Béla of Macsó

Béla of Macsó (after 1243 – November 1272) was a member of the Olgovichi clan. He was Duke of Macsó (1262–1272) and of Bosnia (1266/1271–1272); and thus he governed the southern provinces of the Kingdom of Hungary.

Béla was the son of Duke Rostislav of Macsó and his wife, Anna, a daughter of King Béla IV of Hungary. King Béla IV, having made these assignments to his grandsons, decided also to make some further changes in his peripheral territories, and assigned Slavonia, Dalmatia, and Croatia, which until then had all been under his elder son and heir, Stephen V, to a younger son named Béla. After the peace, Stephen V occupied the possessions which Béla and his brother had inherited from their father in the eastern parts of the kingdom (the former royal possessions in Bereg County and the Castle of Füzér).

After King Stephen V had died on August 6, 1272, and his son, the young Ladislaus IV ascended the throne, King Béla IV’s former partisans (among them Béla’s mother and Henry Kőszegi) returned to Hungary. Thenceforward, several fractions of the leading nobles were competing with each other, and all of them were endeavoring to acquire the control over the government of the kingdom. In November, the members of Henry Kőszegi’s retinue killed Béla (who was the young king’s closest adult male relative at that time) following a sharp dispute.

After his murder, Béla’s domains were divided among the members of the leading noble families.

Ancestors

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