Thurzo or Turzo was a Hungarian noble family from the 15th century to the first half of the 17th century.
The ancestors of the Thurzo family came to the Kingdom of Hungary

Kingdom of Hungary

The Kingdom of Hungary comprised present-day Hungary, Slovakia and Croatia , Transylvania , Carpatho Ruthenia , Vojvodina , Burgenland , and other smaller territories surrounding present-day Hungary's borders...

 from Lower Austria

Lower Austria

Lower Austria is the northeasternmost state of the nine states in Austria. The capital of Lower Austria since 1986 is Sankt Pölten, the most recently designated capital town in Austria. The capital of Lower Austria had formerly been Vienna, even though Vienna is not officially part of Lower Austria...

.
Their original possessions were located around the village of Betlanovce

Betlanovce

Betlanovce is a village and municipality in the Spišská Nová Ves District in the Košice Region of central-eastern Slovakia.-Geography:The village lies at an altitude of 546 metres and covers an area of 10.124km².It has a population of about 638 people....

 in the Szepes county (today Spiš

Spiš

Spiš is a region in north-eastern Slovakia, with a very small area in south-eastern Poland. Spiš is an informal designation of the territory , but it is also the name of one the 21 official tourism regions of Slovakia...

 region). From the end of the 15th century, they were mostly businessmen and entrepreneurs in Kraków

Kraków

Kraków also Krakow, or Cracow , is the second largest and one of the oldest cities in Poland. Situated on the Vistula River in the Lesser Poland region, the city dates back to the 7th century. Kraków has traditionally been one of the leading centres of Polish academic, cultural, and artistic life...

, Levoča

Levoca

Levoča is a town in the Spiš region of eastern Slovakia with a population of 14,600. The town has a historic center with a well preserved town wall, a Renaissance church with the highest wooden altar in Europe, carved by Master Paul of Levoča, and many other Renaissance buildings.On 28 June 2009,...

, Spiš, Gemer

Gemer

Gemer is the name of a historic administrative county of the Kingdom of Hungary. In the 19th century, and in the beginning of the 20th century, it was united with the Kishont region to form Gömör-Kishont county . Its territory is presently in southern Slovakia and northern Hungary...

, central Upper Hungary

Upper Hungary

Upper Hungary is the usual English translation for the area that was historically the northern part of the Kingdom of Hungary, now mostly present-day Slovakia...

, Transylvania

Transylvania

Transylvania is a historical region in the central part of Romania. Bounded on the east and south by the Carpathian mountain range, historical Transylvania extended in the west to the Apuseni Mountains; however, the term sometimes encompasses not only Transylvania proper, but also the historical...

, Bohemia

Bohemia

Bohemia is a historical region in central Europe, occupying the western two-thirds of the traditional Czech Lands. It is located in the contemporary Czech Republic with its capital in Prague...

 and Germany

Germany

Germany , officially the Federal Republic of Germany , is a federal parliamentary republic in Europe. The country consists of 16 states while the capital and largest city is Berlin. Germany covers an area of 357,021 km2 and has a largely temperate seasonal climate...

. In 1495, they established the Thurzo-Fugger

Fugger

The Fugger family was a historically prominent group of European bankers, members of the fifteenth and sixteenth-century mercantile patriciate of Augsburg, international mercantile bankers, and venture capitalists like the Welser and the Höchstetter families. This banking family replaced the de'...

 company, which is sometimes regarded as the first capitalist company in Europe

Europe

Europe is, by convention, one of the world's seven continents. Comprising the westernmost peninsula of Eurasia, Europe is generally 'divided' from Asia to its east by the watershed divides of the Ural and Caucasus Mountains, the Ural River, the Caspian and Black Seas, and the waterways connecting...

. They soon acquired a monopoly on the trade of copper

Copper

Copper is a chemical element with the symbol Cu and atomic number 29. It is a ductile metal with very high thermal and electrical conductivity. Pure copper is soft and malleable; an exposed surface has a reddish-orange tarnish...

 and opened new places all over Europe. Around the year 1500 they dominated the production of precious and non-ferrous metals in Hungary.

From their earnings they bought lands in the northern part of the Kingdom of Hungary (today Slovakia), and owned several castles and their surroundings, for example Červený Kameň

Cervený Kamen Castle

Červený Kameň Castle is a castle in southwestern Slovakia in the Little Carpathians near the village of Častá.-History:A stone castle was built in the 13th century as part of the chain of country frontier defense castles ranging from Bratislava to Žilina. This castle was completely rebuilt as a...

, Lietava

Lietava Castle

The Lietava Castle is an extensive castle ruin in the Súľov Mountains of northern Slovakia, between the villages of Lietava and Lietavská Svinná-Babkov in the Žilina District.-History:...

, Tematín

Tematín

Tematín Castle is a castle ruin in western Slovakia. The castle was originally built in the second half of the 13th century. It was completely reconstructed by the Thurzo family, owners of the castle from 1524. The last owner was Miklós Bercsényi, general of the anti-Habsburg insurrection army...

, Zvolen

Zvolen Castle

Zvolen Castle is a medieval castle located on a hill near the center of Zvolen, in central Slovakia.The original seat of the region was above the confluence of Slatina and Hron rivers on a steep cliff in a castle from the 12th century, known today as Pustý hrad...

, Hlohovec, Orava

Orava (castle)

Orava Castle is situated on a high rock above Orava river. It is considered to be one of the most beautiful castles in Slovakia. The castle was built in the thirteenth century...

 and so on, as well as land in the other parts of the Kingdom of Hungary and Germany.

In the whole of the 16th and the first half of the 17th century, they were one of the most prominent families of Royal Hungary

Royal Hungary

The Kingdom of Hungary between 1538 and 1867 was part of the lands of the Habsburg Monarchy, while outside the Holy Roman Empire.After Battle of Mohács, the country was ruled by two crowned kings . They divided the kingdom in 1538...

, and slowly began to control the key top posts in the kingdom. They became hereditary chiefs of the Szepes (Spiš) and Árva (today Orava

Orava (region)

Orava is the traditional name of a region situated in northern Slovakia and partially also in southern Poland . It encompasses the territory of the former Árva county.-History:...

) counties (in today Slovakia

Slovakia

The Slovak Republic is a landlocked state in Central Europe. It has a population of over five million and an area of about . Slovakia is bordered by the Czech Republic and Austria to the west, Poland to the north, Ukraine to the east and Hungary to the south...

).

The Thurzo family died out in the first half of the 17th century, with the Orava-Bytča branch in 1621 and the Spiš branches in 1635 and 1636.

External links

• Thurzo family tree (uses Hungarian names only)