page_title: Elizabeth of Bosnia
section_title: Mary's marriage
hierarchical_section_title: Elizabeth of Bosnia / Widowhood and regency / Mary's marriage
caption_attribution_description: English: Dowager Queen Elizabeth and Queen Mary of Hungary mourning at the tomb of the former's husband and latter's father, King Louis I of Hungary and Poland.
context_page_description: Elizabeth of Bosnia was queen consort and later regent of Hungary and Croatia, as well as queen consort of Poland.
  Daughter of Ban Stephen II of Bosnia, Elizabeth became Queen of Hungary upon marrying King Louis I in 1353. In 1370, she gave birth to a long-anticipated heir, Catherine, and became Queen of Poland when Louis ascended the Polish throne. The royal couple had two more daughters, Mary and Hedwig, but Catherine died in 1378. Initially a consort with no substantial influence, Elizabeth then started surrounding herself with noblemen loyal to her, led by her favourite, Nicholas I Garai. When Louis died in 1382, Mary succeeded him with Elizabeth as regent. Unable to preserve the personal union of Hungary and Poland, the queen dowager secured the Polish throne for her youngest daughter, Hedwig.
  During her regency in Hungary, Elizabeth faced several rebellions led by John Horvat and John of Palisna, who attempted to take advantage of Mary's insecure reign. In 1385, they invited King Charles III of Naples to depose Mary and assume the crown. Elizabeth responded by having Charles murdered two months after his coronation, in 1386.
context_section_description: Mary's fiancé Sigismund and his brother Wenceslaus, King of Germany and Bohemia, were also opposed to Elizabeth and Garai. The queen dowager and the Palatine, on the other hand, were not enthusiastic about Sigismund reigning together with Mary. Both Sigismund and Charles schemed to invade Hungary; the former intended to marry Mary and become her co-ruler, while the latter intended to depose her. Elizabeth was determined to allow neither and, in 1384, started negotiating Mary's marriage to Louis of France, notwithstanding her daughter's engagement to Sigismund. Had this proposal been made after Catherine's death in 1378, the Western Schism would have represented a problem, with France recognising Clement VII as pope and Hungary accepting Urban VI. However, Elizabeth was desperate to avoid an invasion in 1384 and unwilling to let the schism stand in the way of the negotiations with the French. Clement VII issued a dispensation which annulled Mary's betrothal to Sigismund, and her proxy marriage to Louis was celebrated in April 1385, but it was not recognized by the Hungarian noblemen, who adhered to Urban VI.
  Elizabeth's plan to have Mary married to Louis of France divided the court. The Lackfis, the master of the treasury Nicholas Zámbó and the judge royal Nicholas Szécsi openly opposed it and renounced their allegiance to the queen dowager in August, which resulted in her depriving them of all their offices and replacing them with Garai's partisans. The kingdom was on the verge of a civil war when Charles decided to invade, encouraged by John Horvat and his brother Paul, Bishop of Zagreb. Charles' imminent arrival forced Elizabeth to yield and abandon the idea of French marriage. While her envoys in Paris were preparing for Louis's journey, Elizabeth came to terms with her opponents and designated Szécsi as the new palatine.
  Four months after her proxy marriage to Louis, Sigismund entered Hungary and married Mary, but the reconciliation between the fractions turned out to be too late to forestall Charles' invasion. Sigismund fled to his brother's court in Prague in the autumn of 1385.
caption: Elizabeth and Mary mourning at Louis' tomb during Charles' coronation, painted by Sándor Liezen-Mayer in 1864
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