Chapter II: Part 2

After Adolph's death Albert was again chosen German king, and was crowned at Aix-la-Chapelle in August 1298. Like his father Rudolph, the new king made it the principal object of his reign to increase the power of his house, but he failed in his attempts to add Bohemia and Thuringia to the hereditary lands of the Habsburgs, and he was equally unsuccessful in his endeavour to seize the countries of Holland and Zealand as vacant fiefs of the Empire. In other directions, however, he was more fortunate. He recovered some of the lost crown lands and sought to abolish new and unauthorized tolls on the Rhine; he encouraged the towns and took measures to repress private wars; he befriended the serfs and protected the persecuted Jews. For a time Albert allied himself with Philip IV. of France against Pope Boniface VIII., who had refused to recognize him as king, but in 1303 he made peace with the pope, a step which enabled him to turn his attention to Bohemia and Thuringia. The greatest danger which he had to face during his reign came from a league which was formed against him in 1300 by the four Rhenish electors--the three archbishops and the count palatine of the Rhine--who disliked his foreign policy and resented his action with regard to the tolls. Albert, however, supported by the towns, was victorious; and the revolting electors soon made their peace.

Henry VII.

After Albert's murder, which took place in May 1308, Henry, count of Luxemburg, a brother of Baldwin (1285-1354), the powerful archbishop of Trier, became king as Henry VII. Although fortunate enough to obtain for his son John the crown of Bohemia, the aggrandizement of his family was not the main object of this remarkable sovereign, the last German king of the old, ambitious type. It was the memory of the Empire which stirred his blood; from the beginning of his reign he looked forward to securing the Lombard and the imperial crowns. His purpose to cross the Alps at the head of a great force was hailed with delight by the Ghibellines, whose aspirations found utterance in Dante's noble prose, but his life was too short for him to fulfil the hopes of his friends. Having restored the Rhine tolls to the Rhenish archbishops and made his peace with the Habsburgs, Henry went to Italy in the autumn of 1310, not, however, with a large army, and remained in the peninsula until his death in August 1313. As in former times the effect of the connexion of Germany with Italy was altogether mischievous, because to expedite his Italian journey the king had added to the great privileges of the princes and had repressed the energies of the towns.

Louis the Bavarian and Frederick of Austria.

After Henry's death the electors, again fearing lest the German crown should become hereditary, refused to choose the late king's young son, John of Bohemia, as their ruler, although the candidature of this prince was supported by the powerful archbishops Baldwin of Trier and Peter of Mainz. They failed, in fact, to agree upon any one candidate, and after a long delay there was a double election for the throne. This took place in October 1314, when the larger party chose Louis IV., duke of Upper Bavaria, while the smaller party gave their votes to Frederick the Fair, duke of Austria, a son of King Albert I. Although related to each other, Louis and Frederick had come to blows before this event; they represented two rival houses, those of Wittelsbach and Habsburg, and the election only served to feed the flame of their antagonism. A second time war broke out between them. The struggle, marked by numerous raids, sieges and skirmishes, lasted for nine years, being practically ended by Frederick's decisive defeat at Muhldorf in September 1322. The vanquished king remained in captivity until 1325, when, during the contest between the Empire and the Papacy, Louis came to terms with him. Frederick acknowledged his rival, and later the suggestion was put forward that they should rule Germany jointly, but this arrangement aroused much opposition and it came to nothing. Frederick returned into an honourable captivity and died in January 1330.

Causes of the success of Louis.

The success of Louis in his war with Frederick was to some extent due to the imperial cities, which supported him from the first. Not only did they pay high taxes, but they made splendid voluntary contributions, thus enabling the sovereign of their choice to continue the fight. But Louis was perhaps still more indebted for his victory to the memorable conflict between the Swiss and the Habsburgs, the defeat of Leopold of Austria at Morgarten in 1315 striking a heavy blow at his position. Thus this struggle for freedom, although belonging properly to the history of Switzerland, exercised much influence on the course of German history.

Louis IV. and the pope.

Had Louis been wise and prudent, it would have been fairly easy for him to attain a strong position after his victory at Muhldorf. But he threw away his advantages. He offended John of Bohemia, who had aided him at Muhldorf, thus converting a useful friend into a formidable foe, and his other actions were hardly more judicious. John was probably alarmed at the increase in the power of the German king, and about the same time a similar fear had begun to possess Pope John XXII. and Charles IV. of France. About 1323 Louis had secured the mark of Brandenburg for his son Louis, and he was eager to aggrandize his family in other directions. It was just at the time when he had estranged John of Bohemia that the pope made his decisive move. Asserting that the German crown could only be worn by one who had received the papal approbation he called upon Louis to lay it down; the answer was an indignant refusal, and in 1324 the king was declared deposed and excommunicate. Thus the ancient struggle between the Papacy and the Empire was renewed, a struggle in which the pen, wielded by Marsiglio of Padua, William of Occam, John of Jandun and others, played an important part, and in which the new ideas in religion and politics worked steadily against the arrogant papal claim. The pope and his French ally, Charles IV., whom it was proposed to seat upon the German throne, had completely misread the signs of the times, and their schemes met with very little favour in Germany. No longer had the princes as in former years any reason to dread the designs of an ambitious king; the destinies of the kingdom were in their own hands and they would not permit them to be controlled by an alien power. Such was the attitude of most of the temporal princes, and many spiritual princes took the same view. As for the electors, they had the strongest possible motive for resisting the papal claim, because if this were once admitted they would quickly lose their growing importance in the state. Lastly, the cities which had stood behind the Empire in the most difficult crises of its contest with Rome were not likely to desert it now.

Louis in Italy.

Thus encouraged, or rather driven forward, by the national sentiment Louis continued to assert the independence of the crown against the pope. In 1327 he marched into Italy, where he had powerful and numerous friends in the Ghibelline party, the Visconti family and others; in January 1328 he was crowned emperor at Rome, and after this event he declared Pope John deposed and raised Peter of Corvara to the papal chair as Nicholas V. The concluding stages of this expedition were not favourable to the new emperor, but his humiliation was only slight and it did not appreciably affect the conditions of the controversy.

Louis in Germany.

For a short time after the emperor's return to Germany there was peace. But this was soon broken by a dispute over the succession to the duchy of Carinthia and the county of Tirol, then ruled by Henry V., who was without sons, and whose daughter, Margaret Maultasch, was married to John Henry, margrave of Moravia, a son of John of Bohemia. Upon these lands the three great families in Germany, those of Wittelsbach, of Habsburg and of Luxemburg, were already casting covetous eyes; Carinthia, moreover, was claimed by the Habsburgs in virtue of an arrangement made in 1286. Thus a struggle between the Luxemburgs and the Habsburgs appeared certain, and Louis, anxious to secure for his house a share of the spoil, hesitated for a time between these rivals. In 1335 Duke Henry died and the emperor adjudged his lands to the Habsburgs; wars broke out, and the result was that John Henry secured Tirol while the other contending family added Carinthia to its Austrian possessions.

The pope and the electors.

During this time Louis had been negotiating continually with Pope John and with his successor Benedict XII. to regain the favour of the church, and so to secure a free hand for his designs in Germany. But the pope was not equally complaisant, and in 1337 the emperor allied himself with Edward III. of England against Philip VI. of France, whom he regarded as primarily responsible for the unyielding attitude of the Papacy. This move was very popular in Germany, and the papal party received a further rebuff in July 1338 when the electors met at Rense and declared that in no possible manner could they allow any control over, or limitation of, their electoral rights. As a sequel to this declaration the diet, meeting at Frankfort a month later, asserted that the imperial power proceeded from God alone and that the individual chosen by a majority of the electors to occupy this high station needed no confirmation from the pope, or from any one else, to make his election valid. Contrary opinions they denounced as _pestifera dogmata_.

Louis and the Luxemburgs.

But in spite of this support Louis threw away his advantages; he abandoned Edward III. in 1341, although this step did not win for him, as he desired, the goodwill of the pope, and he was soon involved in a more serious struggle with John of Bohemia and the Luxemburgs. With his Bohemian followers John Henry had made himself very unpopular in Tirol, where his wife soon counted herself among his enemies, and in 1341 he was driven from the land, while Margaret announced her intention of repudiating him and marrying the emperor's son Louis, margrave of Brandenburg. The emperor himself entered heartily into this scheme for increasing the power of his family; he declared the marriage with John Henry void, and bestowed upon his son and his bride Margaret not only Tirol, but also Carinthia, now in the hands of the Habsburgs. Nothing more was needed to unite together all the emperor's foes, including Pope Clement VI., who, like his predecessors, had rejected the advances of Louis; but in 1345, before the gathering storm broke, the emperor took possession of the counties of Holland, Zealand and Friesland, which had been left without a ruler by the death of his brother-in-law, Count William IV. By this time John of Bohemia and his allies had completed their plans. In July 1346 five of the electors met, and, having declared Louis deposed, they raised John's son Charles, margrave of Moravia, to the German throne. For a time no serious steps were taken against Louis, but after King John had met his death at Crecy Charles, who succeeded him as king of Bohemia, began to make vigorous preparations for war, and only the sudden death of the emperor (October 1347) saved Germany from civil strife.

The domestic policy of Louis.

Notwithstanding the defects of Louis's personal character his reign is one of the most important in German history. The claim of the Papacy to political supremacy received in his time its death-blow, and the popes themselves sowed the seeds of the alienation from Rome which was effected at the Reformation. With regard to the public peace Louis persistently followed the lines laid down by Albert I. He encouraged the princes to form alliances for its maintenance, and at the time of his death such alliances existed in all parts of the country. To the cities he usually showed himself a faithful friend. In many of them there had been for more than a century a struggle between the old patrician families and the democratic gilds. Louis could not always follow his own impulses, but whenever he could he associated himself with the latter party. Thus in his day the government of the imperial cities became more democratic and industry and trade flourished as they had never before done. The steady dislike of the princes was the best proof of the importance of the cities. They contained elements capable of enormous development; and had a great king arisen he might even yet, by their means, have secured for Germany a truly national life.

Charles IV. becomes king.

In January 1349 the friends of the late emperor elected Gunther, count of Schwarzburg, as their king, but before this occurrence Charles of Moravia, by a liberal use of gifts and promises, had won over many of his enemies, prominent among whom were the cities. In a few months Gunther himself abandoned the struggle, dying shortly afterwards, and about the same time his victorious rival was recognized by Louis of Brandenburg, the head of the Wittelsbach family. As king of Bohemia Charles was an enlightened and capable ruler, but he was indifferent towards Germany, although this country never stood in more urgent need of a strong and beneficent sovereign. In the early years of the reign the people, especially in the south and west, attacked and plundered the Jews; and the consequent disorder was greatly increased by the ravages of the Black Death and by the practices and preaching of the Flagellants, both events serving to spur the maddened populace to renewed outrages on the Jews. In dealing with this outburst of fanaticism many of the princes, both spiritual and secular, displayed vigour and humanity, but Charles saw only in the sufferings of this people an excuse for robbing them of their wealth.

The Golden Bull.

Charles's most famous achievement was the issue of the Golden Bull (q.v.). Although the principle of election had long been admitted and practised with regard to the German crown, yet it was surrounded by many practical difficulties. For instance, if the territory belonging to an electoral family were divided, as was often the case, it had never been settled whether all the ruling princes were to vote, or, if one only were entitled to this privilege, by what principle the choice was to be made. Over these and other similar points many disputes had arisen, and, having been crowned emperor at Rome in April 1355, Charles decided to set these doubts at rest. The Golden Bull, promulgated in January 1356 and again after some tedious negotiations in December of the same year, fixed the number of electors at seven, Saxe-Wittenberg and not Saxe-Lauenburg obtaining the Saxon vote, and the vote of the Wittelsbachs being given to the ruler of the Rhenish Palatinate and not to the duke of Bavaria. The votes of a majority of the electors were held to make an election valid. In order that there might be no possibility of dispute between the princes of a single house, the countries ruled by the four secular electors--Bohemia, the Rhenish Palatinate, Saxony and Brandenburg--were declared to be indivisible and to be heritable only by the accepted rules of primogeniture. The electors were granted full sovereign rights over their lands, and their subjects were allowed to appeal to the royal or the imperial tribunals only in case they could not obtain justice elsewhere. A blow was struck at the cities, which were forbidden to form leagues or to receive _Pfahlburger_.

Fehmic Courts.

If the Golden Bull be excepted, the true interest of this reign is in the movements beyond the range of the emperor's influence. It is significant that at this time the _Femgerichte_, or Fehmic Courts (q.v.), vastly extended the sphere of their activities, and that in the absence of a strong central authority they were respected as a check upon the lawlessness of the princes. The cities, notwithstanding every kind of discouragement, formed new associations for mutual defence or strengthened those which already existed. The Hanseatic League carried on war with Valdemar V., king of Denmark, and his ally, the king of Norway, seventy-seven towns declaring war on these monarchs in 1367, and emerged victorious from the struggle, while its commerce extended to nearly all parts of the known world. In 1376 some Swabian towns formed a league which, in spite of the imperial prohibition, soon became powerful in south-west Germany and defeated the forces of the count of Wurttemberg at Reutlingen in May 1377. The emperor, meanwhile, was occupied in numerous intrigues to strengthen his personal position and to increase the power of his house. In these he was very fortunate, managing far more than his predecessors to avoid conflicts with the Papacy and the princes. The result was that when he died in November 1378 he wore the crowns of the Empire, of Germany, of Bohemia, of Lombardy and of Burgundy; he had added Lower Lusatia and parts of Silesia to Bohemia; he had secured the mark of Brandenburg for his son Wenceslaus in 1373; and he had bought part of the Upper Palatinate and territories in all parts of Germany.

Wenceslaus.

After the death of Charles, his son Wenceslaus, who had been crowned German king in July 1376, was recognized by the princes as their ruler, but the new sovereign was careless and indolent and in a few years he left Germany to look after itself. During his reign the struggle between the princes and the cities reached its climax. Following the example set by the electors at Rense both parties formed associations for protection, prominent among these being the Swabian League on the one side and the League of the Lion (_Lowenbund_)[1] on the other. The result was that the central authority was almost entirely disregarded. Wenceslaus favoured first one of the antagonists and then the other, but although he showed some desire to put an end to the increasing amount of disorder he was unable, or unwilling, to take a strong and definite line of action. The cities entered upon the approaching contest at a considerable disadvantage. Often they were separated one from the other by large stretches of territory under the rule of a hostile prince and their trade was peculiarly liable to attack by an adventurous body of knights. The citizens, who were called upon to fight their battles, were usually unable to contend successfully with men whose whole lives had been passed in warfare; the isolation of the cities was not favourable to the creation or mobilization of an active and homogeneous force; and, moreover, at this time many of them were disturbed by internal troubles. However, they minimized this handicap by joining league to league; in 1381 the Swabian and the Rhenish cities formed an alliance for three years, while the Swabian League obtained promises of help from the Swiss.

General disorder in Germany.

The Swiss opened the fight. Attacked by the Habsburgs they defeated and killed Duke Leopold of Austria at Sempach in July 1386 and gained another victory at Nafels two years later; but their allies, the Swabian cities, were not equally prompt or equally fortunate. The decisive year was 1388, when the strife became general all over south-west Germany. In August 1388 the princes, under Count Eberhard of Wurttemberg, completely defeated their foes at Doffingen, while in the following November Rupert II., elector palatine of the Rhine, was equally successful in his attack on the forces of the Rhenish cities near Worms. Exhaustion soon compelled the combatants to come to terms, and greatly to the disadvantage of the cities peace was made in 1389. The main result of this struggle was everywhere to strengthen the power of the princes and to incite them to fresh acts of aggression. During the same time the Hanse towns were passing through a period of difficulty. They were disturbed by democratic movements in many of the cities and they were threatened by the changing politics of the three northern kingdoms, Norway, Sweden and Denmark, and by their union in 1397; their trading successes had raised up powerful enemies and had embroiled them with England and with Flanders, and the Teutonic Order and neighbouring princes were not slow to take advantage of their other difficulties.

Rupert chosen king.

Towards the close of the century the discontent felt at the incompetent and absent German king took a decided form. The movement was led by the four Rhenish electors, and after some preliminary proceedings these princes met in August 1400; having declared Wenceslaus dethroned they chose one of their number, the elector palatine Rupert III., in his stead, and the deposed monarch accepted the sentence almost without demur. Rupert was an excellent elector, and under more favourable circumstances would have made a good king, but so serious were the jealousies and divisions in the kingdom that he found little scope for his energies outside the Palatinate. In spite of the peace of 1389 the cities had again begun to form leagues for peace; but, having secured a certain amount of recognition in the south and west of Germany, the new king turned aside from the pressing problems of government and in 1401 made a futile attempt to reach Rome, an enterprise which covered him with ridicule. After his return to Germany he had to face the hostility of many of the princes, and this contest, together with vain attempts to restore order, occupied him until his death in May 1410.

Sigismund is chosen king.

After Rupert's death two cousins, Jobst, margrave of Moravia, and Sigismund, king of Hungary, were in the autumn of 1410 both chosen to fill the vacant throne by opposing parties; and the position was further complicated by the fact that the deposed king, Wenceslaus, was still alive. Jobst, however, died in January 1411, and in the succeeding July Sigismund, having come to terms with Wenceslaus, was again elected king and was generally recognized. The commanding questions of this reign were ecclesiastical. It was the age of the great schism, three popes claiming the allegiance of Christendom, and of the councils of Constance and of Basel; in all ranks of the Church there was an urgent cry for reform. Unfortunately the council of Constance, which met mainly through the efforts of Sigismund in 1414, marred its labours by the judicial murders of John Huss and of Jerome of Prague. This act greatly incensed the Bohemians, who broke into revolt in 1419, and a new and fiercer outburst occurred in 1420 when Sigismund, who had succeeded his brother Wenceslaus as king of Bohemia in the preceding August, announced his intention of crushing the Hussites. Led by their famous general, John Zizka, the Bohemians won several battles and spread havoc and terror through the neighbouring German lands. During the progress of this revolt Germany was so divided and her king was so poor that it was impossible to collect an army of sufficient strength to crush the malcontents. At the diet of Nuremberg in 1422 and at that of Frankfort in 1427 Sigismund endeavoured to raise men and money by means of contributions from the estates, but the plan failed owing to mutual jealousies and especially to the resistance of the cities. He secured some help from Frederick of Brandenburg, from Albert of Austria, afterwards the German king Albert II., and from Frederick of Meissen, to whom he granted the electoral duchy of Saxe-Wittenberg; but it was only when the Hussites were split into two factions, and when Zizka was dead, that Germany was in any way relieved from a crushing and intolerable burden.

Brandenburg and the Hohenzollerns.

The continual poverty which hindered the successful prosecution of the war against the Hussites, and which at times placed Sigismund in the undignified position of having to force himself as an unwelcome guest upon princes and cities, had, however, one good result. In 1415 he granted, or rather sold, the mark of Brandenburg to his friend Frederick of Hohenzollern, burgrave of Nuremberg, this land thus passing into the hands of the family under whom it was destined to develop into the kingdom of Prussia. During this reign the princes, especially the electors, continued their endeavours to gain a greater share in the government of Germany, and to some extent they succeeded. Sigismund, on his part, tried to enforce peace upon the country by forming leagues of the cities, but to no purpose; in fact all his plans for reform came to nothing.

Albert II.

Sigismund, who died in December 1437, was succeeded on the German throne and also in Hungary and Bohemia by his son-in-law Albert of Austria, and from this time, although remaining in theory elective, the German crown was always conferred upon a member of the house of Habsburg until the extinction of the male line of this family in 1740. The reign of Albert II. was too short to enable him to do more than indicate his good intentions; he acted in general with the electors in observing a neutral attitude with regard to the dispute between the council of Basel and Pope Eugenius IV., and he put forward a scheme to improve the administration of justice. He died in October 1439, and was succeeded by his kinsman Frederick, duke of Styria, who became German king as Frederick IV. and, after his coronation at Rome in 1452, emperor as Frederick III.

Frederick III. and the Papacy.

The first concern of the new king was with the papal schism. The council of Basel was still sitting, and had elected an anti-pope, Felix V., in opposition to Eugenius IV., while the electors, adhering to their neutral attitude, sought to bring Frederick into line with them on this question. Some years were occupied in negotiations, but the king soon showed himself anxious to come to terms with Eugenius, and about 1446 the electors ceased to act together. At length peace was made. The consent of several of the electors having been purchased by concessions, Frederick signed with Pope Nicholas V., the successor of Eugenius, in February 1448 the concordat of Vienna, an arrangement which bound the German Church afresh to Rome and perpetuated the very evils from which earnest churchmen had been seeking deliverance. Thus Germany lost the opportunity of reforming the Church from within, and the upheaval of the 16th century was rendered inevitable.

Germany under Frederick.

Frederick's reign is one of great importance in the history of Austria and of the house of Habsburg, but under him the fortunes of Germany sank to the lowest possible point. Without any interference from the central authority wars were waged in every part of the country, and disputes of every kind were referred to the decision of the sword. The old enmity between the cities and the princes blazed out afresh; grievances of every kind were brought forward and many struggles were the result. Perhaps the most famous of these was one between a confederation of Franconian and Swabian cities under the leadership of Nuremberg on the one side, and Albert Achilles, afterwards elector of Brandenburg, and a number of princes on the other. The war was carried on with great barbarity for about four years (1449-1453), and was in every respect a critical one. If the cities had gained the day they might still have aimed at balancing the power of the princes, but owing partly to their imperfect union, partly to the necessity of fighting with hired troops, they did not gain any serious advantage. On the whole, indeed, in spite of temporary successes, they decidedly lost ground, and on the conclusion of peace there was no doubt that the balance of power in the state inclined to the princes. Frederick meanwhile was involved in wars with the Swiss, with his brother Albert and his Austrian subjects, and later with the Hungarians. He had no influence in Italy; in Burgundy he could neither stop Duke Philip the Good from adding Luxemburg to his possessions, nor check the towering ambition of Charles the Bold; while after the death of Charles in 1477 he was equally unable to prevent the king of France from seizing a large part of his lands. Torn by dissensions the Teutonic Order was unsuccessful in checking the encroachments of the Poles, and in 1466 the land which it had won in the north-east of Germany passed under the suzerainty of Poland, care being taken to root out all traces of German influence therein. Another loss took place in 1460, when Schleswig and Holstein were united with Denmark. In Germany itself the king made scarcely any pretence of exercising the supreme authority; for nearly thirty years he never attended the imperial diet, and the suggestions which were made for his deposition failed only because the electors could not agree upon a successor. In his later years he became more of a recluse than ever, and even before February 1486, when his son Maximilian was chosen German king, he had practically ceased to take any part in the business of the Empire, although he survived until August 1493.

The power of the princes.

During the reign of Frederick the electors and the greater princes continued the process of consolidating and increasing their power. Lands under their rule, which were technically imperial fiefs, were divided and devised by them at will like other forms of private property; they had nearly all the rights of a sovereign with regard to levying tolls, coining money, administering justice and granting privileges to towns; they were assisted in the work of government by a privy council, while their courts with their numerous officials began to resemble that of the king or emperor. They did not, however, have everything their own way. During this century their power was limited by the formation of diets in many of the principalities. These bodies were composed of the mediate prelates, the mediate nobles and representatives of the mediate cities. They were not summoned because the princes desired their aid, but because arms could only be obtained from the nobles and money from the cities, at least on an adequate scale. Once having been formed these local diets soon extended their functions. They claimed the right of sanctioning taxation; they made their voice heard about the expenditure of public money; they insisted, although perhaps not very effectually, on justice being administered. Such institutions as these were clearly of the highest importance, and for two centuries they did something to atone for the lack of a genuine monarchy.

Methods of warfare.

During this reign the conditions of warfare began to change. The discovery of gunpowder made small bodies of men, adequately armed, more than a match for great forces equipped in medieval fashion. Hence the custom of hiring mercenary troops was introduced, and a prince could never be certain, however numerous his vassals might be, that the advantage would not rest with his opponent. This fact, added to the influence of the local diets, made even the princes weary of war, and a universal and continuous demand arose for some reform of the machinery of government. Partly at the instance of the emperor a great Swabian confederation was formed in 1488. This consisted of both princes and cities and was intended to enforce the public peace in the south-western parts of Germany. Its effects were excellent; but obviously no partial remedy was sufficient. It was essential that there should be some great reform which would affect every part of the kingdom, and for the present this was not to be secured.

Maximilian I.

Maximilian came to the throne in 1486 with exceptional advantages. He was heir to the extensive Austrian lands, and as the widowed husband of Charles the Bold's daughter Mary he administered the Netherlands. Although he soon gave up these provinces to his son Philip, the fact that they were in the possession of his family added to his influence, and this was further increased when Philip married Joanna, the heiress of the Spanish kingdoms. From Maximilian's accession the Empire exercised in the affairs of Europe an authority which had not belonged to it for centuries. The reason for this was not that the Empire was stronger, but that its crown was worn by a succession of princes who were great sovereigns in their own right.

Reforms in Germany. 1495.

Having in 1490 driven the Hungarians from Vienna and recovered his hereditary lands, and having ordered the affairs of the Netherlands, Maximilian turned his attention to Italy, whither he was drawn owing to the invasion of that country by Charles VIII. of France in 1494. But before he could take any steps to check the progress of Charles pecuniary necessities compelled him to meet the diet. At this time the German, or imperial, diet consisted of three colleges, one of the electors, another of the princes, both spiritual and secular, and a third of representatives of the free cities, who had, however, only just gained the right to sit beside the other two estates. The diet was an extremely clumsy instrument of government, and it was perhaps never more discredited or more impotent than when it met Maximilian at Worms in March 1495. But in spite of repeated rebuffs the party of reform was valorous and undaunted; its members knew that their case was overwhelmingly strong. Although disappointed in the hope which they had nourished until about 1490 that Maximilian himself would lead them, they had found a capable head in Bertold, elector of Mainz. The king lost no time in acquainting the diet with his demands. He wished for men and money to encounter the French in Italy and to resist the Turks. Bertold retorted that redress of grievances must precede supply, and Maximilian and the princes were soon discussing the proposals put forward by the sagacious elector. His first suggestion that a council nominated by the estates should be set up with the power of vetoing the acts of the king was abandoned because of the strenuous opposition of Maximilian; but Bertold was successful in getting the diet to proclaim an eternal _Landfriede_, that is, to forbid private war without any limitation of time, and it was agreed that the diet should meet annually to advise the king on matters of moment. The idea of a council, however, was not given up although it took a different form. An imperial court of justice, the _Reichskammergericht_, was established; this consisted of sixteen members nominated by the estates and a president appointed by the king. Its duties were to judge between princes of the Empire and to act as the supreme court of appeal in cases where humbler persons were concerned. Partly to provide for the expenses of this court, partly to furnish Maximilian with the promised monetary aid, a tax called the common penny was instituted, this impost taking the form both of a property tax and of a poll tax. Such in outline were the reforms effected by the important diet of Worms.

Difficulties and further reforms.

The practical difficulties of the reformers, however, were only just beginning. Although Maximilian took some interest in the collection of the common penny it was difficult, and from some classes impossible, to obtain payment of this tax, and the king was persistently hostile to the imperial court of justice, his hostility and the want of money being indeed successful in preventing that institution for a time from doing any real service to Germany. In 1497 he set up a new Aulic council or _Hofrat_, the members of which were chosen by himself, and to this body he gave authority to deal with all the business of the Empire. Thus he undermined the foundations of the _Reichskammergericht_ and stole a march upon Bertold and his friends. A series of diets between 1495 and 1499 produced only mutual recriminations, and then Maximilian met with a serious rebuff. The Swiss refused to pay the common penny and to submit to the jurisdiction of the imperial court of justice. Consequently, in 1499, Maximilian sent such troops as he could collect against them, but his forces were beaten, and by the peace of Basel he was forced to concede all the demands made by the Swiss, who became virtually independent of the Empire. Heartened by this circumstance Bertold and his followers returned to the attack when the diet met at Augsburg in 1500. The common penny as a means of taxation fell into the background, and in its place a scheme was accepted which it was thought would provide the king with an army of about 30,000 men. But more important perhaps was the administrative council, or _Reichsregiment_, which was established by the diet at this time. A revival of the idea put forward by the elector of Mainz at Worms in 1495, this council was to consist of twenty members appointed by the electors and other princes and by representatives of the cities, with a president named by the king. Its work was practically that of governing Germany, and it was the most considerable encroachment which had yet been made on the power of the king. It is not surprising therefore that Maximilian hated the new body, to the establishment of which he had only consented under great pressure.

Maximilian hampers the reformers.

In 1500 the _Reichsregiment_ met at Nuremberg and began at once to treat for peace with France. Maximilian was not slow to resent this interference; he refused to appoint a president, and soon succeeded in making the meetings of the council impossible. The relations between the king and the princes were now very strained. Bertold called the electors together to decide upon a plan of campaign; Maximilian on his part tried to destroy the electoral union by winning over individual members. The result was that when the elector of Mainz died in 1504 the king's victory was complete. The _Reichskammergericht_ and the _Reichsregiment_ were for all practical purposes destroyed, and greater authority had been given to the _Hofrat_. Henceforward it was the king who put forward schemes of reform and the diet which modified or rejected them. When the diet met at Cologne in 1505 Maximilian asked for an army and the request was granted, the necessary funds being raised by the old plan of a levy on the estates. At Constance, two years later, the diet raised men and money in a similar fashion, and on this occasion the imperial court of justice was restored, with some slight alteration in the method of appointing its members. After Maximilian had taken the novel step of assuming the title of Roman emperor at Trent in 1508 the last of the reforming diets met at Cologne in 1512. In 1500 Germany had been divided into six circles (_Kreise_) or districts, for the purpose of sending representatives to the _Reichsregiment_. These circles were now increased in number to ten and an official (_Hauptmann_) was placed over each, his duties being to enforce the decisions of the _Reichskammergericht_. But it was some time before the circles came into working order; the only permanent reform of the reign was the establishment of the imperial court of justice, and even this was not entirely satisfactory, Maximilian's remaining diets loudly denouncing it for delay and incompetence. The period marked by the attempted reform of Bertold of Mainz was that of the last struggle between the supporters of a united Germany and those who preferred a loose confederation of states. Victory remained with the latter party. Maximilian himself had done a great deal to promote the unity of his Austrian lands and, incidentally, to cut them off from the remainder of the German kingdom, and other princes were following his example. This movement spelled danger to the small principalities and to the free cities, but it gave a powerful impetus to the growth of Brandenburg, of Saxony, of Bavaria and of the Palatinate, and the future of the country seemed likely to remain with the particularist and not with the national idea.

Maximilian's wars in Italy.

During the period of these constitutional struggles the king's chief energies were spent in warring against the French kings Charles VIII. and Louis XII. in Italy, where he hoped to restore the claims, dormant, perhaps even extinct, of the German kings. In 1508 he helped to promote the league of Cambrai, formed to despoil Venice, but he soon returned to his former policy of waging war against France, and he continued to do this until peace was made in 1516. The princes of Germany showed themselves singularly indifferent to this struggle, and their king's battles were largely fought with mercenary troops. Maximilian gained his most conspicuous success in his own kingdom in 1504, when he interfered in a struggle over the succession to the duchy of Bavaria-Landshut. He gained some additions of territory, but his victory was more important because it gave him the prestige which enabled him to break down the opposition of the princes and to get his own way with regard to his domestic policy.

Decay of feudal relations.

In many respects the reign of Maximilian must be regarded as the end of the middle ages. The feudal relation between the king and the princes and between the princes and their vassals had become purely nominal. No real control was exerted by the crown over the heads of the various states, and, now that war was carried on mainly by mercenary troops, the mediate nobles did not hold their lands on condition of military service. The princes were sovereigns, not merely feudal lords; and by the institution of local diets in their territories an approach was made to modern conceptions of government. The age of war was far indeed from being over, but men were at least beginning to see that unnecessary bloodshed is an evil, and that the true outlet for the mass of human energies is not conflict but industry. By the growth of the cities in social, if not in political, importance the products of labour were more and more widely diffused; and it was easier than at any previous time for the nation to be moved by common ideas and impulses. The discovery of America, the invention of printing, the revival of learning and many other causes had contributed to effect a radical change in the point of view from which the world was regarded; and the strongest of all medieval relations, that of the nation to the Church, was about to pass through the fiery trial of the Reformation. This vast movement, which began in the later years of Maximilian, definitely severed the medieval from the modern world.

The Reformation.

The seeds of the Reformation were laid during the time of the great conflict between the Papacy and the Empire. The arrogance and the ambition of the popes then stamped upon the minds of the people an impression that was never effaced. During the struggle of Louis IV. with the popes of his day the feeling revived with fresh intensity; all classes, clerical as well as lay, looked upon resistance to papal pretensions as a necessity imposed by the national honour. At the same time the spiritual teaching of the mystics awakened in many minds an aspiration which the Church, in its corrupt state, could not satisfy, and which was in any case unfavourable to an external authority. The Hussite movement further weakened the spell of the Church. Still more powerful, because touching other elements of human nature and affecting a more important class, was the influence of the Renaissance, which, towards the end of the 15th century, passed from Italy to the universities of Germany. The men of the new learning did not sever themselves from Christianity, but they became indifferent to it; its conceptions seemed to them dim and faded, while there was a constantly increasing charm in literature, in philosophy and in art. No kind of effort was made by the Church to prepare for the storm. The spiritual princes, besides displaying all the faults of the secular princes, had special defects of their own; and as simony was universally practised, the lives of multitudes of the inferior clergy were a public scandal, while their services were cold and unimpressive. The moral sense was outraged by such a pope as Alexander VI.; and neither the military ambition of Julius II. nor the refined paganism of Leo X. could revive the decaying faith in the spirituality of their office. Pope Leo, by his incessant demands for money and his unscrupulous methods of obtaining it, awakened bitter hostility in every class of the community.

Luther.

The popular feeling for the first time found expression when Luther, on All Saints' day 1517, nailed to a church door in Wittenberg the theses in which he contested the doctrine which lay at the root of the scandalous traffic in indulgences carried on in the pope's name by Tetzel and his like. This episode, derided at first at Rome as the act of an obscure Augustinian friar intent on scoring a point in a scholastic disputation, was in reality an event of vast significance, for it brought to the front, as the exponent of the national sentiment, one of the mightiest spirits whom Germany has produced. Under the influence of Luther's strong personality the most active and progressive elements of the nation were soon in more or less open antagonism to the Papacy.

Charles V. and Luther.

When Maximilian died in January 1519 his throne was competed for by his grandson Charles, king of Spain, and by Francis I. of France, and after a long and costly contest the former was chosen in the following June. By the time Charles reached Germany and was crowned at Aix-la-Chapelle (October 1520) Luther had confronted the cardinal legate Cajetan, had passed through his famous controversy at Leipzig with Johann Eck, and was about to burn the bull of excommunication. After this daring step retreat was impossible, and with keen excitement both the reformer's followers and his enemies waited for the new sovereign to declare himself on one side or on the other. Charles soon made up his mind about the general lines of his policy, although he was completely ignorant of the strength of the feeling which had been aroused. He fancied that he had to deal with a mere monkish quarrel; at one time he even imagined that a little money would set the difficulty at rest. It was not likely, however, in any case that he would turn against the Roman Church, and that for various reasons. He was by far the most important ruler of the time, and the peoples under his direct sway were still adherents of the old faith. He was king of Spain, of Sicily, of Naples and of Sardinia; he was lord of the Netherlands, of the free county of Burgundy and of the Austrian archduchies; he had at his command the immense resources of the New World; and he had been chosen king of Germany, thus gaining a title to the imperial crown. Following the example set by Maximilian he called himself emperor without waiting for the formality of a coronation at Rome. Now the protection of the Church had always been regarded as one of the chief functions of the emperors; Charles could not, therefore, desert it when it was so greatly in need of his services. Like his predecessors he reserved to himself the right to resist it in the realm of politics; in the realm of faith he considered that he owed to it his entire allegiance. Moreover, he intended to undertake the subjugation of northern Italy, a task which had baffled his imperial grandfather, and in order to realize this scheme it was of the highest importance that he should do nothing to offend the pope. Thus it came about that at the diet of Worms, which met in January 1521, without any thorough examination of Luther's position, Charles issued the famous edict, drawn up by Cardinal Aleandro, which denounced the reformer and his followers. This was accepted by the diet and Luther was placed under the imperial ban.

Charles and the movement for reform.

When Charles was chosen German king he was obliged to make certain promises to the electors. Embodied in a _Wahlkapitulation_, as it was called, these were practically the conditions on which the new sovereign was allowed to take the crown, and the precedent was followed at subsequent elections. At the diet of Worms steps were taken to carry these promises into effect. By his _Wahlkapitulation_ Charles had promised to respect the freedom of Germany, for the princes looked upon him as a foreigner. He was neither to introduce foreign troops into the country, nor to allow a foreigner to command German soldiers; he must use the German language and every diet must meet on German soil. An administrative council, a new _Reichsregiment_, must be established, and other reforms were to be set on foot. The constitution and powers of this _Reichsregiment_ were the chief subject of difference between Charles and the princes at the diet. Eventually it was decided that this council should consist of twenty-two members with a president named by the emperor; but it was only to govern Germany during the absence of the sovereign, at other times its functions were merely advisory. The imperial chamber was restored on the lines laid down by Bertold of Mainz in 1495 (it survived until the dissolution of the Empire in 1806), and the estates undertook to aid the emperor by raising and paying an army. In April 1521 Charles invested his brother Ferdinand, afterwards the emperor Ferdinand I., with the Austrian archduchies, and soon afterwards he left Germany to renew his long struggle with Francis I. of France.

Sickingen's rising.

While the emperor was thus absent great disturbances took place in Germany. Among Luther's friends was one, Ulrich von Hutten, at once penetrated with the spirit of the Renaissance and emphatically a man of action. The class to which Hutten and his friend, Franz von Sickingen, a daring and ambitious Rhenish baron, belonged, was that of the small feudal tenants in chief, the _Ritterschaft_ or knights of the Empire. This class was subject only to the emperor, but its members lacked the territorial possessions which gave power to the princes; they were partly deprived of their employment owing to the suppression of private wars, and they had suffered through the substitution of Roman law for the ancient feudal laws and customs. They had no place in the constitution or in the government of Germany, and they had already paralysed the administration by refusing to pay the taxes. They were intensely jealous of the princes, and it occurred to Hutten and Sickingen that the Reformation might be used to improve the condition of the knights and to effect a total change in the constitution of the Empire. No general reform, they maintained, either in church or state, could be secured while the country was divided into a number of principalities, and their plan was to combine with all those who were discontented with the existing order to attack the princes and to place the emperor at the head of a united nation. Sickingen, who has been compared to Wallenstein, and who doubtless hoped to secure a great position for himself, had already collected a large army, which by its very presence had contributed somewhat to the election of Charles at Frankfort in 1519. He had also earned renown by carrying on feuds with the citizens of Worms and of Metz, and now, with a view to realizing his larger ambitions, he opened the campaign (August 1522) by attacking the elector of Trier, who, as a spiritual prince, would not, it was hoped, receive any help from the religious reformers. For a moment it seemed as if Hutten's dream would be realized, but it was soon evident that it was too late to make so great a change. Luther and other persons of influence stood aloof from the movement; on the other hand, several princes, including Philip, landgrave of Hesse, united their forces against the knights, and in May 1523 Sickingen was defeated and slain. A few weeks later Hutten died on an island in the lake of Zurich.

The causes of the Peasants' War.