Adelaide of Hungary (The Kalmar Union)

Adelaide was the final Hungarian monarch from the Bezier line. Unexpectedly made heir apparent after brother's death, her marriage to Wenceslaus of Bohemia would bring Hungary into the Luxembourg sphere for two centuries.

Born in 1346 to John I and his second wife Catherine of Bosnia, Adelaide had expected to merely be queen consort for one of the great dynasties of Europe. Potential matches with the Anglian Estridssons or Bavarian Wittelsbachs were briefly mooted. But as Bohemian and Hungarian interests increasingly intertwined she was betrothed to Wenceslaus, heir to Bohemia in 1350. They would eventually marry in 1363 following papal dispensation (which was sought from both sides of the ongoing Papal schism just in case) to overcome their close familial relation. Adelaide would reside in Prague with her husband, at least until 1375.

That year her younger brother and heir apparent Charles of Buda died. This left only Adelaide and her younger sister Jadwiga as heirs. John I set about ensuring Adelaide's succession, not only in Hungary but in Poland which he ruled too. Wenceslaus had by this point inherited Bohemia, the Duchy of Luxembourg and the Margravate of Brandenburg and the Hungarian nobles quickly came to appreciate he could be of great use to them.

And when John I died in 1382 the rights and gifts he had bestowed upon the Hungarian nobles meant they quickly elected Adelaide as their rightful ruler. The succession was marred however as Poland refused to grant her the same honour electing her sister Jadwiga instead who promised to remain resident in Poland, a promise neither Adelaide or her husband would agree to. Of course the Hungarian nobles, emboldened by Wenceslaus's Bohemian and Brandenburg armies urged the couple to seize the throne, or at least seize the territories John had helped the Poles reclaim during his reign.

The young Jadwiga had divided support in Poland but crucially she could depend on Denmark and the Teutonic Knights who if anything were more anti-Luxembourg than the Poles. Wenceslaus' invasion was defeated at Trzebnica and again at Jezierzyca River whereupon Wenceslaus sued for peace and released Halych back to the Polish crown. He had other battles to fight anyway.

While Wenceslaus spent the next few years actively pursuing his war against Rupert of Wittelsbach for the Imperial crown Adelaide authorised another invasion of Naples to support her cousin Louis I's rule, now under severe pressure from Aragon. Though the Hungarian army under her favourite, Demetrius Garai, would not reach Italia in time to prevent the loss of Sicily in 1388 they would stymie Aragonese attempts to gain a foothold on the peninsula, a small victory in a exhausting fifty-year campaign.

By 1387 Wenceslaus, now Holy Roman Emperor, returned his attentions to Hungary, this time defeating the Byzantines (who had by now begun to tire of Bezier domination of the Adriatic) at Đakovo. He was rewarded by the nobility with co-kingship of Hungary and after this Adelaide pulled away from what governmental role she had played. She still continued to make grants of land and use her own regnal seal but Wenceslaus increasingly called the shots, using the Hungarian army and its considerable wealth to further his aims in Germany and Italia.

Adelaide would die in 1395 and Wenceslaus remained as king for the remainder of his life. Hungary, like the other Luxembourg lands, would be inherited by their eldest son Charles.