Euròpa és a középkor határvidékén a Kapisztrán-levelezés, a Magyar Királyság és az oszmán hódítás

The paper consists of two parts. The first presents, for the first time in Hungarian, the principles and historiographical motives of the international research that has been initiated by the author and further developed in cooperation with several European scholars. The ultimate goal of the project is the complete critical edition of the some 700 letters that document the several-year-long mission of John of Capistrano in Germany and Central Europe. The second part of the paper examines the activities of John in Hungary. These started after the fall of Constantinople, when the organisation of a crusade against the Ottoman Empire emerged as his single most important objective. Of course, the Christian victory at Belgrade in 1456 cannot wholly be attributed to John’s personal participation in the battle, and nor did he succeed in convincing all those concerned of the necessity to organise a crusade in the defence of Christendom. Yet observing these crucial events in Hungary through the correspondence of John of Capistrano nevertheless opens a new approach to the transition from borderland Christianitas to Europe, and from the Middle Ages to the Early Modern Era in general.