page_title: Stephen of Anjou
section_title: Youth
hierarchical_section_title: Stephen of Anjou / Youth
caption_attribution_description: Elżbieta Łokietkówna z dziećmi
context_page_description: Stephen was a Hungarian royal prince of the Capetian House of Anjou. He was the youngest son of Charles I of Hungary and Elizabeth of Poland to survive childhood. He was styled as duke of Slavonia from 1339 to 1346, but he had no role in the government of the province. Stephen's separate household was set up in 1349. In this year, he received the counties of Szepes and Sáros from his brother, Louis I of Hungary. Louis made him duke of Transylvania in late 1349, but soon appointed him to administer Slavonia.
  Stephen was regarded his childless brother's heir. He and his mother governed the kingdom during Louis's first campaign of Naples in 1350. Late in the same year, Stephen was again made duke of Transylvania, but from 1352 to 1353 he was styled duke of Szepes and Sáros. Thereafter, he was entrusted with the administration of Croatia, Dalmatia and Slavonia. He died on his return from a campaign against Serbia. His infant son, John, inherited his duchy.
context_section_description: Stephen was the youngest of five sons born to Charles I of Hungary and his third wife, Elizabeth of Poland. Of the five, Louis, Andrew and Stephen survived infancy. Stephen was born on "the feast of St Stephen" (that is on 20 August) in 1332, according to the Illuminated Chronicle. He was named for the first king of Hungary, Stephen, who had been canonized in 1083. He was baptized by Archbishop Csanád Telegdi. A priest of Bohemian origin, Ladislaus, was one of his tutors.
  Stephen was first mentioned in a royal charter of his father on 12 May 1339. In the document, he was styled as Duke of Slavonia, but he did not assume direct government of the province: the bans (or governors) continued to govern Slavonia on the king's behalf. In July, Stephen's maternal uncle, Casimir III of Poland, named Stephen's mother and father or one of their sons as his heir if he died without a legitimate heir. Decades later, the Polish historian, Jan of Czarnków, claimed that Charles had decided to secure a throne for each of his sons and wanted to make Stephen his heir in Hungary. Next year, a Venetian envoy recorded that Charles was planning to visit Dalmatia along with his wife and "their younger son" who must have been Stephen.
  Charles I died on 16 July 1342. During the first years of the reign of his brother, Louis, Stephen was only sporadically mentioned in official documents. At Stephen's request, the judge royal, Paul Nagymartoni, deferred a hearing in 1343 and exempted a nobleman of paying a fine in 1344. Stephen was regularly mentioned in his brother's charters of grant from May 1345, evidencing that he had become a member of the royal council.
  Stephen's brother, Andrew, who had married Joanna I of Naples, was murdered on 18 September 1345. Louis I of Hungary accused Joanna of staging the plot against Andrew. Louis entered into correspondence with Pope Clement VI, demanding her punishment. From early 1346, Louis also urged the pope to grant the Kingdom of Naples to him or to Stephen. The pope styled Stephen as duke or duke of Transylvania in his letters addressed to Louis, but the Hungarian documents consequently referred to him as the "duke of all Slavonia" in 1345 and 1346. Louis conquered significant territories during his first campaign in southern Italy in 1347 and 1348, but after he returned to Hungary, Joanna and her second husband, Louis of Taranto, expelled Louis' troops from most fortresses.
caption: The child Stephen, standing on his mother's left side, along with his brothers and sisters, as depicted in the Illuminated Chronicle
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