Page:Poetry of the Magyars.djvu/54

xxxii amidst the clang of arms, a few days before his death.

Some dramatic writers belong to this epoch. Karádi's Balassa Menyhárt and Bornemisza's Klytemnestra are the most remarkable. A few years after, we find a description of the sort of plays performed in Transylvania. "Hinc publicae fabulae exhibitae et comaediae expugnationem Caniszensem, Turcarum trepidationem fugam et futuram stragem, represententes." But both tragedies and comedies were represented by strolling players, both in Hungarian and Latin, to which the Jesuits contributed a great number.

is not without some merit as a didactic and meditative poet. He was a contemporary of Balassa, though the exact dates are unknown of his birth and death.

made the first attempt to break through the fetters which rhymes imposed upon the Magyar poets, and to introduce the classical prosodial forms. The Bohemians had attempted this before, and the first Sapphics of the Germans are of the year 1537. In 1541, Erdösi wrote his "A' Magyar népnek ki ezt olvassa," an address to such of the Magyars as would read it, in flowing hexameters. He had for a long time no followers, and the singular aptitude of the Hungarian