FRANCIS II., prince of Transylvania (1676-1735), was born at Borsi, Zemplen, on March 2, 1676. Having lost his father during infancy, he was educated under the guardianship of his mother, Helen Zrinyi, in an ultra-patriotic Magyar environment, though the Emperor Leopold I. claimed a share in his tutelage. In 1682 his mother married Imre Thokoly, through whose specu lations Rakoczy lost the greater part of his estates. As a child of eleven he witnessed the heroic defence by his mother of his ancestral castle of Munkacs against Count Antonio Caraffa (d 1693). On its surrender (Jan. 7, 1688) the child was transferred to Vienna that he might be isolated from the Hungarian nation and brought up as an Austrian magnate Cardinal Kollonics, the sworn enemy of Magyar separatism, now became his governor, and sent him to the Jesuit college at Neuhaus in Bohemia. In 1690 he completed his course at Prague, and in 1694 he married Maria Amelia of Hesse-Rheinfels, and lived for the next few years on his Hungarian estates. Rakoczy's birth, rank, wealth and bril liant qualities made him the natural leader of the Magyar nation. On the eve of the war of the Spanish Succession Rakoczy, with some other magnates, entered into correspondence with Louis XIV. for assistance through one Longueval, a Belgian general in the Austrian service. Longueval betrayed his trust, and RakOczy was arrested and imprisoned at Eperjes. His wife saved him from certain death by enabling him to escape to Poland in the uniform of a dragoon officer. On June 18, 1703 he openly took up arms against the emperor ; but the Magyar gentry stood aloof, and his ill-supported peasant levies (the Kuruczes) were repeatedly scat tered. He had, indeed, some initial success; but the battle of Blenheim made any direct help from France impossible, and on June 13, 1704 his little army of 7,000 men was routed by the imperialists at Koronco and subsequently at Nagyszombat Want of arms, money, native officers and infantry, made, indeed, any permanent success in the open field impossible; yet he drilled his army into some degree of efficiency, and even after the rout of Pudmerics (Aug. II, 1705), disposed of r00,000 men.
RakOczy, who had already been elected Prince of Transyl vania (July 6, 1704), now surrounded himself with a council of state of 24 members. But his efforts to secure toleration for his Calvinist followers alienated the pope, who dissuaded Louis XIV. from assisting him. Peace negotiations with the emperor during 1705 came to nothing, the latter refusing to acknowledge the independence of Transylvania, while France would not recog nize the rebels officially till they had formally proclaimed the de position of the Habsburgs, which last desperate measure was actually accomplished by the Onod diet on June 13, 1707. This measure, alienated both the emperor's foreign allies and the majority of the Magyar gentry, while, after all, Louis XIV sent no effective help. On Aug. 3, 1708 Rakoczy was heavily defeated at Trencsen (Tren6n), and again at Romhany (Jan. 22, 1710). A desperate effort to secure the help of Peter the Great also failing, Rakoczy quitted his country for ever on Feb. 21, 1711, refusing to accept the general amnesty conceded after the peace of Szatmar. (See HUNGARY, History.) He lived for a time in France on the bounty of Louis XIV., finally entering the Carmelite Order. In 1717, with forty comrades, he volunteered to assist the Turks against the Austrians, but his services were not utilized. He lived for the rest of his life at Rodosto, where he died on April 8, 1735.