History In the late 13th century, the royal counties gradually turned into highly autonomous noble counties. The reasons for this development were: • The arrival of new
hospites: hospites were foreign settlers who were allowed to apply their own foreign law in their settlements; particularly Germans and especially after 1242. This considerably restricted the real powers of the county heads, since the hospites were outside their jurisdiction. • At the end of the 12th century, and even more so in the early 13th century under King
Andrew II, large parts of royal territory (i. e. of the kingdom) were donated to the so-called "royal servants" (in the 9th–12th centuries members of certain professions, mostly craftsmen, who were settled in special villages and served the king with their respective skills). • In the 13th century, the royal servants managed to co-ordinate their activities in order to increase their own powers at the expense of those of the county heads (see also the
Golden Bull of 1222) and thus became nobles:
servientes regis. As a result, by royal decrees of 1267, 1290, and 1298, the king could only confirm that the royal counties had turned into noble ones. Nobles (mostly former royal servant families) became quasi-rulers in the counties. The change from a royal to a noble county, however, took place at different times in each county. In the 15th century, the borders of the counties stabilised and basically remained unchanged until 1920. Between the early 16th century and the late 17th century, however, most of the counties ceased to exist once they became part of the
Ottoman Empire (the
Turks) or of the
Principality of Transylvania. After the final defeat of the Turks in 1718, the three southern counties
Temesiensis,
Torontaliensis and
Krassoviensis created the special administrative district
Banatus Temesiensis (Temeswar
Banate). This district was dissolved again in 1779, but its southernmost part remained part of the
Military Frontier (
Confiniaria militaria) till the late 19th century. The bodies of the new counties considerably helped to defend the interests of lower and middle nobility with respect to the
oligarchs, who were often the
de facto rulers of the kingdom, and with respect to the
absolutistic efforts of the
Habsburg kings. The counties as noble institutions were abolished only in the course of the
Revolution of 1848 by legal articles III–V and XVI/ 1848. , right before the Josephinian administrative reform.
Temporary centralization (1785–1790) In 1785, king
Joseph II decided to abolish the counties as entities of noble
autonomy (self-governance) and tried to introduce a new system of absolutist centralized state administration in the Kingdom of Hungary. The kingdom, including
Croatia and
Slavonia, was primarily divided into 10 newly created military/administrative districts, each of which consisted of four to seven counties. The territory of each county initially corresponded to the traditional one, but in 1786 many of them were merged, and the counties became pure units of state administration: the
main county heads were abolished, the county clerks became employees of the state, the courts became the responsibility of the state, etc. The capitals of the districts were chosen to be centrally situated in the district. The number of processus districts was reduced. The official language became
German rather than Latin. The districts were headed by a
commissioner appointed by the
Austrian emperor, who was simultaneously also the
king of Hungary. After the death of Emperor Joseph II, however, facing strong resistance against any kind of absolutist centralization in Hungary, the new king
Leopold II had to repeal all the reforms, and the old system of the self-government of the counties was reinstated in 1790.
Functioning Only the duty to support the king militarily, the territorial unit and formally also the title of
county head remained from the former royal counties. The new county was a self-governing (autonomous) entity of lower gentry. It was led by the
county head (
comes), appointed by the king, and by his deputy, appointed by the county head. These two persons were the link between the king and the nobility. As a rule, the county heads (from the 15th/16th centuries onwards called
main county head) were the supreme
feudal lords of the county. From the beginning of the 14th century, the county head was at the same time the
castellan of the respective county castle in 13 counties. People became county heads for a limited period of time and could be recalled by the king, but a number of
prelates (from the 15th century also
seculars) received the "eternal county leadership" of their
diocese. The formal title
comes was also borne by some dignitaries of the
Court (e. g.
comes curiae) and other nobles in the
Early Middle Ages, and then by other members of the middle nobility in the
Late Middle Ages, and it did not mean
count in these cases. From the 13th–14th centuries onwards, the
deputy county heads, and not the
county head himself, were the real administrators of the county. The county heads were also higher dignitaries of the state or of the court at the same time (
palatine,
treasurer, etc.), so that they did not have much time for the management of the county. The
deputy county heads role was to administer the county during the
county heads absence. Originally, the deputy county head was a personal employee of the king and thus the main person through which the king exercised influence in the county. At the same time, the deputy was the
castellan of the castle of the county head or an economic officer (Latin:
provisor) of the properties of the same. Initially, the nobles of the county could not influence the appointment of the deputy county head, but in the early 15th century, they managed to put through a rule that only a noble from the same county could become the deputy county head (see below). Initially, in the 13th century, the influence of nobles made itself felt only in the
judicial sphere. The judges of the
servientes regis - the so-called
iudices servientium - developed into the
noble judges (see below), and the courts of the
servientes regis - the so-called
sedes iudiciaria or - developed into the county court (the Latin name remained ). The meetings were led by the county head, later de facto by his deputy (see below). Until the 15th century, the county head's co-judges were his
deputy county head, the (usually four)
noble judges, and a number of persons appointed
ad hoc from among the present nobles. From the 15th century onwards, permanent
jurors were elected from among the nobles of the county. The served as the
court of first instance for minor disputes of the nobles and as the
appeal instance for village courts and patrimonial courts (). From the beginning of their existence, the
noble judges were the real representatives of county autonomy. They were elected by the
congregatio generalis (see below) and were not only judges, but also political administrators of their respective processus districts (see below). They formed the core of the newly arising class of
squires. Later, the counties even turned into political entities, representing the
noble autonomy (noble self-government). This evolution started especially under the kings
Charles Robert and
Louis I. From 1385 onwards, the counties were sending representatives to meetings of the Diet of the Kingdom of Hungary and they played a role in the collection and setting of taxes. But only in the early 15th century, the nobles managed to put through a rule that only a noble from the same county could become the deputy county head and a co-judge. From 1504 onwards the deputy county head's appointment had to be approved by the nobles (congregatio generalis -see below), so that the deputy county head definitively became the
de facto leader of the county. The county head, appointed by the king from the
oligarchs (supreme nobility), was only the formal representative of the county. The county authorities were very powerful, and administered all spheres of public life. They were responsible for all inhabitants of the county, except for inhabitants of free royal towns (
liberae regiae civitates), mining towns, free districts, and at the time of the Anjou kings also of royal castle domains. Until 1486, some members of the supreme nobility were also exempt from the jurisdiction of the county. The most important body of self-government of the county was the
congregatio generalis, i.e. the county assembly convened and led by the county head. Originally, this body was created and served only as a judicial body, which comprised the judge, the
sedria members and 8 elected noble
jurors, and which was usually convened once a year. At the same time, the
inquisitio communis (hearing of a witness) enabled the nobles to influence the proceedings conducted at the royal
curia. Gradually, judicial affairs were excluded from the meetings of the
congregatio generalis, which thus turned from a judicial body into an administrative body. All nobles of the county participated in person in the meetings of the
congregatio, and the
congregatio decided on all important political, military and economic affairs. As from the beginning of the 15th century, the territory of each county was divided into
processus, each of which was administered by one of the noble judges (there were therefore usually four in each county). The aim was to simplify the administration. The number of
processus was increasing from the 18th century onwards, because the functions of the counties were increasing too. The
processus, in turn, consisted of 2 to 6 "circuits" (Latin:
circuli), each of which was the responsibility of a "deputy noble judge". Until the 1840s (with an exception in 1785–1790), the official language of county administration was
Latin. In 1840, the deputy county head (
alispán, Ger.
Vicegespann or
Vizegespan) was described as "the personage of the most importance in the county", having duties similar to an English sheriff but also presiding over the county court of justice. (The
Obergespann, theoretically his superior, was usually a nobleman, who would commonly be in Vienna or Pesth and thus have little time for local affairs.) Furthermore, the
Vicegespann presided over the county assembly, which had as late as 1840 a long list of powers, ranging from police regulations to tax, to improvements on bridges and roads. == State counties (1849–1860) ==