that promoted the myth (Chronology and Testimonium). The analysis shows that these texts quote passages from sixteenth-century Transylvanian parliaments in a distorted format, giving the impression that severe punitive sanctions were imposed on Catholics. Rhetorical analysis reveals that the two texts are not written according to the same rhetorical principles. The Testimonium clearly adapts the historiographical method, while the Chronology reflects a strong influence of hagiography. On the other hand, the latter work refers to the written, but now lost or only orally transmitted tradition of persons who, although not authenticating the Battle of Hargita, make it likely that some tradition of the miraculous survival of the Catholic faith arose already in the second half of the seventeenth century, connected to the construction of the shrine in the same century.

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