Based on ANTHONY ENDREY: HUNGARIAN HISTORY, The Hungarian Institute, Melbourne

For fifteen years after the battle on the Lechfeld, the Hungarians and the German Empire kept an uneasy truce. In the south, however, the long era of peace with Byzantium encouraged both sides to enter into trade and cultural relations. The appearance of Greek traders in the settlements of the Hungarians was matched by the activities of missionaries sent from Constantinople. Encouraged by the tolerant policies of the gyula, strong Christian centers grew up in eastern Hungary. After Bulcsu's tragic disappearance from the scene, the Hungarian ruler Taksony decided to signify his peaceful intentions and settle the differences with the West. Taksony sent emissaries to Pope John XII in 960.

Taksony died around 970 and was succeeded by his son Geza, a talented and ambitious prince who had married the gyula's elder daughter, Sarolt. Geza was a pagan, but his wife had a Christian upbringing. Geza soon realized that the days of foreign conquests were over and that his people could not forever maintain a hostile stance towards the Christian nations surrounding them, thus he terminated all military excursions into neighboring countries at once. This necessitated assertion of his authority over the tribal chieftains who had grown too independent during the reigns of Solt and Taksony. Later Hungarian chronicles observed that Geza had "blood on his hands" as he subdued the tribe leaders.

Then Geza took a bold step to settle the differences with the German Empire. He sent twelve noblemen to Otto the Great, offering a peace treaty and asking for Christian missionaries for the conversion of the Hungarians. The Hungarian envoys were received on Easter Sunday by the ageing emperor, along with kings and ambassadors from other European countries. On this solemn occasion the emperor concluded peace with the Magyars (i.e. Hungarians) on behalf of the entire Christian Commonwealth. In the same year Geza and his household received baptism, including his four-year old son, Vajk, who then was given the name Stephen in honour of the patron saint of the diocese of Passau that was also given the task of converting the people of Hungary. This quickly pushed back the Byzantine influences in the Church.

The priests arrived from Bavaria as well as from Bohemia and Italy. Geza appointed a court chaplain and had built a church in his castle at Esztergom which he made the new seat of the royal court. This was symbolic of Geza's attitude of opening to the West but it also enabled him to keep a check on the foreigners flocking into Hungary. The official capital of Hungary remained Szekesfehervar, the ancient seat of the Arpad dynasty. To avoid the German expansion under the cloak of religion, Geza gave precedence to the saintly bishop of Prague, Adalbert, and his Benedictine monks. The first Benedictine abbey in Hungary was founded after 983 at Pannonhalma, and became an important center of religion and knowledge for the next thousand years. Geza also founded a convent for Greek nuns in the valley of Veszprem, the town which was often visited by the queen, Sarolt, and later became the official residence of the queens of Hungary. Geza encouraged the settlement in Hungary of noble knights from the West, a step which added to his international standing and enriched the economic and cultural life of his country.

Geza also introduced energetic measures to lay down the foundations of the military and civil organization of the state. He erected several fortifications on the immense royal estates and resettled the former soldiers with their families around the castles. Geza was well on the way to establishing a western-style government on his own tribal territory, and probably started the minting of the first silver coinage.

Although the chieftains submitted to Geza and more or less complied with his commands, these tribal leaders were only waiting for the day when he was no longer on the scene to assert their independence again. Under these circumstances, it was particularly important to strengthen his son Stephen by a suitable marriage. Adalbert's friendship to the German imperial house played the key role in that. Adalbert, a friend of the Hungarian royal family and highly regarded by the young emperor Otto III took the necessary diplomatic moves to bring such a marriage about. He secured for Stephen the hand of Gisela, daughter of the duke of Bavaria and second cousin of the emperor. This royal marriage was solemnized by Adalbert himself in the Benedictine monastery at Scheyern in 996, and put the final seal on the century-old friendship between Hungary and Bavaria. Stephen had all the princely attributes, and with Gisela, a cultured and devout woman they became an exemplary royal couple in every sense.

Geza died less then a year after the royal wedding. Stephen was girt with a sward in the royal chapel at Esztergom. One of his cousins, Koppany, however, by his seniority claimed the throne and the hand of the dowager queen, Sarolt. Koppany laid a siege to the castle of Veszprem to fill his claim. Stephen collected the Hungarian troops his father organized so carefully, and also asked help from the foreign knights who had settled in Hungary. Stephen raised the siege of Veszprem, administered a crushing defeat to Koppany, and sent the pieces of Koppany's body to the gates of the larger cities of Veszprem, Esztergom and Gyor, as well as the fourth quarter to the gyula in Transylvania to warn him not to engage in fight against him.

Stephen continued his father Geza's work. Applying the decimal organizational system of his pagan ancestors, he set up ten dioceses in Hungary, and decreed that every ten village erect a church and maintain a priest. He began the construction of the cathedral of the Virgin Mary at Szekesfehervar and enacted that people give one-tenth of their produce to their bishop. By the year 1000, Stephen felt sufficiently advanced with his work to receive a crown, the mark of kingship. He also sought the elevation of the diocese of Esztergom to the rank of archdiocese, as confirmation of the independence of the Church of Hungary. Even though the relations with Otto III of Germany were cordial at that time, Stephen sent his confidant, Bishop Asherik, to Pope Sylvester II in Rome to ask for these. Stephen wanted to avoid that Hungary become a vassal to the emperor, so he addressed his request for a crown to the pope who at that time did not yet assume feudal pretensions. Pope Sylvester granted Stephen the crown, an apostolic cross, and a letter of apostolic blessing. Stephen was crowned on New Year's day in 1001 with loudly proclaimed unanimous approval.

To complete his administrative reorganization of the kingdom, Stephen established some fifty counties. He put a royal official called ispan in their charge who were civil as well as military administratives and enforced Stephen's law. Stephen issued two lawbooks to safeguard royal and private property and provide penalties for major crimes. He regulated the status of women, including protection for widows and orphans. The punishments were considerably more humane than those found in contemporary Europe. Stephen also carefully observed the custom of holding annual "law days" at Szekesfehervar in the octave of the Feast of Assumption (August 15). Through establishing a system of tolls and taxes, he ensured revenues for his vast constructions. The silver coinage minted by him was so well regarded in Europe that it displaced the German imperial currency in a number of surrounding countries and was widely used even as far as Scandinavia. One third of the land was his own, thus creating royal estates to grant his followers for their loyal services. Another third belonged to the control of the ispans, and the remaining part laid the foundations of private ownership as it belonged to the Hungarian clans.

Eventually Stephen set out to subdue the two remaining major dissidents, the gyula and Ajtony. He first moved against the gyula, his maternal uncle, and defeated him. The gyula escaped to Poland, and was followed by his wife. The sons did not follow their father and received large tracts of land in western Hungary. Ajtony reigned in his seat Marosvar, being backed by Samuel, Tsar of Bulgaria. Ajtony often stopped the vital salt supplies coming down the Maros from Transylvania. Stephen sent one of his relatives, Csanad to capture Marosvar. Ajtony was killed in the battle and Csanad was rewarded with a substantial share in his possessions and the command of Marosvar.

Stephen regarded his royal crown as an embodiment of virtues which were the essential prerequisite for both the reservation of royal power on earth and the gaining of a crown in eternity. He affirmed this philosophy with his entire life and brought up his son Emeric in a similar spirit. Stephen even wrote down his teaching to him in his Admonitions around 1015. Stephen was highly trained in warfare yet he preferred to live in peace. The religious and political reforms carried out by him also had profound cultural consequences for the Magyars. The official language of the royal court became Latin, the language of the western Church marking the beginning of a strong Latin literature which lasted for over eight hundred years.

To Stephen's deep grief, most of his children died at a young age, and his only surviving son, Emeric was killed in a hunting accident in 1031. Stephen himself passed from the life on August 15, 1038, the Feast of the Assumption and was buried in the cathedral built by him at Szekesfehervar. Thirty-five years later, Stephen was canonized a saint of the universal Church.