REVIEWS:
'... a fascinating book... Tanner has a shrewd sense of character and a vivid eye for detail (his account of Matthias's blowsy Neapolitan wifeand her miserable widowhood is particularly fine), and he succeeds in bringing life to the politics of Matthias's reign, with all its dinastic in-fighting and geopolitical jockeying for position.' Noel Malcom, The Sunday Telgraph

'It's a deeply stirring story ... a fascinating yet little-known true-life tale that has all the hallmarks of gripping fiction.' Murrough O'Brien interview with Marcus Tanner, The Independent on Sunday

DESCRIPTION:
Seizing the Hungarian throne at the age of fifteen, Matthias Corvinus, 'the Raven King', was an effervescent presence on the fifteenth-century stage. A successful warrior and munificent art patron, he sought to leave as symbols of his strategic and humanist ambitions a strong, unified country, splendid palaces, and the most magnificent library in Christendom. But Hungary, invaded by Turkey after Matthias' death in 1490, yielded its treasures and the exquisite library of two thousand volumes, witness to a golden cultural age, was dispersed first across Europe and then the world.The quest to recover this collection of sumptuously illuminated scripts provoked and tantalised generations of princes, cardinals, collectors and scholars, and imbued Hungarians with the mythical conviction that the restoration of the lost library would seal their country's rebirth. In this thrilling and absorbing account, drawing on a wealth of original sources in several languages, Marcus Tanner tracks the destiny of the Raven King and his magnificent bequest, uncovering the remarkable story of a life and library almost lost to history.

AUTHOR BIOGRAPHY:
 Read more about Marcus Tanner, writer, journalist, editor and commentator.

SUBJECT CLASSIFICATIONS:
Biography & autobiography: historical, political & military
European history: c 500 to c 1500

ADDITIONAL INFORMATION:
Illustrations: 24 b&w illustrations
Number of Pages: 352
Dewey: 943.903092