Page - 41 - in Maximilian Hell (1720–92) - And the Ends of Jesuit Science in Enlightenment Europe

41The Making of a Jesuit Astronomer in the Habsburg Provinces by “heretics.”7 Although the first parish priest of Lutheran leanings soon left the town, and the Ordo divinorum (Order of divine services) adopted in 1528 does not reflect much change in the liturgy, Pál Várdai (1483–1549), the arch- bishop of Esztergom (Strigonium, Gran), reiterated the warning about heresy in a letter to the councilors in 1531—not without ground, as from 1529 the local gymnasium used Luther’s catechism as the basis of religious instruction, and the new priest, Sigmund (Zsigmond) Staudacher (dates unknown), got mar- ried in 1531.8 From then on, one royal decree after another was arranged by the archbishop to forbid and sanction similar developments, and generally to counter the tide of the Reformation in Banská Štiavnica, Banská Bystrica, and Kremnica—for the time being, all in vain.9 The town councilors coordinated the responses of their communities, which culminated in the adoption of the Confessio montana (Confession of the mines [1559]), the expression of their joint commitment to the cause of Protestantism.10 By this time, the parish schools of the towns naturally also came under Lutheran control, and in the 1560s to the 1580s their curricula underwent thorough reform established on the priorities of the studia humanitatis.11 In this regard, there was actually little difference between Protestant schools and those of the Jesuits, who were first invited to the Kingdom of Hungary by Archbishop Miklós Oláh (1493–1568)—himself a renowned humanist scholar as Nicolaus Olahus—in 1561, and into Transylvania by Prince István Báthori (1533–86, r.1571–86) in 1579. The Jesuit convent and college founded by the for- mer in Trnava (the temporary archiepiscopal see during the Ottoman occupa- tion of Esztergom) was closed as early as 1567, partly because the first two rec- tors were arrogant foreigners provoking conflict with the local chapter, and the other members of the crew inexperienced novices. Nor was its re- establishment in Kláštor pod Znievom (Znióváralja) in 1589 lasting. The Jesuit college of Cluj initially fared much better in its rivalry with the Unitarian and Calvinist town schools, but after Báthori’s death the Protestant estates prevailed and achieved 7 János Breznyik, A selmecbányai ágost. hitv. evang. egyház és lyceum története. I. A. xvi. századi események (Selmecbánya: Joerges Ágost, 1883), 39. 8 Breznyik, A selmecbányai ágost, 46, 57, 68. 9 For a comprehensive discussion, see Andrea Cobern (née Fröhlich), “Negotiating the Ref- ormation in Habsburg Hungary, c.1520–c.1620: A Case Study of Seven Mining Cities” (PhD diss., University of Cambridge, 2014). 10 Andrea Fröhlich, “The Confessio montana, 1559: Composition and Aftermath/Confessio montana, 1559: Zostavenie a následky,” Montánna história 3 (2010): 8–24. 11 István Mészáros, xvi. századi városi iskoláink és a “studia humanitatis” (Budapest: Aka- démiai Kiadó, 1981), 84–96. On humanism in the region in the sixteenth century, see fur- ther Marcell Sebők, Humanista a határon: A késmárki Sebastian Ambrosius története (1554–1600) (Budapest: L’Harmattan, 2007).