Fran Krsto Frankopan

Early life and poetry

Fran Krsto Frankopan with Petar Zrinski.

Born in Bosiljevo, Croatia, twenty years younger than his brothers, Fran Krsto Frankopan was an authentic poet in his own right. Following the death of his father, Vuk Krsto Frankopan, he was sent to be schooled in Zagreb, where he enrolled at the Jesuit academy. He lived at today's Habdelić street in the Upper Town, before continuing his education in Italy.^[1] He underwent various poetic influences, none of which was able to deafen his own inspiration. In such a vein was written his The Garden in which to Cheat Time, a personal account of the poet's experiences while in prison.

Living in an area bordering on several Croatian dialects, Frankopan mainly wrote his poetry in the Kajkavian-ikavian dialect of the Croatian language (as seen in his poem Srića daje kaj misal ne zgaje). In prison, Frankopan translated Molière's Georges Dandin, the first translation not only in Croatian, but also in any language of this work of Molière's.

Along with Petar Zrinski, his brother Nikola, Fran Krsto Frankopan and his sister Katarina, contributed greatly to 17th century Croatian poetry and literature. It is also certain that Zrinski and Frankopan were not behind the other European courts in the literary field.

Coat of arms of Fran Krsto Frankopan

Death

Tombstone of Petar Zrinski and Fran Krsto Frankopan in Wiener Neustadt

Marquis Fran Krsto Frankopan and his brother-in-law Ban (viceroy) Petar Zrinski were both outstanding statesmen, warriors and writers, are among the most beloved figures in the history of Croatia. They had a great successes in liberating the areas occupied by the Ottoman Turks. However, the Viennese Military council, instead of supporting them to free the rest of the Hungarian and Croatian lands, signed a shameful peace treaty with the Ottomans, by which the liberated territories had to be given back to them, causing Frankopan and Zrinski to rebel against the king, Leopold I.

The result of the rebellion against Vienna was a cruel public decapitation of Zrinski and Frankopan in Wiener Neustadt near Vienna in 1671.

Fran Krsto Frankopan wrote a very sensitive letter to his wife. "My dear Julia, I would lie with all my soul to leave behind a last commemoration of my deepest love, but I am naked and miserable". The deaths of Zrinski and Frankopan fell hard on Croatia. Zrinski and Frankopan did not even try to answer the court in Vienna on the terms in which Vienna dealt with them, but rather wished to counteract its injustices with what was then a quite justifiable diplomacy. Vienna had seen the whole danger of such an undertaking whose cause was rooted in the dissatisfaction among Hungarians and Croats occasioned by the unfavorable Peace of Vasvár.

The remains of Fran Krsto Frankopan and Petar Zrinski were buried in the Cathedral of Zagreb in 1919.