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From: "Todd A. Farmerie" <>
Subject: Re: Which Agatha?
Date: Sun, 03 Dec 2000 08:32:12 -0700


Hugh NanKivell wrote:
>
> I have no academic knowledge whatsoever about Agatha'a parentage.
> However, when I visited the National Museum of Hungary in Budapest in
> September this year, I noticed a family tree (or alleged family tree) of the
> Arpad Dynasty on display. I don't know who researched it and prepared it.
> This family tree shows Agota, a daughter of King Saint Istvan (Stephen) of
> Hungary and Blessed Gisella of Bavaria, as marrying Edward 'the exile',
> Prince of England, and that their two children, viz. daughter Margaret
> (married Malcolm III, King of Scots) and son Edgar (married Margaret of
> Scotland, daughter of Duncan I, King of Scots and Aelflaed of Northumbria).

This is one of the older solutions to the issue. There are
chronicle sources which state that Agatha was daughter of the
King of Hungary, and others making her niece (although the word
is more specific - along the lines of brother's daughter, which
doesn't fit here) of Emperor Henry, and this solution harmonized
the two - Stephen married the sister of Henry II.

The problem with this solution is multi-fold. First, the
chronology is stretched - not impossible, but certainly
strained. Second, the issue of Stephen's succession is well
known. Hungary was fought over by Stephen's nephew, the Doge of
Venice (representing foreign interests), and brother-in-law Aba
Samuel, for a decade. Had there been a surviving child, she (or
her husband) immediately would have been the primary heir, and
the centerpiece of this succession struggle. Likewise, at the
time of his marriage, Edward was living in Russia, a landless
exile with no prospects, living in the company of hungarian
prince Andrew, whose father was killed by Stephen. No supporter
of the Stephen marriage has come up with a scenario which would
explain Stephen sending his daughter of to marry his enemy
kinsman's friend. Finally, that same connection, between Andrew
and Edward, is what brought Edward to Hungary, as part of exile
Andrew's return to contest the throne. Had Edward married the
daughter of Stephen, he would have been the primary competitor of
Andrew, and the prince certainly would not have complicated the
task he faced by bringing with him someone with, arguably, a
better claimant than he.

ta

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