He Was a Polish King, I Was a Graduated Man Who Loved Him
A fictional love story grounded in some reality
As a historian in training, sometimes I need to make the hard distinction between my wishes and fictionalized desires to the truth. This story is exactly that — fiction. I just knew there was more to it than I could prove, so I wanted to fill in the gaps.
Władysław Warneńczyk, or Ladislaus of Varna, was King of Poland and Supreme Duke of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania from 1434, as well as King of Hungary and Croatia from 1440 until his death at the Battle of Varna.
One of the most important historical writers of Poland, Jan Długosz, was perhaps the first to associate the name of the king to homosexuality — but that in the context of his loss at Battle of Varna, in 1444, being caused by this “affliction”.
Some new studies point to a possible lover he might have had, Jan of Siennów. And that, maybe, some of the king’s will to fight came from a desire to build a world that would allow him to live his truth.
Hard to know for sure, but we can always try to imagine that.
(Bonus: his body was never found after the battle, and many legends were born out of that, including a secret pilgrimage to Portugal before he went on to become the father of…
