To many casual readers it may seem a singular circumstance that nearly
every claimant to regal paternity has found authors, more or less
numerous, to espouse his cause, and assert his identity with the
monarch whose name he laid claim to. On inspection the singularity
vanishes. Putting on one side the difficulties of investigation which
ancient annalists had to encounter, and as a rule the defective
evidence they had to judge by, the undeniable fact is arrived at that
not a few of the so-called historians often wilfully misrepresented,
falsified, omitted, and even invented _facts_ to suit their own party
views.
Many of these forgeries the acumen and research of later ages have
exposed; many more will doubtless, in course of time, be discovered,
but a still larger number in all probability linger undetected in the
pages of history, and will ever remain so. It is unfortunate that the
class of men to whom we are compelled to resort chiefly for historic
and social information prior to the invention of printing, are the very
men whose writings it is necessary to hold in greatest doubt; and it
is, beyond dispute, well ascertained that history which had to filter
through a priest's brains, as a rule descended to posterity deeply
tinged, to say the best of it, with the hue its author wished it to
have in the eyes of the world.
AEneas Sylvius Piccolomini, better known as Pius the Second, amongst his
numerous works left a _History of Bohemia_, and the thirteenth chapter
of that history details the events which have caused us to insert
amongst the claimants to royalty the name of Suatocopius, leaving the
reader to decide for himself as to the credibility of the aspirant's
claim to the name and title of the supposed slain monarch.
The Marcomanni, or Moravians, are asserted to have been converted to
Christianity about the middle of the ninth century by Methodius and
Cyril, two Greek monks. These two men, noted in history for having
implanted the Christian faith in Russia, Bulgaria, and the adjacent
lands, were brothers, members of an illustrious Thessalonican family,
and distinguished for their learning and the purity of their lives.
About the year 860 these missionaries are stated to have appeared at
the court of Suatocopius, a king whose sway was more or less
acknowledged, not only by the Moravians, but also, according to
priestly authority, by the Hungarians, Bohemians, Poles, and
inhabitants of Black Russia, but who, notwithstanding the extent of his
territories and the number of his subjects, was tributary to the
Emperor of Germany, as had been his predecessors since the days of
Charlemagne.
Converted by the Greek brothers to the Christian religion, Suatocopius
is stated for many years to have set a good example to his subjects of
all the virtues called royal; but finally, emboldened by the continuous
prosperity of a long reign and the representations of his courtiers, he
declined paying any more tribute into the imperial exchequer. This
refusal at once involved him in warfare with the Emperor Arnulph, and
in a battle which ensued the Moravians were defeated, and, so it was
universally believed, their monarch slain. The body of Suatocopius
could not be discovered, declares our chief authority, but the fact of
his death was deemed indisputable, and his son was permitted by his
godfather, the victor, to ascend the vacant throne.
Many years elapsed, and Suatocopius was probably forgotten, when some
monks brought his son the astounding information that his father, the
king, had only just expired, in the distant and mean hermitage whence
they came. The tale which they told, and which their hearer placed
entire credence in, according to the history of Pope Pius, was to the
effect that for several years they had housed and fed a wanderer who
one day had besought their hospitality; during the whole time he had
lived with them he had cheerfully and patiently endured all the
hardships of their rough and indigent life, but finding his end
approaching, the unknown had summoned them to his side and said:--
"Until the present moment you have not known who I am. Know then that
I am the King of Moravia, who, having lost a battle, took refuge
amongst you. I die, after having tasted the joys of reigning and of
private life. The royal state is certainly not preferable to the
repose of solitude. Here I sleep without fear and without disquietude,
enjoying the calm and pleasures of life, tasting fruits and the purest
water, which is far more agreeable than the most precious beverages the
courts of kings afford. I have spent with you happily the remainder of
the life God has granted me, and the time which I passed upon the
throne now seems to me to have been a continual death.... When I am
dead inter my body in this place, but go, I beg you, and inform my son,
if he be still alive, what I have told you."
Soon after this confession the supposed king died; his body was duly
interred by his fellow monks, and information of his decease sent to
the reigning monarch. He, with all diligence, had the body disinterred
and brought to Volgrade, the capital of Moravia, and, notwithstanding
the years that had elapsed since the disappearance of Suatocopius, and
the length of time the corpse had been buried, recognized the body as
his father's, and had it deposited, with all due pomp and ceremony, in
the royal sepulchre, to moulder, royal or plebeian, amid the ashes of
his predecessors.