2021-07-07 Wed

John Sigismund Zapolya was King of Hungary as John II from 1540 to 1551 and from 1556 to 1570, and the first Prince of Transylvania, from 1570 to his death. He ruled parts of the Kingdom of Hungary with the support of the Ottoman Sultan Suleiman; the remaining areas were ruled by Ferdinand I of Habsburg, who also ruled Austria and Bohemia.

John Sigismund initiated a series of theological debates among the representatives of the concurring theological schools of the Reformation in the 1560s. He converted from Catholicism to Lutheranism in 1562 and from Lutheranism to Calvinism in 1564. Around five years later, accepting the Anti-Trinitarian views of his physician, Giorgio Biandrata and court preacher Ferenc David, he became the only Unitarian monarch in history.

In 1568, the Diet passed the Edict of Torda (now Turda in Romania), which emphasized that "faith is a gift of God" and prohibited the persecution of people for religious reasons. The edict expanded the limits of freedom of religion beyond the standards of late 16th-century Europe. John Sigismund abandoned the title "elected king of Hungary" in the Treaty of Speyer in 1570. Thereafter, he styled himself "Prince of Transylvania and Lord of Parts of the Kingdom of Hungary". He died childlessly. The Catholic Stephen Bathory succeeded him.

Depicted here is a John Sigismund Zapolya, Transylvania Denar issued in 1556.

Image Source: Wikipedia.org