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The Bat Bomb Invention and Other Odd Facts from History and War

Khalid Elhassan May 10, 2020 33 min

32. A King Killed by His Throne

Bela I of Hungary. Opusztaszer National Park, Hungary

Bela I of Hungary (circa 1020 – 1063) reigned from 1060 until his death. Bela was born into Hungarian royalty. His father, prince Vazul, had been a nephew of the childless Hungarian king Stephen I. When the king bypassed Bela’s father to name another nephew heir, Vazul rebelled, but was captured and blinded as punishment in 1031. Bela and his siblings fled Hungary, but returned in 1046, when Bela’s eldest brother successfully deposed the king and seized the crown.

The blinding of Bela’s father, Prince Vazul. Wikimedia

When Bela became king, he solidified Hungary’s Christian identity by putting down a final pagan rebellion. He also fought a successful war against Holy Roman Emperor Henry III to defend Hungary’s independence. Bela accomplished much during his relatively brief tenure on the throne. Unfortunately, it was his very throne that would prove his undoing: it literally killed him.

Written by

Khalid Elhassan

A lifelong history buff, I developed a particular passion for WW2 history as a child, when I spent hours listening to my grandfather, enraptured, as he recounted his wartime experiences in the British East African Campaign and with the British 8th Army in North Africa.

I graduated with a history BA from George Mason University, then went on to get a JD from the University of Virginia School of Law. After lawyering for a decade, I moved to sunny Rio de Janeiro and a less demanding career, opening a tourism agency in Copacabana.

A big chunk of my free time is spent blogging (you can follow me on Quora https://www.quora.com/profile/Khalid-Elhassan ) or freelance writing, mostly about my favorite subject, history.