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Ladislas IV, byname Ladislas The Cuman, or Kuman, Hungarian Kun László, (born 1262—died July 10, 1290, Körösszeg, Hung.), king of Hungary who, by his support of the German king Rudolf I at the Battle of Dürnkrut, helped to establish the future power of the Habsburg dynasty in Austria.
The son of Stephen V, Ladislas IV became king of Hungary on his father’s death in 1272. His minority (until 1277) was troubled by palace revolutions and civil wars. His mother was a princess of the Cumans, a Turkic people from the Black Sea area that had settled in Hungary. She was engaged in a continuous struggle with rebellious vassals who had the support of the expansion-minded Otakar II of Bohemia: Otakar had designs on Slovakia, then part of Hungary. Thus, common interests impelled Ladislas to join forces with Rudolf, who was of the house of Habsburg, in his struggle with Otakar, and 56,000 Hungarians and Cumans helped Rudolf defeat Otakar at the Battle of Dürnkrut (Marchfeld; Aug. 26, 1278).
The Bohemian danger over, Ladislas, a talented but wild and reckless man, came into conflict with his own magnates. He had married Isabella of Anjou, a daughter of Charles I of Naples and Sicily, but had neglected her for Cuman mistresses. His enemies accused him of undermining Christianity by preferring the nomadic Cumans to the Magyars. After an inquiry by a papal legate, he was forced to war against the Cumans, whom he defeated at Hódmezö (May 1282).
Ladislas soon relapsed, however. He adopted Cuman dress, passed his time exclusively with Cumans, and abused his legitimate wife. At last, Pope Nicholas IV decided that the crown of Hungary should pass to the Angevin Charles Martel, son of Ladislas’ sister Maria by her marriage to Isabella’s brother Charles II of Naples and Sicily. On Aug. 8, 1288, the pope proclaimed a crusade against Ladislas.
For the next two years, civil war convulsed Hungary. Ladislas, who fought with desperate valour, was driven from one end of the kingdom to the other. On Dec. 25, 1289, he issued a manifesto to the lesser gentry, many of whom sided with him, urging them to fight on against the magnates and their foreign supporters. In the next year, however, he was murdered in his camp by the Cumans, who never forgave him for attacking them in 1282.
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