Chapter IV: , VII (130)

"A pilgrimage first took the Normans to Southern Italy, where
they were to found a kingdom. Here there were, if I may so
speak, three wrecks, three ruins of nations—Lombards in the
mountains, Greeks in the ports, Sicilian and African Saracens
rambling over the coasts. About the year 1000, some Norman
pilgrims assist the inhabitants of Salerno to drive out a
party of Arabs, who were holding them to ransom. Being well
paid for the service, these Normans attract others of their
countrymen hither. A Greek of Bari, named Melo or Meles, takes
them into pay to free his city from the Greeks of Byzantium.
Next they are settled by the Greek republic of Naples at the
fort of Aversa, which lay between that city and her enemies,
the Lombards of Capua (A. D. 1026). Finally, the sons of a
poor gentleman of the Cotentin, Tancred of Hauteville, seek
their fortune here. Tancred had twelve children; seven by the
same mother. It was during William's [the Conqueror's]
minority, when numbers of the barons endeavoured to withdraw
themselves from the Bastard's yoke, that these sons of
Tancred's directed their steps towards Italy, where it was
said that a simple Norman knight had become count of Aversa.
They set off penniless, and defrayed the expenses of their
journey by the sword (A. D. 1037?). The Byzantine governor, or
Katapan, engaged their services, and led them against the
Arabs. But their countrymen beginning to flock to them, they
no sooner saw themselves strong enough than they turned
against their paymasters, seized Apulia [A. D. 1042], and
divided it into twelve countships. This republic of
Condottieri held its assemblies at Melphi. The Greeks
endeavoured to defend themselves, but fruitlessly. They
collected an army of 60,000 Italians; to be routed by the
Normans, who amounted to several hundreds of well-armed men.
The Byzantines then summoned their enemies, the Germans, to
their aid; and the two empires, of the East and West,
confederated against the sons of the gentleman of Coutances.
The all-powerful emperor, Henry the Black (Henry III.),
charged Leo IX., who had been nominated pope by him, and who
was a German and kin to the imperial family, to exterminate
these brigands. The pope led some Germans and a swarm of
Italians against them [1053]; but the latter took to flight at
the very beginning of the battle, and left the warlike pontiff
in the hands of the enemy. Too wary to ill-treat him, the
Normans piously cast themselves at their prisoner's feet, and
compelled him to grant them, as a fief of the Church, all that
they had taken or might take possession of in Apulia,
Calabria, and on the other side of the strait; so that, in
spite of himself, the pope became the suzerain of the kingdom
of the Two Sicilies (A. D. 1052-1053)."

_J. Michelet,
History of France,
book 4, chapter 2._

The two elder of the sons of Tancred were now dead, and the
third son, Humphrey, died not long after. A fourth brother,
Robert, surnamed Guiscard, who had lately arrived from
Normandy with reinforcements, then established himself (A. D.
1057) with some difficulty in the leadership and succession.
"He accomplished the reduction of almost all the country which
composes the present kingdom of Naples, and, extinguishing the
long dominion of the Beneventine Lombards and of the eastern
empire in Italy [see BENEVENTUM, and AMALFI], finally received
from Pope Nicholas II. the confirmation of the titles which he
had assumed, of duke of Calabria and Apulia [A. D. 1080]. …
While Robert Guiscard was perfecting his dominion on the
continent, his younger brother Roger engaged in the
astonishing design of conquering the large and beautiful
island of Sicily from the Saracens with a few Norman
volunteers. An air of romantic extravagance breathes over all
the enterprises of the Normans in Italy; and, even if we
discard the incredible tales which the legends and chronicles
of the times have preserved of the valour and corporeal
strength of these northern warriors, enough will remain in the
authentic results of their expeditions to stagger the reason
and warm the imagination with attractive visions of chivalrous
achievement. … We are assured that 300 Christian knights
were the greatest number which Roger could for many years
bring into the field; and that 136 routed a prodigious host of
Saracens at the battle of Ceramio. … But the Saracens were
embroiled in internal discord, and their island was broken up
into numerous petty states; we may, therefore, attribute to
their dissensions a great part of the success which the
chroniclers of the Normans have assigned to their good swords
alone. Roger had, however, embarked in an arduous and
laborious undertaking, which it required the unbending
perseverance and patient valour of thirty years [A. D.
1060-1090] to accomplish. … At length, all Sicily bowed to
his sway; Norman barons were infeuded over its surface; and
Roger, with the title of great count, held the island as a
fief of his brother's duchy."

_G. Proctor,
History of Italy,
chapter 2, part 2._

ALSO IN:
_E. Gibbon,
Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire,
chapter 56._

_J. W. Barlow,
Short History of the Normans in South Europe,
chapters 1-7._

{1810}

ITALY: A. D. 1056-1122.
Beginning of the conflict of the Popes with the Emperors.
Hildebrand and Henry IV.
The War of Investitures.

See PAPACY: A. D. 1056-1122;
and GERMANY: A. D. 973-1122.

ITALY: A. D. 1056-1152.
The rise of the republican cities.

"The war of investitures, which lasted more than sixty years,
accomplished the dissolution of every tie between the
different members of the kingdom of Italy. Civil wars have at
least this advantage,—that they force the rulers of the
people to consult the wishes of their subjects, oblige them to
gain affections which constitute their strength, and to
compensate, by the granting of new privileges, the services
which they require. The prelates, nobles, and cities of Italy
obeyed, some the emperor, others the pope; not from a blind
fear, but from choice, from affection, from conscience,
according as the political or religious sentiment was
predominant in each. The war was general, but everywhere waged
with the national forces. Every city armed its militia, which,
headed by the magistrates, attacked the neighbouring nobles or
towns of a contrary party. While each city imagined it was
fighting either for the pope or the emperor, it was habitually
impelled exclusively by its own sentiments: every town
considered itself as a whole, as an independent state, which
had its own allies and enemies; each citizen felt an ardent
patriotism, not for the kingdom of Italy, or for the empire,
but for his own city. At the period when either kings or
emperors had granted to towns the right of raising
fortifications, that of assembling the citizens at the sound
of a great bell, to concert together the means of their common
defence, had been also conceded. This meeting of all the men
of the state capable of bearing arms was called a parliament.
It assembled in the great square, and elected annually two
consuls, charged with the administration of justice at home,
and the command of the army abroad. … The parliament, which
named the consuls, appointed also a secret council, called a
Consilio di Credenza, to assist the government, composed of a
few members taken from each division; besides a grand council
of the people, who prepared the decisions to be submitted to
the parliament. … As industry had rapidly increased, and had
preceded luxury,—as domestic life was sober, and the produce
of labour considerable,—wealth had greatly augmented. The
citizens allowed themselves no other use of their riches than
that of defending or embellishing their country. It was from
the year 900 to the year 1200 that the most prodigious works
were undertaken and accomplished by the towns of Italy. …
These three regenerating centuries gave an impulse to
architecture, which soon awakened the other fine arts. The
republican spirit which now fermented in every city, and gave
to each of them constitutions so wise, magistrates so zealous,
and citizens so patriotic, and so capable of great
achievements, had found in Italy itself the models which had
contributed to its formation. The war of investitures had
given wing to this universal spirit of liberty and patriotism
in all the municipalities of Lombardy, in Piedmont, Venetia,
Romagna, and Tuscany. But there existed already in Italy other
free cities. … Venice, … Ravenna, … Genoa, … Pisa, …
Rome, Gaëta, Naples, Amalfi, Bari, were either never conquered
by the Lombards, or in subjection too short a time to have
lost their ancient walls, and the habit of guarding them.
These cities served as the refuge of Roman civilization. …
Those cities which had accumulated the most wealth, whose
walls inclosed the greatest population, attempted, from the
first half of the twelfth century, to secure by force of arms
the obedience of such of the neighbouring towns as did not
appear sufficiently strong to resist them, … to force them
in to a perpetual alliance, so as to share their good or evil
fortune, and always place their armed force under the standard
of the dominant city. … Two great towns in the plains of
Lombardy surpassed every other in power and wealth: Milan,
which habitually directed the party of the church; and Pavia,
which directed that of the empire. Both towns, however, seem
to have changed parties during the reigns of Lothario III. and
Conrad II., who, from the year 1125 to 1152 placed in
opposition the two houses of Guelphs and Ghibelines in
Germany. … Among the towns of Piedmont, Turin took the lead,
and disputed the authority of the counts of Savoy, who called
themselves imperial vicars in that country. … The family of
the Veronese marquises, … who from the time of the Lombard
kings had to defend the frontier against the Germans, were
extinct; and the great cities of Verona, Padua, Vicenza,
Treviso, and Mantua, nearly equal in power, maintained their
independence. Bologna held the first rank among the towns
south of the Po. … Tuscany, which had also had its powerful
marquises, saw their family become extinct with the countess
Matilda, the contemporary and friend of Gregory VII. Florence
had since risen in power, destroyed Fiesole, and … was
considered the head of the Tuscan league; and the more so that
Pisa at this period thought only of her maritime expeditions.
… Such was the state of Italy, when the Germanic diet,
assembled at Frankfort in 1152, conferred the crown on
Frederick Barbarossa, duke of Swabia, and of the house of
Hohenstaufen."

_J. C. L. de Sismondi,
History of the Italian Republics,
chapters 1-2._

ALSO IN:
_E. A. Freeman,
Historical Geography of Europe,
chapter 8, section 3._

_W. K. Williams,
The Communes of Lombardy
(Johns Hopkins University Studies, 9th series, 5-6)._

_H. Hallam,
The Middle Ages,
chapter 3, part 1 (volume 1)._

_Europe during the Middle Ages
(Lardner's Cabinet Cyclop.,
volume 1, chapter 1)._

See, also,
FLORENCE: 12TH CENTURY.

ITALY: A. D. 1063.
Birth of Pisan architecture.

See PISA: A. D. 1063-1293.

ITALY: A. D. 1077-1102.
Countess Matilda's donation to the Holy See.

See PAPACY: A. D. 1077-1102.

{1811}

ITALY: (Southern): A. D. 1081-1194.
Robert Guiscard's invasions of the Eastern Empire.
Union of Sicily with Apulia, and creation of the Kingdom of
the Two Sicilies, or Naples.

"The success of his brother [Roger, in Sicily—see above:
A. D. 1000-1090] furnished another spur to the ambition of
Robert Guiscard. Taking advantage of a dynastic revolution at
Constantinople, he and his son Bohemund commenced a series of
invasions of the Eastern Empire [see BYZANTINE EMPIRE: A. D.
1081-1085] which only ended with his death. These, though
unsuccessful in their ultimate result, were influential causes
of the first crusade, and deeply affected the relations of East
and West for years to come. Meanwhile in Sicily Roger had been
succeeded by his son [Roger II.], and, in 1127, this heir of
the destinies of his race added the dukedom of Apulia to that
of Sicily, obtained from Pope Anacletus the title of king, and
finally established the Norman kingdom of Naples [also called
the Kingdom of the Two Sicilies]. His character is thus
described by a contemporary chronicler: 'He was a lover of
justice and most severe avenger of crime. He abhorred lying;
did everything by rule, and never promised what he did not
mean to perform. He never persecuted his private enemies; and
in war endeavoured on all occasions to gain his point without
shedding of blood. Justice and peace were universally observed
throughout his dominions.' During his reign the intercourse
between England and Sicily was close. The government was
organized on principles very similar to that of England. …
Under his wise rule and that of his immediate successors, the
south of Italy and Sicily enjoyed a transient gleam of
prosperity and happiness. Their equal and tolerant government,
far surpassing anything at that day in Europe, enabled the
Saracen, the Greek, and the Italian to live together in
harmony elsewhere unknown. Trade and industry flourished, the
manufacture of silk enriched the inhabitants, and the kingdom
of Naples was at peace until she was crushed under the iron
heel of a Teutonic conqueror."

_A. H. Johnson,
The Normans in Europe,
chapter 6._

ALSO IN:
_E. A. Freeman,
The Normans at Palermo
(Historical Essays, 3d series)._

_J. W. Barlow,
Short History of the Normans in South Europe,
chapters 8-11._

ITALY: A. D. 1096-1102.
The First Crusades.

See CRUSADES: A. D. 1096-1099; and 1101-1102.

ITALY: A. D. 1138.
The accession of the Hohenstaufens to the Imperial throne, and
the origin, in Germany, of the Guelf and Ghibelline factions.

See GERMANY: A. D. 1138-1268.

ITALY: A. D. 1154-1162.
The first and second expeditions of Frederick Barbarossa.

Frederick I., the second of the emperors of the Hohenstaufen
line, called by the Italians Frederick Barbarossa (Red beard),
was elected king at Frankfort in March, 1152. In October,
1154, he crossed the Alps and entered Italy with a strong
German army, having two purposes in view:

1. To receive the imperial crown, from the hands of the Pope,
and to place on his own head, at Pavia, the iron crown of
Lombardy or Italy.

2. To reduce to order and submission the rising city-republics
of Lombardy and Tuscany, which had been growing rapidly in
independence and power during the last four troubled imperial
reigns.

At Roncaglia, he held the diet of the kingdom, and listened to
many complaints, especially against Milan, which had undoubtedly
oppressed the weaker towns of its neighbourhood and abused its
strength. Then he moved through the country, making a personal
inspection of affairs, and giving a taste of his temper by
burning the villages which failed to supply provisions to his
troops with satisfactory promptitude. At Tortona he ordered
the inhabitants to renounce their alliance with the Milanese.
They refused, and endured in the upper portion of the city a
siege of two months. Forced by want of water to surrender, at
last, they were permitted to go free, but their town was
sacked and burned. Asti, Chieri, Rosate, and other places of
more or less importance, were destroyed. Frederick did not
venture yet to attack Milan, but proceeded to Rome, demanding
the imperial crown. The pope (Adrian IV.) and the Romans were
alike distrustful of him, and he was not permitted to bring
his army into the city. After no little wrangling over
ceremonious details, and after being compelled to lead the
horse and to hold the stirrup of the haughty pontiff,
Barbarossa was finally crowned at St. Peter's, in the Vatican
suburb. The Romans attempted to interrupt the coronation, and
a terrible tumult occurred in which a thousand of the citizens
were slain. But the Germans made no attempt to take possession
of the city. On the contrary, they withdrew with haste, and
the emperor led his army back to Germany, burning Spoleto on
the way, because it failed in submissiveness, and marking a
wide track of ruin and desolation through Italy as he went.
This was in the summer of 1155. Three years passed, during
which the Italian cities grew more determined in their
independence, the emperor and his German subjects more bitter
in hostility to them, and the pope and the emperor more
antagonistic in their ambitions. In 1158 Frederick led a
second expedition into Italy, especially determined to make an
end of the contumacy of Milan. He began operations by creating
a desert of blackened country around the offending city, being
resolved to reduce it by famine. Mediators, however, appeared,
who brought about a treaty of pacification, which interrupted
hostilities for a few weeks. Then the Milanese found occasion
to accuse the emperor of a treacherous violation of the terms
of the treaty and again took up arms. The war was now to the
death. But, before settling to the siege of Milan, Frederick
gave himself the pleasure, first, of reducing the lesser city
of Crema, which continued to be faithful among the allies of
the Milanese. He held some children of the town in his hands,
as hostages, and he bound them to the towers which he moved
against the walls, compelling the wretched citizens to kill
their own offspring in the act of their self-defense. By such
atrocities as this, Crema was taken, at the end of seven
months, and destroyed. Then Milan was assailed and
beleaguered, harassed and blockaded, until, at the beginning
of March, 1162, the starved inhabitants gave up their town.
Frederick ordered the doomed city "to be completely evacuated,
so that there should not be left in it a single living being.
On the 25th of March, he summoned the militias of the rival
and Ghibeline cities, and gave them orders to rase to the
earth the houses as well as the walls of the town, so as not
to leave one stone upon another. Those of the inhabitants of
Milan whom their poverty, labour and industry attached to the
soil, were divided into four open villages, built at a
distance of at least two miles from the walls of their former
city. Others sought hospitality in the neighbouring towns of
Italy. …
{1812}
Their sufferings, the extent of their sacrifices, the
recollection of their valour, and the example of their noble
sentiments, made proselytes to the cause of liberty in every
city into which they were received." Meantime Frederick
Barbarossa returned to Germany, with his fame as a puissant
monarch much augmented.

_J. C. L. de Sismondi,
History of the Italian Republics,
chapter 2._

ALSO IN:
_U. Balzani,
The Popes and the Hohenstaufen,
chapters 3-5._

_G. B. Testa,
History of the War of Frederick I.
against the Communes of Lombardy,
books 1-6._

_E. A. Freeman,
Frederick the First, King of Italy
(Historical Essays, 1st series)._

ITALY: A. D. 1163-1164.
Third visitation of Frederick Barbarossa.
The rival Popes.

Frederick Barbarossa entered Italy for the third time in 1163,
without an army, but imposingly escorted by his German nobles.
He imagined that the country had been terrorized sufficiently
by the savage measures of his previous visitation to need no
more military repression. But he found the Lombard cities
undismayed in the assertion of their rights, and drawing
together in unions which had never been possible among them
before. The hostility of his relations with the Papacy and
with the greater part of the Church gave encouragement to
political revolt. His quarrel with Pope Hadrian had been ended
by the death of the latter, in 1159, but only to give rise to
new and more disturbing contentions. It had grown so bitter
before Hadrian died that the Pope had allied himself by treaty
with Milan, Crema, and other cities resisting Frederick, and
had promised to excommunicate the emperor within forty days.
Sudden death frustrated the combination. At the election of
Hadrian's successor there was a struggle of factions, each
determined to put its representative in the papal chair, and
each claiming success. Two rival popes were proclaimed and
consecrated, one under the name of Alexander III., the other
as Victor IV. Frederick recognized the latter, who made
himself the emperor's creature. The greater part of
Christendom soon gave its recognition to the former, although
he had been driven to take refuge in France. Pope Alexander
excommunicated Frederick and Frederick's pope, and Pope Victor
retorted like anathemas. Whether the curses of Alexander were
more effectual, or for other reasons, the authority of Victor
dwindled, and he himself presently died (April 1164), while
Frederick was making his third inspection of affairs in Italy.
The emperor found it impossible to execute his unbending will
without an army. Verona, Vicenza, Padua, and Treviso held a
congress and openly associated themselves for common defense.
Frederick attempted to make use of the militia forces of
Pavia, Cremona, and other Ghibelline towns against them; but
he found even these citizen-soldiers so mutinous with
disaffection that he dared not pursue the undertaking. He
returned to Germany for an army more in sympathy with his
obstinate designs against Italian liberty.

_U. Balzani,
The Popes and the Hohenstaufen,
chapters 4-5._

ALSO IN:
_H. H. Milman,
History of Latin Christianity,
book 8, chapters 7-8._

_G. B. Testa,
History of the War of Frederick I. against
the Communes of Lombardy,
book 7._

ITALY: A. D. 1166-1167.
The fourth expedition of Frederick Barbarossa.
The League of Lombardy.

"When Frederick, in the month of October, 1166, descended the
mountains of the Grisons to enter Italy [for the fourth time]
by the territory of Brescia, he marched his army directly to
Lodi, without permitting any act of hostility on the way. At
Lodi, he assembled, towards the end of November, a diet of the
kingdom of Italy, at which he promised the Lombards to redress
the grievances occasioned by the abuses of power by his
podestas, and to respect their just liberties; he was desirous
of separating their cause from that of the pope and the king
of Sicily; and to give greater weight to his negotiation, he
marched his army into central Italy. … The towns of the
Veronese marches, seeing the emperor and his army pass without
daring to attack them, became bolder: they assembled a new
diet, in the beginning of April, at the convent of Pontida,
between Milan and Bergamo. The consuls of Cremona, of Bergamo,
of Brescia, of Mantua and Ferrara met there and joined those
of the marches. The union of the Guelphs and Ghibellines, for
the common liberty, was hailed with universal joy. The
deputies of the Cremonese, who had lent their aid to the
destruction of Milan, seconded those of the Milanese villages
in imploring aid of the confederated towns to rebuild the city
of Milan. This confederation was called the League of
Lombardy. The consuls took the oath, and their constituents
afterwards repeated it, that every Lombard should unite for
the recovery of the common liberty; that the league for this
purpose should last twenty years; and, finally, that they
should aid each other in repairing in common any damage
experienced in this sacred cause, by anyone member of the
confederation: extending even to the past this contract for
reciprocal security, the league resolved to rebuild Milan. The
militias of Bergamo, Brescia, Cremona, Mantua, Verona, and
Treviso, arrived the 27th of April, 1167, on the ground
covered by the ruins of this great city. They apportioned
among themselves the labour of restoring the inclosing walls;
all the Milanese of the four villages, as well as those who
had taken refuge in the more distant towns, came in crowds to
take part in this pious work; and in a few weeks the new-grown
city was in a state to repel the insults of its enemies. Lodi
was soon afterwards compelled, by force of arms, to take the
oath to the league; while the towns of Venice, Placentia,
Parma, Modena, and Bologna voluntarily and gladly joined the
association."

_J. C. L. de Sismondi,
History of the Italian Republics,
chapter 2._

Meantime Frederick Barbarossa had made himself master of the
city of Rome. The Roman citizens had boldly ventured out to
meet his German army and its allies on the Tusculan hills and
had suffered a frightful defeat. Then some part of the walls
of the Leonine City were carried by assault and the
castellated church of St. Peter's was entered with ax and
sword. Two German archbishops were among the leaders of the
force which took the altars of the temple by storm and which
polluted its floors with blood. Frederick's new 'anti-pope,
Paschal III., successor to Victor IV., was now enthroned, and
the empress was formally crowned in the apostolic basilica.
Pope Alexander, who had been in possession of the city,
withdrew, and the victorious emperor appeared to have the
great objects of his burning ambition within his grasp.
"Destiny willed otherwise. It was now August; the sun was
burning the arid Campagna and oppressing the weary German
troops. A slight rain came to refresh them, but the following
day sudden destruction fell upon the camp.
{1813}
Deadly fever attacked the army with terrible violence and
reduced it daily. The men fell in heaps, and when struck down
in the morning were dead by night. The disease took stronger
hold owing to the superstitious fears of the army and the idea
of divine vengeance, for the soldiers remembered in terror the
profanation of St. Peter's, and they felt the keen edge of the
destroying angel's sword. Decimated, dismayed, demoralised,
the imperial army was hopelessly defeated, and Frederick was
compelled to strike his tents and fly before the in visible
destroyer. … The flower of his troops lay unburied in the
furrows, and with difficulty could he manage to carry back to
their native land the bodies of his noblest and trustiest
knights. Never perhaps before had Frederick given proofs of
such unshaken strength of mind. … He returned to Germany
alone and almost a fugitive, his bravest knights dead, his
army destroyed, and leaving behind him a whole nation of proud
and watchful enemies. He returned alone, but his spirit was
undaunted and dreamt of future victory and of final revenge."

_U. Balzani,
The Popes and the Hohenstaufen,
chapter 5._

ALSO IN:
_J. Miley,
History of the Papal States,
book 6, chapter 2._

_H. H. Milman,
History of Latin Christianity,
book 8, chapter 10._

_G. B. Testa,
History of the War of Frederick I.,
books 8-9._

ITALY: A. D. 1174-1183.
The last expedition of Frederick Barbarossa.
The Battle of Legnano, and the Peace of Constance.

It was not until 1174—seven years after his flight from the
Roman pestilence—that Barbarossa was able to return to Italy
and resume his struggle with Pope Alexander and the Lombard
cities. He had been detained by troubles in Germany—the
growing quarrel with his most powerful vassal, Henry the Lion,
of Saxony, more particularly. Meantime, the League of the
Lombard cities had spread and gained strength, and Pope
Alexander III. was in active co-operation with it. To better
fortify the frontiers of Lombardy, the League had built a
strong new city, at the junction of the Tanaro and Bormida,
had given it an immediate population of 15,000 people and had
named it Alessandria, after the Pope. "The Emperor, whose
arrival in Italy was urgently implored, was retained in
Germany by his mistrust of Henry the Lion, who, in order to
furnish himself with a pretext for refusing his assistance in
the intended campaign without coming to an open breach,
undertook a pilgrimage to Jerusalem, A. D. 1171; whence, after
performing his devotions at the holy sepulchre, without
unsheathing his sword in its defence, he returned to his
native country. … At length, in 1174, Frederick Barbarossa
persuaded the sullen duke to perform his duty in the field,
and for the fourth time [with an army] crossed the Alps. A
terrible revenge was taken upon Susa, which was burnt to the
ground. Alexandria [Alessandria] withstood the siege. The
military science of the age, every 'ruse de guerre,' was
exhausted by both the besiegers and the besieged, and the
whole of the winter was fruitlessly expended without any
signal success on either side. The Lombard league meanwhile
assembled an immense army in order to oppose Frederick in the
open field, whilst treason threatened him on another side. …
Henry also at length acted with open disloyalty, and declared
to the emperor, who lay sick at Chiavenna, on the lake of
Como, his intention of abandoning him; and, unshaken by
Frederick's exhortation in the name of duty and honour to
renounce his perfidious plans, offered to provide him with
money on condition of receiving considerable additions to his
power in Germany, and the free imperial town of Goslar in
gift. … Frederick, reduced to the alternative of either
following his insolent vassal, or of exposing himself and his
weakened forces to total destruction by remaining in his
present position, courageously resolved to abide the hazard,
and to await the arrival of fresh reinforcements from Germany;
the Lombards, however, saw their advantage, and attacked him
at Legnano, on the 29th of May, 1176. The Swabians (the
southern Germans still remaining true to their allegiance)
fought with all the courage of despair, but Berthold von
Zähringen was taken prisoner, the emperor's horse fell in the
thickest of the fight, his banner was won by the 'Legion of
Death,' a chosen Lombard troop, and he was given up as dead.
He escaped almost by a miracle, whilst his little army was
entirely overwhelmed."

_W. Menzel,
History of Germany,
chapter 151._

After the disastrous battle of Legnano, Frederic "was at
length persuaded, through the mediation of the republic of
Venice, to consent to a truce of six years, the provisional
terms of which were all favourable to the league. … At the
expiration of the truce Frederic's anxiety to secure the crown
for his son overcame his pride, and the famous Peace of
Constance [A. D. 1183] established the Lombard republics in
real independence. By the treaty of Constance the cities were
maintained in the enjoyment of all the regalian rights,
whether within their walls or in their district, which they
could claim by usage. Those of levying war, of erecting
fortifications, and of administering civil and criminal
justice, were specially mentioned. The nomination of their
consuls, or other magistrates, was left absolutely to the
citizens; but they were to receive the investiture of their
office from an imperial legate. The customary tributes of
provision during the emperor's residence in Italy were
preserved; and he was authorized to appoint in every city a
judge of appeal in civil causes. The Lombard league was
confirmed, and the cities were permitted to renew it at their
own discretion; but they were to take every ten years an oath
of fidelity to the emperor. This just compact preserved, along
with every security for the liberties and welfare of the
cities, as much of the imperial prerogatives as could be
exercised by a foreign sovereign consistently with the
people's happiness. … The Peace of Constance presented a
noble opportunity to the Lombards of establishing a permanent
federal union of small republics. … But dark, long-cherished
hatreds, and that implacable vindictiveness which, at least in
former ages, distinguished the private manners of Italy,
deformed her national character. … For revenge she threw
away the pearl of great price, and sacrificed even the
recollection of that liberty which had stalked like a majestic
spirit among the ruins of Milan."

_H. Hallam,
The Middle Ages,
chapter 3, part 1 (volume 1)._

ALSO IN:
_U. Balzani,
The Popes and the Hohenstaufen,
chapter 6._

_G. B. Testa,
History of the War of Frederick I.,
book 10._

See, also,
VENICE: A.D. 1177.

{1814}

A. D. 1183-1250.
Frederick II. and the end of the Hohenstaufen struggles.

After the settlement of the Peace of Constance, Frederick
Barbarossa made no further attempt to destroy the now well
established liberties of the north Italian cities. On the
contrary, he devoted himself, with considerable success, to
the regaining of their confidence and good-will, as against
the papacy, with which his relations were not improved. In
southern Italy, he acquired an important footing by the
marriage of his son Henry (already crowned King of Rome, as
Henry VI.), to Constance, the sole heiress of the Norman
kingdom of the Two Sicilies. Soon after which he went
crusading to the Holy Land, and perished in Asia Minor (A. D.
1190). His son and successor, Henry VI., who survived him but
seven years, was occupied so much in securing the Kingdom of
the Two Sicilies, already fallen to his wife (1194) by the
death of the last of the Norman kings, that he had little time
to trouble the peace of Lombardy or Germany. He was one of the
meanest of kings, faithless and cold-blooded,—brutal to the
Normans of the Sicilies and contemptible in his treatment of
the English King Richard, when his vassal of Austria made a
chance captive of the lion-hearted prince. He died in 1197,
leaving as his heir a son but four years old—the Frederick
II. of later years. There was war at once. Two rival kings
were elected in Germany, by the two factions, Guelf and
Ghibelline. The next year, one of them, Philip I., the
Ghibelline, a younger son of Frederick Barbarossa, was
assassinated; the other, Otho IV., a son of Henry the Lion,
was recognized by his opponents, and went to Rome to claim the
imperial crown. He received it, but soon quarrelled, as all
his predecessors had done, with the pope (the great pope
Innocent III. being now on the throne), and, Guelf as he was,
began to put himself in alliance with the Ghibellines of
Italy. Meantime, the boy Frederick had become king of the Two
Sicilies by the death of his mother, and Pope Innocent was his
guardian. He was now brought forward by the latter as a
claimant of the Germanic crown, against Otho, and was sent
into Germany to maintain his claim. The civil war which
followed was practically ended by the battle of Bouvines (July
27, 1214—see BOUVINES) in which Otho's cause was lost. Four
years after, the latter died, and Frederick reigned in
Germany, Italy and the Two Sicilies, without a rival, holding
the three separate crowns for five years before he received
the imperial crown, in 1220. Meantime Innocent III. died, and
Frederick became involved, even more bitterly than his father
or his grandfather had been, in quarrels with the succeeding
popes. He was a man far beyond his age in intellectual
independence (see GERMANY: A. D. 1138-1268) and freedom from
superstitious servility to the priesthood. His tastes were
cultivated, his accomplishments were many. He welcomed the
refinements which Europe at that time could borrow from the
Saracens, and his court was one of gaiety and splendor. His
papal enemies execrated him as a heretic, a blasphemer and an
"apocalyptic beast." His greatest original offenses had grown
out of two promises which he made in his youth:

1. To lead a crusade for the recovery of Jerusalem,—which he
was slow in fulfilling;

2. To resign his Italian possessions to his son, retaining
only the sovereignty of Germany for himself,—which promise he
did not fulfil at all.

The war of the Church against him was implacable, and he was
under its ban when he died. The pope even pursued him with
maledictions when he went, at last, upon his crusade, in 1228,
and when he did, by negotiations, free Jerusalem for a time
from the Moslems (see CRUSADES: A. D. 1216-1229). He was
involved, moreover, in conflicts with the Lombard cities (see
FEDERAL GOVERNMENT: MEDIÆVAL LEAGUE) which the papacy
encouraged and stimulated, and, in 1236, he won a great
victory over the League, at Cortenuova, capturing the famous
"Carroccio" of the Milanese and sending it as a gift to the
Roman Senate. But, attempting to use his victory too
inflexibly, he lost the fruits of it, and all his later years
were years of trouble and disastrous war—disastrous to Italy
and to himself. He died on the 13th of December 1250. "Out of
the long array of the Germanic successors of Charles, he
[Frederick II.] is, with Otto III., the only one who comes
before us with a genius and a frame of character that are not
those of a Northern or a Teuton. There dwelt in him, it is
true, all the energy and knightly valour of his father Henry
and his grandfather Barbarossa. But along with these, and
changing their direction, were other gifts, inherited perhaps
from his Italian mother and fostered by his education among
the orange-groves of Palermo—a love of luxury and beauty, an
intellect refined, subtle, philosophical. Through the mist of
calumny and fable it is but dimly that the truth of the man
can be discerned, and the outlines that appear serve to
quicken rather than appease the curiosity with which we regard
one of the most extraordinary personages in history. A
sensualist, yet also a warrior and a politician; a profound
lawgiver and an impassioned poet; in his youth fired by
crusading fervour, in later life persecuting heretics while
himself accused of blasphemy and unbelief; of winning manners
and ardently beloved by his followers, but with the stain of
more than one cruel deed upon his name, he was the marvel of
his own generation, and succeeding ages looked back with awe,
not unmingled with pity, upon the inscrutable figure of the
last Emperor who had braved all the terrors of the Church and
died beneath her ban, the last who had ruled from the sands of
the ocean to the shores of the Sicilian sea. But while they
pitied they condemned. The undying hatred of the Papacy threw
round his memory a lurid light; him and him alone of all the
imperial line, Dante, the worshipper of the Empire, must
perforce deliver to the flames of hell."

_J. Bryce,
The Holy Roman Empire,
chapter 13._

"The Emperor Frederick was a poet who could not only celebrate
the charms of his sovereign lady, 'the flower of all flowers,
the rose of May,' but could also exhibit his appreciation for
the beauties of nature. … Frederick also delighted in
sculpture, painting, and architecture. … Under his fostering
influence every branch of learning was starting into life
after the slumber of ages. Frederick's age can only be
compared to that glorious era of the Renaissance, when the sun
of learning, no longer shorn of his beams, poured a flood of
light over the dark places of Europe. Frederick was not only
distinguished for his love of polite literature, but also for
his ardour in the pursuit of scientific knowledge. He was
himself an author on medical subjects.
{1815}
He was a great patron of natural history. He used his friendly
relations with eastern kings to form a collection of animals
not often seen in Europe—the elephant, camel, giraffe, and
camelopard. He also wrote a treatise on Hawking, which is
still cited with respect. He classifies birds, and treats
generally of their habits. … But poetry and science were
very far from occupying all the thoughts of this distinguished
monarch. His great concern was the internal regulation of the
kingdom committed to his charge. His code in Sicily and Naples
was framed with the special view of securing equal rights to
all classes of his subjects, and of delivering them from the
yoke of the feudal oppressor. He stripped the nobles and
prelates of their jurisdiction in criminal cases. He also
decreed that any count or baron, carrying on war on his own
account, should lose his head and his goods. These were
amazing strides in the right direction, but the former was
quite unprecedented in feudal kingdoms. Many justiciaries were
appointed throughout the kingdom. No one might hold this
office without the authorisation of the crown. He strove to
make his officials as righteous as he was himself. He himself
came before his courts. So great was his love of justice, that
he would rather lose his cause than win it if he were in the
wrong. No advocates were allowed to practise without an
examination by the judicial bench. They were obliged to take
an oath that they would allege nothing against their
conscience. The court furnished widows, orphans, and the poor
with champions free of expense. The law, by which it was
guided, endeavoured to secure an even-handed administration of
justice."

_A. B. Pennington,
The Emperor Frederick II.
(Royal Historical Society, Transactions, new series,
volume 1)._

Although arbitrary and despotic in temper, the political
intelligence of Frederick led him to practical ideas of
government which were extraordinarily liberal for his age. In
his Sicilian kingdom "the towns were shorn to a great extent
of their local privileges, but were taught to unite their
strength for the common good. Twice, at least, in the course
of his reign, in 1232 and in 1240, Frederick summoned their
deputies to a conference or Parliament, 'for the weal of the
Kingdom and the general advantage of the State.' Forty-seven
cities, all belonging to the Imperial domain, sent two
deputies each to the Assembly convoked, which must not be
confounded with the Solemn Courts held by the Sovereign and
his Barons for the purpose Of revising charters, enacting
Constitutions, and regulating the government. We should be
mistaken in supposing that the Sicilian Parliament enjoyed
much of the power implied by the name. There is no trace of
any clamour against grievances, of any complaints against
officials, or of any refusal to grant supplies. The only
function of the deputies summoned seems to have been the
assessing of the public burdens. The Emperor demanded a
certain sum of money, and the deputies, meekly complying,
regulated the ways and means of raising it. 'Send your
messengers,' thus runs the writ, 'to see the Serenity of our
face on your behalf, and to bring you back our will.' Later in
the century, the Assembly acquired greater authority. It is
just possible that Simon de Montfort, who is known to have
visited the Imperial Court, may have borrowed his famous
improvement on the old English constitution from an Apulian
source; the gathering of the Commons at Foggia certainly
preceded their first meeting at Westminster by thirty years.
Other countries besides our own were indebted to Frederick for
a better mode of legislation. Shortly after his death, many of
his innovations were borrowed by his cousin Alonzo the Wise,
and were inserted in Las Siete Partidas, the new Code of
Castile. The ideas of the Suabian Emperor were evidently the
model followed by St. Louis and his successors; in France, as
well as in Southern Italy, the lawyer was feeling his way
towards the enjoyment of the power wielded of old by the
knight and the churchman; Philip the Fair was able to carry
out the projects which Frederick had merely been able to
sketch. The world made rapid strides between 1230 and 1300.
The Northern half of Italy, distracted by endless struggles,
was not insensible to the improvements introduced into the
South by her mighty son. But in the North two fatal obstacles
existed, the Papal power and the municipal spirit of the
various States, which marred all Frederick's efforts in behalf
of Italian unity." Frederick's court was the most brilliant
and refined in Europe. Mr. Kington, his historian, introduces
us to one of the Emperor's banquets, in the following
description: "A great variety of strangers meet at the
banqueting hour. Ambassadors from the Greek Monarch arrive
with a present of falcons. Some clerical visitors from Germany
are astounded to find themselves seated close to the turbaned
men of the East, and shudder on hearing that these are envoys
from the Sultan of Cairo and the Old Man of the Mountain. The
honest Germans whisper among themselves some remarks on the
late end of the Duke of Bavaria, who was stabbed at Kelheim by
a man, suspected to be an assassin, employed by the mysterious
Old Man on Frederick's behalf. The Emperor himself eats and
drinks very little. He is the very model of a host. … The
Emperor, it must be allowed, is rather loose in his talk.
Speaking of his late Crusade, he remarks: 'If the God of the
Jews had seen my Kingdom, the Terra di Lavoro, Calabria,
Sicily, and Apulia, he would not have so often praised that
land which he promised to the Jews and bestowed upon them.'
The Bishops treasure up this unlucky speech, which will one
day be noised abroad all over Italy. When the meal is over,
the company are amused by the feats of some of the Almehs,
brought from the East. Two young Arab girls of rare beauty
place themselves each upon two balls in the middle of the flat
pavement. On these they move backwards and forwards, singing
and beating time with cymbals and castanets, while throwing
themselves into intricate postures. Games and musical
instruments, procured for the Empress, form part of the
entertainment. We hear moreover of a Saracen dancer from
Aquitaine. Such sports are relished by the guests quite as
much as the Greek wine and the viands prepared by Berard the
Court cook, who is famous for his scapece; this dish,
consisting of fish boiled in salt water and sprinkled with
saffron, popular to this day in the province of Lecce, has
been derived from Apicius. … The Emperor now shows his
guests the wild beasts, which he has brought from Africa and
the East. There is the huge elephant, soon to be sent to
Cremona, the bearer of the Imperial banner, guarded by a troop
of Saracens.
{1816}
There is the female camelopard, called Seraph by the Arabs and
Italians. Next come the camels and dromedaries which carry the
Emperor's treasures when he is on the march. Lions, leopards,
panthers, and rare birds form part of the collection, and are
tended by Saracen keepers. Frederick perhaps wishes to show
his friends some sport in the Apulian plains; he has hawks of
all breeds, each of which has its name; but what most
astonishes strangers is his method of bringing down the deer.
The cheetahs, or hunting leopards of the East, are mounted on
horseback behind their keepers; these animals, as the Emperor
says, 'know how to ride.' He is a strict preserver of game; he
gives orders that the wolves and foxes, which prey upon the
small animals in his warren at Melazzo, be destroyed by means
of a poison called wolf's powder. He has many parks and
fishponds, to which he contrives to attend, even in the midst
of Lombard wars. He directs the plantation of woods, and when
a storm blows down his trees, the timber is to be sold at
Naples. … The treasures, with which Frederick dazzles the
eyes of his visitors, rival those of Solomon. The Sultan of
Egypt has given his Christian brother a tent of wonderful
workmanship, displaying the movements of the sun and moon, and
telling the hours of the day and night. This prodigy, valued
at 20,000 marks, is kept at Venosa. There is also a throne of
gold, decked with pearls and precious stones, doomed to become
the prey of Charles of Anjou and Pope Clement. There are
purple robes embroidered with gold, silks from Tripoli, and
the choicest works of the Eastern loom. Frederick charms the
ears of his guests with melodies played on silver trumpets by
black slaves, whom he has had trained. He himself knows how to
sing. Travellers, jesters, poets, philosophers, knights,
lawyers, all find a hearty welcome at the Apulian Court; if
they are natives of the Kingdom they address its Lord in the
customary second person singular, 'Tu, Messer.' He can well
appreciate the pretensions of each guest, since he is able to
converse with all his many subjects, each in his own tongue.
The Arab from Palestine, the Greek from Calabria, the Italian
from Tuscany, the Frenchman from Lorraine, the German from
Thuringia, find that Cæsar understands them all. With Latin,
of course, he is familiar. Very different is Frederick from
his Northern grandsire, who could speak nothing but German and
very bad Latin. Troubadour, Crusader, Lawgiver; German by
blood, Italian by birth, Arab by training; the pupil, the
tyrant, the victim of Rome; accused by the world of being by
turns a Catholic persecutor, a Mohammedan convert, an Infidel
freethinker; such is Frederick the Second. His character has
been sketched for us by two men of opposite politics,
Salimbene the Guelf and Jamsilla the Ghibelline, both of whom
knew him well. Each does justice to the wonderful genius of
the Emperor, and to the rapid development of the arts and
commerce under his fostering care. But all is not fair,
whatever appearances may be. Every generation of the
Hohenstaufen Kaisers seemed to add a vice to the shame of
their house. Cruelty is the one dark stain in the character of
Barbarossa; cruelty and treachery mar the soaring genius of
Henry the Sixth; cruelty, treachery, and lewdness are the
three blots that can never be wiped away from the memory of
Frederick the Second. He has painted his likeness with his own
hand. His Registers with their varied entries throw more light
upon his nature than any panegyrics or diatribes can do. One
example will be enough. If he wishes to get an impregnable
castle into his hands, he thus writes to his
general:—'Pretend some business, and warily call the
Castellan to you; seize on him if you can, and keep him till
he cause the castle to be surrendered to you.' … Frederick's
cruelty is indisputable. His leaden copes, which weighed down
the victims of his wrath until death came to the rescue, were
long the talk of Italy and are mentioned by Dante."

_T. L. Kington,
History of Frederick the Second, Emperor of the Romans,
volume 1, chapter 9._

"After the death of Frederick II., an interval of twenty-three
years passed without the appointment of a king of the Romans
[the Great Interregnum—see GERMANY: A. D. 1250-1272], and an
interval of sixty years without the recognition of an emperor
in Italy." Frederick's son Conrad, whom he had caused to be
crowned, was driven out of Germany and died in 1254. Another
son, Manfred, acquired the crown of Sicily and reigned for a
time; but the unrelenting pope persuaded Charles of Anjou to
make a conquest of the kingdom, and Manfred was slain in
battle (A. D. 1266). Conrad's young son, Conradin, then
attempted to recover the Sicilian throne, but was defeated,
taken prisoner, and perished on the scaffold (1268). He was
the last of the Hohenstaufen.

_O. Browning,
Guelfs and Ghibellines,
chapters 2-3._

ALSO IN:
_J. Bryce,
The Holy Roman Empire,
chapters 11-13._

_E. A. Freeman,
The Emperor Frederick the Second
(Historical Essays, volume 1, Essay 10)._

_Mrs. W. Busk,
Mediæval Popes, Emperors, Kings, and Crusaders,
book 4 (volumes 3-4)._

ITALY: A. D. 1198-1216.
The establishing of Papal Sovereignty in the
States of the Church.

See PAPACY: A. D. 1198-1216.

ITALY: 13th Century.
Political conditions which prepared the way for the despots.