Montecuculi had derived but little assistance in his campaigns from
the good will or aid of the Hungarians. Their disaffection led to the
adoption by the Austrian Government of a course of measures at variance
with the laws of the realm, and as impolitic as they were illegal,
their main objects being to Germanize the nation, and to extirpate
the Protestant heresy. The excesses of the German troops were such as
to make the Hungarians, especially the Protestants, feel that they
would rather gain than lose by the restoration of Mahometan rule. The
proselytizing activity of the Jesuits was specially irritating to the
non-Catholics, but the discontent was so general, that when the natural
consequences broke out in the shape of an extensive and dangerous
conspiracy, nearly all its leaders were dignitaries of the realm,
and zealous Roman Catholics. The Emperor, whose natural disposition
was mild and humane, was goaded to severity by the falsehoods and
exaggerations of his advisers. The Hungarians, for instance, were
accused of having poisoned the well of the citadel of Vienna. It was
found, on examination, to have been tainted by the dead bodies of dogs
and cats. The French ambassador, Grantonville, was exciting the Emperor
to measures for the extirpation of heresy, and the destruction of
the Hungarian constitution and nationality, while, at the same time,
he was holding secret communication with the heads of the Hungarian
nobility—Counts Nadasky, Zriny, and Rakoczy, and encouraging their
reunion. At the head of the malcontents were the brave Palatine Francis
Wesseleny, and Nicholas Zriny, a great grandson of the defender of
Szygeth. At a meeting at Neusohl it was agreed to apply for Turkish
assistance. The designs, however, of this formidable league were
thwarted by the untimely deaths of the two above-mentioned leaders.
Zriny perished by a wound from the tusk of a wild boar, and Wesseleny
was carried off in the prime of life by a sudden fever.
The ranks of the conspirators could furnish no man worthy, from talent
and influence, to replace the loss so unexpectedly incurred at this
critical juncture; and the enterprise, falling into inferior hands,
was commenced without plan and prosecuted without energy. The young
Prince Rakoczy, and Peter Zriny, brother to the deceased, were the
inefficient substitutes elected for its guidance. The latter had gained
over to the cause his brother-in-law Francis Frangipani, a young and
ardent man, incited by motives of revenge for an injury received from
a German officer. The governor also of Styria, Count Tettenbach, a
man related by marriage with the Hungarian leaders of the conspiracy,
joined its ranks. He undertook to arm his peasants and foresters to
the number of some thousands, to impart all official intelligence
which should reach him, as governor, to the party, and to put them
in possession of the town and citadel of Gratz. Frangipani undertook
to provide a naval force in the Adriatic, and to gain over the Uskok
and Greek population of Croatia. The chief meetings of the parties
took place at the castle of Pottendorf, on the Hungarian frontier, a
residence of the Count Nadasky, in a summer-house, the roof of which
was adorned with a rose in stucco, from which the common expression
“sub rosâ” derives its origin. The moment of execution for the designs
of the conspirators was near at hand, when the danger, of incalculable
magnitude to the Austrian government, was averted by an accidental
disclosure. Tettenbach, too confident of success, had thrown into
prison for some petty theft a servant initiated into the plot. This
man, in the accidental absence of the Count, was submitted, in the
usual course of law, to the torture, and to save his life confessed
all he knew. The officers who administered the province in the absence
of Tettenbach lost no time in forwarding the weighty intelligence to
Vienna. Tettenbach on his return to Gratz was arrested. His papers
contained ample evidence of his designs, which was confirmed by the
discovery of arms for 6000 men in the cellars of his residence. The
imperial minister, Prince Lobkowitz, offered a generous forgiveness
to Zriny, but sent a force to occupy his residence of Czakathurn.
Zriny betrayed a fatal vacillation of purpose, observing in the first
instance and afterwards violating the conditions of his pardon. He
was finally, together with Frangipani, arrested, and confined at
Czakathurn. Effecting their escape, they conceived the project of
presenting themselves and offering their submission at Vienna. Their
project was betrayed to the Emperor by a friend named Keri, with whom
they had taken refuge. He was instructed to encourage them to persevere
in their design, but should they depart from it, and proceed to join
Rakoczy, to arrest them. Keri preferred, for the purpose of magnifying
his own services, to act at once on the latter part of the instruction.
He arrested and conveyed them to Neustadt. Rakoczy, who had taken as
yet no open measures, fled to his mother, who by her influence with
the Jesuits procured his pardon. Charles Duke of Lorraine besieged the
fortress Murany, occupied by the widow of Wesseleny, Maria Szetsi.
She surrendered it without resistance, and died some years after, a
prisoner at Vienna. The papers found at Murany compromised many leading
men, and especially Nadasky, the Judex Curiæ of Hungary, who bore the
name of the Hungarian Crœsus, coin to the amount of five millions
being found in his treasury at Pottendorf. He also was conveyed a
prisoner to Vienna. Of the remaining conspirators Stephen Tekeli was
the most formidable. He died during the siege of his fortress of Arva
by the imperialists. His daughters were dragged to prison at Vienna;
but his son Emerich, afterwards so famous, escaped to Transylvania,
and, joining the Turks, became an active adviser and promoter of
every design of that power hostile to Austria. An extraordinary
commission was instituted at Vienna for the trial of the accused.
Its acts were submitted to the Imperial Chamber at Spire, and to the
universities of Ingoldstadt, Tubingen, and Leipzick, and these learned
and merciless bodies unanimously condemned the prisoners to suffer
all the refinements of cruelty which the practice of the age assigned
to the crime of treason in the highest degree. The Imperial Privy
Council advised the loss of the right hand and beheading, which the
Emperor mitigated to simple beheading, accompanied by degradation from
the rank of noble and confiscation of property. The ceremony of the
degradation of Nadasky took place with the accustomed form of words,
“No longer Count Nadasky, but—_thou_ traitor.” He was then brought to
the town-house by the Captain of the city guard in a close carriage.
The Pope, Clement X., had interceded for his life and that of Zriny,
but in vain. On the 30th of April, 1674, at an early hour, the gates
of the city were closed; the Burgher guard under arms; chains drawn
across the streets; the principal public places occupied by regular
troops, foot and horse. In the Burgher hall, near the Register office,
the scaffolding hung with red was prepared, and the executioner, John
Moser, in attendance, the black staff in his right hand, the sword in
his left. The spectators sat round, all dressed in black. A Turkish
Chiaus or officer of the Sultan’s guard was present in a private
tribune. Nadasky’s head fell at one blow. The body was laid on a bier
and exhibited till evening in the court of the town-house. It was then
conveyed to the Augustines, and subsequently to the convent founded by
the victim at Lockenhaus, in Hungary, where it is said to remain to
this day uncorrupted. The sword and chair used in the execution are now
in the Burgher arsenal. On the same day Frangipani and Zriny were also
executed. Tettenbach’s fate was deferred till December, when he also
was beheaded at Gratz.