Gyula III, also Gyula the Younger, Geula or Gyla, was an early medieval ruler who apparently ruled in Transylvania

Transylvania

Transylvania is a historical region in the central part of Romania. Bounded on the east and south by the Carpathian mountain range, historical Transylvania extended in the west to the Apuseni Mountains; however, the term sometimes encompasses not only Transylvania proper, but also the historical...

 (c. 980 - 1003/1004). His actual name was probably Prokui, yet Prokui cannot possibly be the same as Gyula. Around 1003, he and his family were attacked, dispossessed and captured by King Stephen I of Hungary (1000/1001-1038). The name "Gyula" also means a title. "Gyula" meant the second highest title in Hungarian tribal confederation.

Life

According to the anonymous writer of the Gesta Ungarorum

Gesta Hungarorum

Gesta Hungarorum is a record of early Hungarian history by an unknown author who describes himself as Anonymi Bele Regis Notarii , but is generally cited as Anonymus...

 (“The Deeds of the Hungarians) written around 1210, Gyula the Younger (Geula/Gyla) was the son of Zombor (Zubor), and the latter was the grandson of Tétény (Tuhutum), one of the seven Hungarian conqueror chiefs, who had occupied Transylvania. The Chronicon Pictum

Chronicon Pictum

The Chronicon Pictum Pictum, Chronica Picta or Chronica de Gestis Hungarorum) is a medieval illustrated chronicle from the Kingdom of Hungary from the fourteenth century...

 (“Illuminated Chronicle”) writes that “the third Gyula” descended from “Captain Gyula”, the conqueror of Transylvania.

One view is that Transylvania in the 10th century seems to have been an independent principality which was governed by a line of princes who were invariably called Gyula; they were the successors, and perhaps also the descendants, of the gyula who had been the military leader of the Hungarian tribal federation

Magyar tribes

The Magyar tribes were the fundamental political units whose framework the Hungarians lived within, until these clans from Asia, more accurately from the region of Ural Mountains, invaded the Carpathian Basin and established the Principality of Hungary.The locality in which the Hungarians, the...

 at the time of the conquest of the Carpathian Basin. Other view is that the family of the gyulas moved to Transylvania only after 970. The Romanian historian Vlad Georgescu

Vlad Georgescu

Vlad Georgescu , Romanian historian, was the director of the Romanian-language department of Radio Free Europe between 1983 and 1988.-Biography:...

 argues that Gyula (Gyla) seems to have been of Pecheneg origin, since Byzantine sources speak of the existence of a Petcheneg tribe called Gylas; a life of the monarch-saint Stephen I also mentions battles with Pechenegs in the heart of Transylvania.

Before he could be crowned king of Hungary

King of Hungary

The King of Hungary was the head of state of the Kingdom of Hungary from 1000 to 1918.The style of title "Apostolic King" was confirmed by Pope Clement XIII in 1758 and used afterwards by all the Kings of Hungary, so after this date the kings are referred to as "Apostolic King of...

 in title and in fact, the young Prince Stephen, whose mother was Gyula’s sister according to the almost contemporary Annales Hildesheimenses (“The Annals of Hildesheim”), had to battle to overcome rebellious lords led by, among others, his relative and rival Koppány

Koppány

Koppány was a Hungarian nobleman of the tenth century. Brother of the ruling prince of Hungary, Géza of the Árpád dynasty, Koppány ruled as Prince of Somogy in the region south of Lake Balaton...

. The Chronicon Pictum

Chronicon Pictum

The Chronicon Pictum Pictum, Chronica Picta or Chronica de Gestis Hungarorum) is a medieval illustrated chronicle from the Kingdom of Hungary from the fourteenth century...

 ("Illuminated Chronicle") narrates that Stephen inflicted a devastating defeat upon Koppány whose corpse was quartered. One quarter of Koppány’s body was delivered to Gyula at his Alba Iulia

Alba Iulia

Alba Iulia is a city in Alba County, Transylvania, Romania with a population of 66,747, located on the Mureş River. Since the High Middle Ages, the city has been the seat of Transylvania's Roman Catholic diocese. Between 1541 and 1690 it was the capital of the Principality of Transylvania...

 (in Hungarian, Gyulafehérvár ‘Gyula’s White Castle’) residence in Transylvania. This quarter of the corpse was pinned to the gate of Alba Iulia.

In 1003 (maybe in 1002 or 1004), Stephen, who had been crowned in 1000 or 1001, personally led his army against his maternal uncle, and Gyula surrendered without a fight. The Romanian historian Florin Curta suggests that the only contemporary source to mention Stephen’s attack against “rex Geula” is the Annales Hildesheimenses. On the other hand, Thietmar of Merseburg

Thietmar of Merseburg

Thietmar of Merseburg was a German chronicler who was also bishop of Merseburg.-Life:...

 (975-1018) refers to another character (Procui) who was King Stephen’s uncle and whose land was occupied by the king. Florin Curta argues that Procui cannot possibly be the same as Gyula: according to the 13-th century Gesta Ungarorum, Gyula was captured by King Stephen I and kept in prison for the rest of his life; by contrast, Procui was expelled from his estates, given back his wife, and later appointed warden of a frontier fort by King Boleslav I of Poland. The name Procui is probably of Slavic

Slavic languages

The Slavic languages , a group of closely related languages of the Slavic peoples and a subgroup of Indo-European languages, have speakers in most of Eastern Europe, in much of the Balkans, in parts of Central Europe, and in the northern part of Asia.-Branches:Scholars traditionally divide Slavic...

 origin.

See also

• Ahtum
  Ahtum
  Ahtum, also Achtum or Ajtony , was a local ruler in the region of Banat in the first decades of the 11th century. King Saint Stephen I of Hungary sent Csanád - one of Ahtum’s former retainers - to fight against him...
  
  
• Gesta Hungarorum
  Gesta Hungarorum
  Gesta Hungarorum is a record of early Hungarian history by an unknown author who describes himself as Anonymi Bele Regis Notarii , but is generally cited as Anonymus...
  
  
• Gyula (title)
• History of Transylvania
  History of Transylvania
  Transylvania is a historical region in the central part of the Romania. In ancient times it was part of the Dacian Kingdom and Roman Dacia. Since the 10th century, Transylvania became part of the Kingdom of Hungary...
  
  
• Kingdom of Hungary in the Middle Ages
  Kingdom of Hungary in the Middle Ages
  The Kingdom of Hungary was formed from the previous Principality of Hungarywith the coronation of Stephen I in AD 1000. This was a result of the conversion of Géza of Hungary to the Western Church in the 970s....
  
  
• Koppány
  Koppány
  Koppány was a Hungarian nobleman of the tenth century. Brother of the ruling prince of Hungary, Géza of the Árpád dynasty, Koppány ruled as Prince of Somogy in the region south of Lake Balaton...
  
  
• Romania in the Early Middle Ages
  Romania in the Early Middle Ages
  The Early Middle Ages in Romania spans the period from the withdrawal of the Roman administration from the province of Dacia in the 271–275 AD, thenceforward modern Romania's territories were to be crisscrossed by migrating populations for almost 1,000 years...
  
  
• Stephen I of Hungary
• Principality of Hungary
  Principality of Hungary
  The Principality of Hungary, also Hungarian Principality or Duchy of Hungary , was the first documented Hungarian state, a tribal alliance in the Carpathian Basin, established 895 or 896, following the 9th-century Magyar invasion of Pannonia.The Magyars , a semi-nomadic group of people led by Árpád...
  
  

Sources

• Curta, Florin: Transylvania around A.D. 1000; in: Urbańczyk, Przemysław (Editor): Europe around the year 1000; Wydawn. DiG, 2001; ISBN 978-837-1-8121-18
• Georgescu, Vlad (Author) – Calinescu, Matei (Editor) – Bley-Vroman, Alexandra (Translator): The Romanians – A History; Ohio State University Press, 1991, Columbus; ISBN 0-8142-0511-9
• Fügedi, Erik: The Realm of St Stephen: A History of Medieval Hungary, 895-1526; I. B. Tauris, 2001, London&New York; ISBN 1-85043-977-X
• Kontler, László: Millennium in Central Europe: A History of Hungary; Atlantisz Publishing House, 1999, Budapest; ISBN 963-9165-37-9
• Kristó, Gyula (General Editor) – Engel, Pál - Makk, Ferenc (Editors): Korai Magyar történeti lexikon (9-14. század) /Encyclopedia of the Early Hungarian History (9th-14th centuries)/; Akadémiai Kiadó, 1994, Budapest; ISBN 963-05-6722-9 (the entry “gyula” was written by Alfréd Márton, “Gyula” by Sándor László Tóth and László Szegfű, “Kézai Simon” by Tibor Almási)
• Kristó, Gyula: Early Transylvania (895-1324); Lucidus Kiadó, 2003, Budapest; ISBN 963-9465-12-7
• Merseburg, Thietmar of (Author) – Wagner, David A. (Translator): Chronicon; Manchester University Press, 2001, Manchester&New York; ISBN 0-7190-4926-1
• Molnár, Miklós (Author) – Magyar, Anna (Translator): A Concise History of Hungary; Cambridge University Press, 2008, Cambridge&New York; ISBN 978-0-521-66736-4