Matilda's son
therefore
was now passed over in silence.
Cambridge Medieval History - v3 - Germany and the Western Empire
The French army harassed the rear of the retreating
army and even fought a slight engagement on the banks of the Aisne.
In the next year Lothair involved himself in a local dispute in Flanders,
but finally sought an interview with the Emperor at Margut on the
Chiers (980), where he agreed to abandon all claim to Lorraine.
During the first seven years of his reign Otto had been fairly successful.
He had settled the troubles with which he was confronted in Bavaria at
the outset of his reign; he had maintained his position in Lorraine in
the face of repeated rebellions and attempts of Lothair to recover it for
the West Frankish crown; he had subdued the Danes, the Bohemians,
and the Poles. Under his rule the work of conversion of the heathen
races on the eastern frontier made rapid progress. Bishoprics were
established for Bohemia at Prague, for Moravia at Olmütz and for
Denmark at Odense on the island of Fyn. Even the Hungarians, in
spite of intermittent warfare in which Liutpold succeeded in extending
the East March as far as the Wienerwald, were inclined to be on better
terms with Germany and permitted Bishop Pilgrim of Passau to pursue
his missionary labours among the heathen Magyars.
The affairs of Germany were at last sufficiently settled to justify the
Emperor's absence in Italy. In November 980 he crossed the Alps
accompanied by his wife, his infant son (Otto III was born in July 980),
and his nephew Otto of Swabia.
The disastrous end of Otto's Italian campaign of 980-9831 led to
revolts all along the German frontier, accompanied by a heathen
reaction. Duke Bernard of Saxony on his way to the diet of Verona
(983) was summoned back by the news that Svein who had deposed his
father, Harold Bluetooth, had overrun the Danish March. The Lusa-
tians broke into rebellion, destroyed the churches of Havelberg and
Brandenburg and put many Christians to the sword. Hamburg was
plundered and burnt by the Obotrites, Zeitz by an army of Bohemians.
The faith of Christ and St Peter, says Thietmar, was forsaken for
the worship of demons. A combined movement of the Saxon princes
East Franks, and King Lothair turned it to the S. E. indicating that the West Frankish
king was lord over Germany. But Thietmar 11. 8 says the opposite. “It was the
custom of all who possessed this place to turn it (the eagle) towards their country";
that is, if it pointed east it indicated that the German king was lord of Aix-la-
Chapelle.
1 Vide supra, pp. 168–70.
## p. 209 (#255) ############################################
Accession of Otto III
209
under the Margrave Dietrich, the Archbishop of Magdeburg and the
Bishop of Halberstadt succeeded in checking the advance in a battle
fought at Belkesheim, just west of the Elbe, but they failed to re-
establish German influence or Christianity among the heathen tribes.
The work of Otto the Great, carried on so successfully in the earlier
years of his son's reign, received a blow from which it did not recover
for more than a century.
It only remains to notice the complete reversal of German policy
which is marked by the diet held at Verona in June 983. The death of
Otto, Duke of Swabia and Bavaria, at Lucca on his way back to Germany
necessitated a new arrangement for the southern duchies. His death,
combined with the disasters in Germany and Italy, involved the ruin of
the party represented by the descendants of Otto the Great's first
marriage, the two Duke Ottos, and the ascendancy of what we may call
the Adelaide party. The Emperor was not strong enough to stand
against the powerful influences of his mother. Not only did he make
her regent in Italy, but further he deposed Otto of Carinthia from his
duchy which, reunited with Bavaria, he gave to Henry the Younger.
The unfortunate Otto was therefore kept from his duchy through no
fault of his own, until Otto III, taking advantage of another vacancy in
995, reinstated him in his former dignity. Swabia was granted to
Conrad of the Franconian family. At the same diet the infant son of
the Emperor was chosen as the successor to the throne.
Misfortune and the Italian climate combined to ruin the Emperor's
health. After a short illness he died at Rome on 7 December 983 in
his twenty-eighth year and was buried in the church of St Peter.
Otto III, then three years old, was being crowned at the Christmas
festival at Aix-la-Chapelle when news arrived of his father's death at
Rome. The question of the regency at once arose. It would, according
to German practice, fall to Henry the Wrangler, the deposed and im-
prisoned Duke of Bavaria, but Byzantine custom favoured the Empress
Mother and it was not likely that Theophano would allow her claim to
be lightly passed over. Henry, who was immediately set at liberty by
the Bishop of Utrecht, took prompt action. Moreover, it soon became
evident that he was aiming not at the regency but at the crown. He
hurried to Cologne and before his opponents had time to consider the
situation, he had taken the young Otto out of the hands of Archbishop
Willigis of Mayence. Though he won the support of the powerful
Archbishops of Cologne, Trèves and Magdeburg and the Bishop of Metz,
yet a strong party in Lorraine collected to withstand him. The strength
of this party lay in the influential family of Godfrey, the Count of
Hainault and Verdun. His son Adalbero was Bishop of Verdun, his
brother, also Adalbero, was Archbishop of Rheims. With the arch-
bishop worked the most remarkable man of the tenth century, Gerbert
of Aurillac. In 983 Otto II had made him abbot of the Lombard
C. JED, H. VOL. III, CHIX.
14
## p. 210 (#256) ############################################
210
The Regency
.
monastery of Bobbio, but disgusted at the lack of discipline of the
monks, he had just returned to resume his former work of Scholasticus
at the cathedral school of Rheims. From his correspondence for these
years we can gather how indefatigably he laboured in the interests of
the
young
Otto.
The situation was rendered more complex by the unexpected appear-
ance of Lothair as a candidate for the regency. Perhaps his real motive
was to induce Henry to give up Lorraine in return for the abandon-
ment of his claim, which, being upheld by the Lotharingian aristocracy,
by his brother Charles, and by Hugh Capet, was sufficiently formidable
to cause alarm. Soon he actually made this proposal to Henry and
entered into a secret compact with him, by which he agreed to support
the duke's claim to the throne in return for the duchy. The Lotharin-
gian nobles, alienated by the altered circumstances, at once prepared to
resist Lothair's attempt to occupy the duchy. Verdun fell before the
French attack (March 984) and Godfrey, who bravely defended it, was
captured. The stout resistance of Godfrey's sons, Herman and Adalbero,
prevented Lothair from making further progress, and the hostility of
Hugh Capet made it necessary for him to turn his attention to his own
kingdom. With the departure of the King of France, the centre of
action shifted to the east. In Saxony Henry's efforts met with no
success. Though he had himself proclaimed king by his supporters at
the Easter festival at Quedlinburg, where he received oaths of fealty from
the princes of the Bohemians, Poles and Obotrites, he was formally
renounced by an assembly of Saxon princes. Loyal to the representative
of the Saxon dynasty, they even prepared to resist the usurper with arms.
Failing to reconcile them, though succeeding in staving off a war by a
truce, Henry withdrew to his old duchy of Bavaria, where he found
himself firmly withstood by his cousin Henry the Younger.
Lothair had made no headway in Lorraine. The loyalty of the
Saxons and the energy of Conrad of Swabia and Willigis of Mayence,
the leaders of Otto's party, prevented Henry from gaining ground in the
other duchies; he was in no position to attempt to win the crown by
force of arms. Driven by pressure of circumstances he submitted his
claim to a diet of German princes. The assembly which met at Bürstadt
near Worms decided unanimously in favour of the young Otto. Henry
engaged to deliver the boy to the care of his mother and grandmother
at a diet to be held at Rara (perhaps Rohr, near Meiningen) on 29 June.
In the interval Henry, supported by Boleslav, prince of the Bohemians,
tried his fortunes in Thuringia but with similar lack of success. At
the diet of Rara, on the guarantee that he would be compensated
with Bavaria, Henry handed over the young king to the charge of
Theophano and Adelaide, who had been summoned from Italy. Henry
the Younger made some show of resistance at being ousted from his
duchy of Bavaria, but a final pacification took place early in the year
a
a
## p. 211 (#257) ############################################
War on the Eastern Frontier
211
985 at Frankfort. Henry was re-established in Bavaria and his cousin
was forced to content himself with Carinthia and the March of Verona,
now again formed into a separate duchy. At first Theophano and
Adelaide acted as joint regents, but the influence of the former soon
became predominant. In the administration of the kingdom she was
assisted by Willigis, Archbishop of Mayence, who took charge of affairs
in Germany during her absence in Italy in 989. The minority fell at a
critical time. The death of King Lothair of France in 986, followed a
year later by the death of his son, Louis V, without an heir, plunged
France into a civil war, during which the opposing parties of Hugh
Capet and Charles of Lower Lorraine, the representative of the Caro-
lingian house, each sought to win the help of the regents of Germany.
Theophano succeeded in maintaining a neutral attitude ; but the dynastic
question was no sooner settled in favour of Hugh, than another hot
dispute broke out as the result of the decision of the synod held at the
monastery of St Basle de Verzy near Rheims (June 991). The Arch-
bishop Arnulf of Rheims, the natural son of Lothair, was deposed from
his see and Gerbert was appointed in his place. Germany was again
called
upon to play a part in the affairs of France. A synod of German
bishops held at Ingelheim in 994 declared against the decisions of
St Basle. The controversy dragged on until 998, when Otto solved
the problem by making Gerbert Archbishop of Ravenna, thus leaving
Rheims in undisputed possession of Arnulf.
Still more serious was the general state of unrest on the Eastern
frontier. During the years 985-987 there was continual fighting against
the Wends and Bohemians. With the help of Mesco, Duke of the
Poles, Meissen was recovered for the Margrave Eckhard. When in 990
a war broke out between the Poles and Bohemians Theophano supported
Mesco while Boleslav was allied with the Lusatians. The Bohemians,
fearing to engage with the Germans, treated for peace. The Saxons
acted as mediators but barely escaped destruction through the treachery
of the barbarians. It was Boleslav, and not their ally Mesco, who
enabled the Saxon army to escape in safety to Magdeburg. On 15 June
991 Theophano died. Adelaide, who now returned from Italy and
undertook the regency, had neither the energy nor the statesmanlike
qualities of the younger Empress, and the weakness of her rule soon
became apparent in the frontier warfare. Brandenburg in 991 became
the centre of operations. The young king captured it with the help of
Mesco, but no sooner was his back turned than it was reconquered for
the Lusatians by a Saxon named Kiso. Otto renewed the attack in the
following year with the help of Henry of Bavaria and Boleslav of
Bohemia ; Boleslav, who had succeeded his father Mesco as prince of the
Poles, being threatened with a war with the Russians, was unable to
accompany the king in person but sent troops to his assistance. But not
till the spring of 993 was the fortress recovered, and then not by the
CH, Tx.
14-2
## p. 212 (#258) ############################################
212
Ambitions of Otto III
ineffectual efforts of his motley army, but by the same means as it was
lost, the treachery of Kiso. His faithless conduct brought on an attack
of the Lusatians; they fell upon and scattered an army sent to Kiso's
support under the Margrave Eckhard of Meissen. However, when the
king took the field himself they were quickly dispersed. A brief notice
of the Quedlinburg annalist informs us of a general rising of the Wends:
“All the Slavs except the Sorbs revolted from the Saxons" (994).
After a short campaign in the following year Otto seems to have
patched up some kind of a truce, and restored order sufficient to permit
him to leave Germany, and fulfil his cherished wish of visiting Italy.
Unfortunately the disturbances were not confined to the eastern
frontier. In 991 the Northmen, taking advantage of the internal
weakness of Germany, renewed their piratical descents on the Frisian
coast. In 994 they actually sailed up the river Elbe and carried their
devastations into Saxony. In an engagement fought at Stade a small
band of Saxons was defeated and their leaders were captured. While
the Saxon chiefs lay bound hand and foot on the ships, the Northmen
ravaged the country at will. Of the captives, some were ransomed, the
Margrave Siegfried effected his escape by making his capturers intoxi-
cated, the remainder, after shameful mutilation, were cast, more dead
than alive, upon the shore. The pirates renewed their inroads in the
next year, but the defensive measures taken by Bishop Bernward of
Hildesheim successfully checked their aggressions.
Our brief summary of the events of the frontier campaigns illustrates
the difficulties of the situation in Germany; it shews how fatal and how
lasting had been the effects of Otto II's Italian policy, how unwise the
high imperial aims of Otto III. Fortunately for the regents the southern
duchies had given no trouble since the baffled attempt of Henry the
Wrangler to obtain the crown for himself. Changes however had taken
place in their administration. On the death of Henry the Younger in
989 Carinthia and the March of Verona had been re-attached to the
duchy of Bavaria. But when Henry the Wrangler died in 995, they did
not pass with Bavaria to his son Henry, afterwards the Emperor Henry II,
but were restored to Otto, the son of Conrad the Red'.
Otto's first object was to visit Italy. He had taken the government
into his own hands in 994 when he was fourteen years of age, but owing
to the unsettled state of Germany it was not until 996 that he was able
to achieve his purpose. It was after his return from his first expedition
across the Alps that he began to develop that ambitious and somewhat
fantastic policy, for which perhaps he has been too severely censured. It
must be remembered that from his earliest boyhood he had come under
the influence of foreigners. The blame must rest equally on all those
who had charge of his education. His mother, the Empress Theophano,
and his tutor John, Abbot of the monastery of Nonantula, a Calabrian by
1 According to some authorities Otto was not restored to his duchy till 1002.
## p. 213 (#259) ############################################
Visit to the tomb of Charlemagne
213
>
birth, had taught him Latin and Greek, taught him to despise “Saxon
rusticity” and to prefer “our Greek subtility? . " They had also made
him familiar with the elaborate ceremonial of the Byzantine court. His
intimacy with Gerbert, when he was still at an impressionable age, had
moulded him into the ideals of the Roman Empire.
He was now in 996 Holy Roman Emperor, and the title had for
him a greater meaning than for his predecessors. The legend on one
of his seals, i renovatio imperii Romanorum,” shews clearly that he
realised that he was making a change in the imperial position. The
change is most apparent in the ordering of the institution where the
business of the Empire was transacted, the imperial chancery. Otto the
Great had not revived the system which had prevailed under the Caro-
lingians of treating Italy as a part of the Empire under the same
administrative machinery. He had established a separate chancery for
Italy. Germany and Italy were to be two distinct governments under one
ruler. When a vacancy occurred in 994 in the chancellorship of Italy,
Otto had appointed his chaplain Heribert. On the death of the German
chancellor, Hildibald of Worms, in 998, Heribert was placed at the
head of the German chancery also. Otto had departed from the system
established by his grandfather and, working on a definite plan, he returned
to the Carolingian tradition of a combined chancery for the whole
Empire. The two titular heads, the arch-chancellors of Germany and
Italy, remained, but their offices were sinecures ; the business of the
Empire was done by a single chancellor in a single chancery. Equally
significant is Otto's choice of counsellors. He completely emancipated
himself from the control of those men who had conducted the administra-
tion during his minority. Willigis of Mayence, Hildibald of Worms,
were replaced by an entirely new body of men. With the exception
of the chancellor Heribert, who was appointed Archbishop of Cologne
in 999, the men who exercised the most influence at court were foreigners.
Gerbert of Aurillac, Marquess Hugh of Tuscany, Peter, Bishop of Como,
the arch-chancellor of Italy, form the Emperor's intimate circle of
advisers.
The reverential, though perhaps over inquisitive, visit of the Emperor
to the tomb of Charles the Great at Aix-la-Chapelle in the year 1000 is
symbolic of his attitude and policy. The famous story of the opening of
the tomb is recorded by the chronicler of the monastery of Novalesa in
Lombardy, who, though writing more than half a century later, gives
his information on the authority of Otto, Count of Lomello, who is said
to have been present on the occasion. “We entered in," he said, “unto
Charles. He was not lying down, as is the manner with the bodies of
other dead men, but sat on a certain chair as though he lived. He was
crowned with a golden crown, and held a sceptre in his hands, the same
being covered with gloves, through which the nails had grown and
1 Gerbert, Epist. (ed. Julien Havet), no. 186.
CH. I.
## p. 214 (#260) ############################################
214
Failure and Death of Otto III
pierced. And above him was a tabernacle compact of brass and marble
exceedingly. Now when we were come in unto the tomb, we brake and
made straightway an opening in it. And when we entered into it, we
perceived a vehement savour. So we did worship forthwith to him with
bended thighs and knees; and straightway Otto the Emperor clad him
with white raiment, and pared his nails, and made good all that was
lacking about him. But none of his members had corrupted and fallen
away, except a little piece of the end of his nose, which he caused at
once to be restored with gold ; and he took from his mouth one tooth,
and built the tabernacle again and departed 1. ”
The Emperor's genuine aim was to unite the interests of Germany and
Italy. The appointments of his cousin Bruno (Gregory V) in 996 and of
Gerbert (Silvester II) in 999 to the papal chair were intended to advance
this end. But this policy in reality amounted to a neglect of Germany.
Since 996 he had spent only a few months on German soil. It is not
surprising, therefore, that he was regarded with distrust. The older
generation of German prelates had their grievance; they disliked his
close connexion with the Papacy, they had been ousted from their
former influential positions by foreigners and they resented it. Otto's
premature death alone prevented an open outbreak in Germany. He
himself realised that he had set his ambitions too high, that he had
sacrificed Germany without gaining any material compensation. • Are
you not my Romans? ” he is reported to have said in bitter reproach.
“For you I have left my country and my kindred. For love of you I
have abandoned my Saxons, and all the Germans, my own blood. . . I have
adopted you as sons, I have preferred you to all. For your sake I
I
have brought upon myself the envy and hatred of all. And now
you have cast out your father. You have encompassed my servants
with a cruel death, you have closed your gates against me. ” These
are the words of a disappointed man. He died in his twenty-second
year at Paterno on 24 January 1002 from an attack of the small-
pox. It was his wish that he should be buried in the Carolingian
capital. After fighting a way through the lines of the hostile Romans,
his followers succeeded in bringing his body safely to Aix-la-Chapelle,
where it was buried in the centre of the choir of the church of St Mary.
1 Chronicon Novaliciense ini. 32: the truth of this narrative has been much
controverted. The smaller details may have been invented, but the central facts
are probably historical and are in part supported by Thietmar (Chronicon iv. 46).
See an article by Professor Grauert, Historisches Jahrbuch, xiv. 302 f. At the same
time it must be admitted that the chronicler of Novalesa, although truthful, had
the inborn gift of romance.
## p. 215 (#261) ############################################
215
CHAPTER X.
THE EMPEROR HENRY II.
When Otto III, still a youth, expired at Paterno in January 1002, it
seemed as if the life work of his grandfather Otto the Great had been com-
pletely undone. Animosity pursued the Emperor even after death; for
only by hard fighting could his friends succeed in transporting his remains
through the plain of Lombardy for interment in Germany. The fate there-
fore, alike of the Western Empire and of the German kingdom upon which
it was based, depended far more than usual upon the qualities of the man
who might be called to occupy the vacant throne.
To this grave crisis there was added the misfortune of a disputed
succession. Otto III, the last descendant in the male line of Otto the
Great, had died unmarried; nor was there any one person naturally des-
tined to succeed him. Descent and election were the two factors by which
accession to the throne was legally determined; but the relative influence
of these varied according to circumstances. On the present occasion it
was election, in practice confined to the magnates, which was bound to
be preponderant. For though a candidate was forthcoming from the
royal house, he was met at once by powerful opponents. And his claim
in itself was not indisputable. The true representative of the Ottos was
the son of the late Emperor's only wedded sister Matilda, wife of Ezo,
son of Herman, Count Palatine in Lorraine. But this heir was a child,
and was the offspring of a marriage which had been deemed unequal.
Matilda's son therefore was now passed over in silence. There were also
two men who could assert some right to be accepted as head of the
Liudolfing house. The one was Otto, Duke of Carinthia, grandson (through
his mother Liutgard) of Otto the Great, and son of the famous Conrad,
once Duke of Lorraine, who had fallen gloriously at the Lechfeld. To his
great position Otto added the personal qualities of dignity and upright-
ness. He must have been at this time at least fifty years of age. The other
was a far younger man, Henry, Duke of Bavaria, son of Duke Henry "the
Wrangler," and grandson of that earlier Henry, the younger brother of
Otto the Great, who was the first of his family to rule in Bavaria. The
present duke therefore was the actual representative in the male line of
King Henry "the Fowler," the first of the Saxon kings. As it happened,
CH. X.
## p. 216 (#262) ############################################
216
Rival candidates
of
no rivalry arose between the two kinsmen. For when Henry expressed
his readiness to accept Otto as king, the latter declined to come forward
and, acknowledging Henry to be the fitter man, urged him to secure
election for himself.
But election also was legally necessary; and the magnates were not
disposed to let slip the present opportunity of choosing a king at their own
pleasure. When therefore the funeral train of the late Emperor reached
Augsburg on its way to Aix, Henry, anxious to assert his claim, first
took forcible possession of the imperial insignia, and then sought by
profuse promises to win over the attendant magnates for the support of
his cause, but he met with little success.
Already indeed a formidable rival had appeared. The chief men of
Saxony had met at Frohse, and there the Margrave Eckhard of Meissen
had revealed his purpose of gaining the throne. He was the foremost
warrior of his time; he had fought with distinction against the Saracens
in Italy, and at Rome in 998 it was he who had brought about the sur-
render of the castle of Sant' Angelo and the death of its defender
Crescentius. As Margrave of Meissen he had repelled the Wends, reduced
Bohemia to vassalage, and restrained the Polish duke Boleslav from
assailing the kingdom. Though not of royal descent, he was sprung
an ancient Thuringian stock, and was connected with the Billungs, the
new ducal house of Saxony. But a powerful enemy, the Margrave Liuthar
of the North Mark, now set himself to frustrate Eckhard's ambitious
design. Having secured a sworn promise from most of the Saxon mag-
nates to take no part in electing a king until a further conference, Liuthar
secretly visited the Duke of Bavaria, upon whom he urged the necessity
of sending an envoy to represent his interests at the postponed meeting.
And so skilfully did Henry's emissary, by means of lavish promises, work
upon the Saxon nobles when they met at Werla, that he won from them a
unanimous recognition of Henry's hereditary right to the throne and a
solemn pledge of service. Eckhard's haughty abstention from the meeting
had ruined his cause.
By this time a third competitor for the crown was in the field. This
was Herman II, Duke of Swabia. Timorous and retiring by nature, Her-
man had come forward at the suggestion of others. After the obsequies
of Otto III had been performed at Aix on 5 April, most of the magnates
there present had expressed their disinclination to accept Henry of Bavaria
as his successor. In the Duke of Swabia they saw a candidate more to their
liking; and certainly Herman's descent from a great Franconian house,
one member of which had formerly occupied the throne, and his position
as ruler of one of the chief races of Germany were plausible reasons for
his elevation. In reality it was his very gentleness of character that
reconimended him to his proposers, who might hope to find in him a
king to be obeyed or not as they pleased.
Through the Duke of Swabia Eckhard hoped to revenge himself upon
## p. 217 (#263) ############################################
Recognition of Henry II
217
Henry. But on his way to Duisburg, where Herman then was, he received
an intimation that he would not be admitted to the counsels of the
Swabian party. Returning homewards after this second rebuff, he was
waylaid at Pöhlde on the night of 30 April by four brothers who cherished
a private grudge against him, and was slain.
This tragic event removed a dangerous enemy from Henry's path, but
the contention with Duke Herman proved long and bitter. Henry could
count upon the magnates of Bavaria, of East Franconia, and of Saxony,
while Herman had the support only of those of Swabia and of West
Franconia. The Swabian faction, however, was resolute, and the Lor-
rainers were still doubtful. Archbishop Willigis of Mayence, the mainstay
of the last two Emperors, now stood for the principle of legitimate suc-
cession. At the beginning of June, Henry, with his Bavarian and
Franconian adherents, approached the Rhine at Worms, evaded Herman,
and entered Mayence. There his election followed; and on 7 June that
act was ratified by his solemn unction and coronation.
This success decided the wavering Dietrich, Duke of Upper Lorraine.
But the election had been carried through in haste by a few partisans of
the new king; and not only did the Duke of Swabia and his friends remain
defiant, but the nobles of Lower Lorraine still held aloof, while those of
Saxony took umbrage at their total exclusion from the proceedings at
Mayence. To force Herman to submission Henry turned southwards and
began to ravage Swabia. But the duke retaliated by assaulting and
sacking his own city of Strasbourg, whose bishop had declared for his
rival, and refused to be drawn into a decision by battle. Baffled in the
South, Henry proceeded to make sure of the rest of the kingdom. In
Thuringia, in July, he received full acknowledgment from Count William
of Weimar and the other chief men, and gratefully abolished the ancient
tribute of swine, due from the Thuringians to the crown. But from the
Saxon magnates Henry obtained a less easy recognition. There had
assembled to meet him at Merseburg on 23 July a great company of the
bishops and counts of Saxony, at whose head stood the Archbishops of
Bremen and Magdeburg with their Duke Bernard and the Margraves
Liuthar and Gero. Duke Boleslav of Poland also, fresh from an attack on
the mark of Meissen made after the death of Eckhard, presumed to appear
among them. These men, though they received the new king with defer-
ence, were not prepared to offer him an unconditional allegiance. They
stood upon their separate rights, and the next day, before any homage was
paid, Bernard came forward in their name and in that of the Saxon people
to assert their peculiar claims, and to demand of Henry how far he would
pledge himself to respect them. Henry replied by extolling the steadfast
loyalty of the Saxons to their kings; it was only with their approval that
he now came among them as king; and so far from infringing their law
he would be careful to observe it at all points, and would do his utmost
to fulfil their reasonable wishes. The speech satisfied the magnates; and
CH, X.
## p. 218 (#264) ############################################
218
Henry's earlier life
Duke Bernard taking the sacred lance in his hands, delivered it to the
king; their homage and oath of fealty then followed. From Merseburg
Henry hastened to Lower Lorraine. In the course of his journey he was
joined by his wife Kunigunda, whom he saw crowned queen at Paderborn
on 10 August by Archbishop Willigis. A fierce conflict, which broke out
between the king's Bavarian followers and the Saxon inhabitants of the
city, marred the rejoicings. In Lower Lorraine Henry found no ready
acceptance. Two bishops only received him; others hesitated to join
them; and Archbishop Heribert of Cologne, indulging a personal grudge,
purposely held aloof. At length the prelates concurred in choosing Henry
to be king, and after tendering him their oath of fealty, accompanied
him to Aix. There, on 8 September, the remaining Lorrainer magnates
joined in placing Henry on the coronation chair of his predecessors, and
in paying him homage. Nothing therefore was now wanting but the
submission of the Duke of Swabia. Herman, however, finding himself now
so far outmatched, was already prepared to yield. Through mediators he
besought the king's grace for himself and his adherents; and then on
1 October appeared in person before Henry at Bruchsal. On swearing
allegiance, Herman was suffered to retain both his duchy and his fiefs,
but was required to make good the damage he had caused to the city
of Strasbourg
Henry's title to reign, thus acknowledged in Germany, was also
accepted by peoples outside. The Venetians renewed with Henry the
treaty of friendship concluded with Otto II. In the vassal state of
Bohemia a revolution had lately set up a new ruler who at once sought
formal investiture at the hands of Henry. Lastly, from Italy, there came
letters and envoys of the imperialist party, urging Henry to intervene in
rebellious Lombardy.
Henry of Bavaria, the fifth of his house to occupy the German throne,
is known in history as Henry II, both as King and Emperor. He was
born on 6 May 973, and had therefore lately completed his twenty-ninth
year when he was crowned at Mayence in June 1002. His early life had
been moulded by adversity. By the rebellion of his father, Duke Henry
“the Wrangler," he had been deprived of his home; and after some time
spent under the care of Abraham, Bishop of Freising, he had been sent, still
a child, to be brought up at Hildesheim. There he received his first
grounding in an education which made him in all ways a cultivated man,
well learned both in Holy Scripture and in ecclesiastical lore. He be-
came acquainted at the same time with the methods of church govern-
ment, as he was meant for the clerical career; but his father's restoration
in 985 brought him back to Bavaria. Further training under Bishop
Wolfgang of Ratisbon helped to form those decided ideas upon Church
and State which afterwards shaped his policy as king. Upon the death
of his father in August 995 Henry succeeded without question to the duchy
of Bavaria. The last exhortation of the repentant Wrangler to his son
а
## p. 219 (#265) ############################################
Character of Henry
219
a
had been to remain ever loyal to his king; and by that advice Henry
steadily walked during the next six years. Otto III had no more faithful
subject than his cousin of Bavaria, who twice accompanied him to Italy,
and on the second occasion was instrumental, with Marquess Hugh of
Tuscany, in saving him from the wrath of the Roman mob. Moreover,
when the German magnates were scheming to dethrone the absent
Emperor, Henry refused to take any part in their conspiracy. Until
Otto's premature death opened to him the prospect of succession, he
had been, as Duke of Bavaria, a just and vigorous ruler.
Of Henry's outward appearance nothing certain is known. Later tradi-
tion indeed gives him the attribute of “the Lame," and two varying legends
profess to account for the supposed infirmity. A real hindrance, however,
was the liability to severe attacks of a painful internal complaint; Henry
was in truth a sickly man, and his bodily weakness may have sometimes
interfered with his plans. His life and actions were regulated by a strict
conscientiousness and by a piety sober and restrained. The Christian faith
and its Founder, the saints and their sanctuaries, the German church and
its officers, were the objects of his reverence; he punctually attended,
and sometimes took part in, the ceremonies of the Church; he was the
determined foe of ecclesiastical abuses; and if he shared the prevailing
superstition in regard to relics, this was balanced by an ungrudging
liberality to the poor and a splendid munificence in the founding and
maintenance of religious institutions. With all this, Henry was no mere
devotee. He was sociable, and took pleasure in the ordinary amusements
of his day; he was not above playing a practical joke on a troublesome
bishop, and once even incurred rebuke for encouraging a brutal form of
sport. The chase was to him a welcome recreation. Henry was thus
utterly unlike Otto III. He loved his ancestral land of Saxony; the
glamour of Italy did not entice him away from his proper task as a German
king; nor did he entertain any visionary idea of universal dominion under
the form of a revived Roman Empire. The whole bent of his mind was
practical; his undertakings were limited in scope and were pursued with
caution. Prudence indeed was the quality by which he most impressed his
contemporaries. Yet he was not without the kingly ideals of his day. He
had a passion for law and order; and in his conception of the kingly office
a
he was the guardian of the realm against attack from without and against
disturbance within, the champion of the weak and the enemy of all wrong-
doers, the defender of the Church and the promoter of its spiritual work.
No king before him was more untiring in travel to dispense justice among
his people; no ruler could be more stern on occasion in executing judg-
ment on rebels and lawbreakers. In spite of his weak health he did not
shrink from taking his full share in the dangers and hardships of a cam-
paign. And with this courage there was joined a royal humanity which
could shew mercy to the vanquished. Alike in the limitation of his aims
and the steady persistency of his rule, he shewed no little resemblance
CH, X.
## p. 220 (#266) ############################################
220
General character of Henry's reign
to the earliest Henry of his race. In moral dignity, it may be safely said,
he excelled any monarch of the Saxon house.
The Empire presented a complication of difficulties such as only
patience and prudence could overcome. Nearly every province was
seething in unrest. Not only were the lay magnates, as ever, at feud
with their ecclesiastical neighbours, but each order was rent by quarrels
among its own members. Among the clergy of every degree, worldliness
and neglect of duty, avarice and loose living, were widely prevalent. It
was a heavy task, therefore, that Henry undertook, and he had now to
restore by his own efforts the sovereign power in face of men who had
hitherto been his equals.
In these adverse circumstances the new reign began, and by them its
course was set. The history of the reign is confused; but through it all
may be traced the king's unwavering purpose of bringing about a more
settled state of things. The large measure of success that he achieved
therein entitles Henry to a high place among the sovereigns of Germany;
but his zeal for the suppression of ecclesiastical abuses was felt over a
wider sphere, and has set him among the reformers of the Western Church.
And it is in the ecclesiastical policy that he pursued, combining as it did
the political system of Otto the Great with the reforming energy of
Henry the Third, and thus linking him with both those monarchs, that
the chief interest of his career is to be found.
The beginning of Henry's reign was marked by two grave losses to
the Empire; in the South, of the Lombard kingdom; in the East, of the
tributary duchy of Bohemia. The former event, indeed, had taken place
even before Henry had become a candidate for the throne. For within a
month of the death of Otto III Lombardy broke into open revolt; and
on 15 February 1002 Ardoin, Marquess of Ivrea, was elected King of the
Lombards and crowned in the basilica of St Michael at Pavia.
This new king was nearly related to, if he did not actually spring from,
the marquesses of Turin, and was connected also with the late royal
house of Ivrea, with whose hereditary March he had been invested about
twelve
years
since. His career as marquess had been a stormy one. During
a quarrel with Peter, Bishop of Vercelli, Ardoin had taken that city by
assault, and in the tumult the bishop was slain. Soon after, his violence
towards Warmund, the Bishop of his own city of Ivrea, had brought down
upon him a severe rebuke from Pope Gregory V. Through the influence
of Leo, Bishop of Vercelli, Ardoin was summoned to Rome in 999 to
answer for his alleged misdeeds. Yet, in spite of papal censure and
imperial forfeiture, he had kept fast hold both of his March and of
his possessions until the turn of fortune raised him to the Lombard
throne.
Ardoin may have been in truth little more than a rough soldier. Yet
he proved himself a skilful leader in war; and if his reign was unfortunate
1. See supra, Chap. VII, pp. 175-6.
## p. 221 (#267) ############################################
Revolt of Lombardy
221
a
it was not through any lack on his part of energy or courage. He cer-
tainly inspired his family and his friends with a devotion that shrank from
no sacrifice. To the lay magnates he was their champion against the
domination of the prelates, some few of whom also, free from German
sympathies, were on his side. But it was chiefly the smaller nobles, the
secundi milites or lesser vavassors, holding their lands at the will of episcopal
or secular overlords, and with nothing to hope for from a foreign sovereign,
who turned naturally to a native king whose domestic enemies were their
own. Beside them stood many of the secular clergy, equally impatient of
episcopal control; while lower down were the serfs, the voiceless tillers of
church lands, many of whom had obtained their freedom, but all of
whom it was now sought to reduce to perpetual bondage. In this endea-
vour the two bishops of Vercelli, Peter and Leo, had been especially
active; and it was the latter who, but a short while before, had drafted
the terrible decree of Otto III that no serf of the Church should ever be
allowed to issue from his servitude. And to Ardoin therefore these
freedmen and bondmen now looked as their only possible saviour.
The revolt, if primarily social, was so far national that it was directed
against those elements of authority which leaned on foreign support.
The German interest in Lombardy was still strong. Some prelates, the
Archbishop of Ravenna and the bishops of Modena, Verona, and Vercelli,
were openly hostile to Ardoin from the first; and in agreement with them
was the Marquess Tedald, holder of the five counties of Reggio, Modena,
Mantua, Brescia, and Ferrara, whose family had risen to eminence by
service to the Ottos. But the real soul of the opposition was Leo of
Vercelli, a German by birth, whose energetic character, strong intellect,
and immense acquirements made him a dangerous enemy. For he was
at once an accomplished man of letters, an able lawyer, and a practised
man of affairs. Worldly-minded, though zealous for good order in the
Church, he was ever eager to advance his material interests; and the
disappearance of the imperial system would mean his own utter ruin.
His whole energies, therefore, were bent to the overthrow of the national
king.
A progress through Lombardy secured Ardoin general acknowledg-
ment, and the administration went on without break. The hostile mag-
nates were helpless; while the rest, whatever their secret inclinations, gave
outward obedience to the monarch in possession. But Ardoin's insolent
bearing enraged his opponents, and so both sides looked abroad for help.
Ardoin sent an envoy to France to obtain a promise of armed support
from King Robert; Leo of Vercelli in person, backed by the prayers of
other Italian magnates, besought Henry, now recognised as king in
Germany, to intervene in Italy. Accordingly, Henry in December 1002
dispatched a moderate force under Duke Otto of Carinthia, in whose
hands was the March of Verona, to the aid of his Italian adherents. The
latter, headed by Archbishop Frederick of Ravenna and the Marquess
CH. X.
## p. 222 (#268) ############################################
222
Boleslav of Poland
Tedald, were already on their way to join the duke, when Ardoin with
superior forces threw himself between the allies, occupied Verona, and
seized the mountain passes beyond. A few days later he made a surprise
attack upon the enemy in the valley of the Brenta, and routed them with
heavy loss. This victory for the time made Ardoin's authority secure.
Only a few weeks after Lombardy had thus asserted its independence,
Bohemia was severed from Germany. Boleslav Chrobry (the Mighty),
since succeeding his father Mesco as Duke of Poland in 992, had built up
a powerful Slav monarchy beyond the Elbe. The various tribes occupying
the plains watered by the Oder, the Warta, and the Vistula were united
under his rule; he was allied by marriage with the neighbouring princes
of Bohemia, Hungary, and Kiev; by the indulgence of the late Emperor
he had been relieved of the annual tribute due to the German crown.
Through Otto also he had secured from Pope Sylvester II the eccle-
siastical independence of his country, with the establishment of Gnesen
as a metropolitan see. Only in his vassalage to the Empire was there left
any sign of political subjection. Now Boleslav saw an opportunity for
enlarging his dominion in the West and achieving full independence. He
overran the whole of the East Mark, or Mark of Gero, as far as the Elbe;
then, turning southwards, he seized the towns of Bautzen and Strehla,
and with the aid of its Slavonic inhabitants gained possession of the city
of Meissen itself. Pushing westwards, he occupied the mark of Meissen as
far as the White Elster, securing it with Polish garrisons. He had thus
mastered all the territory known later as the Upper and Lower Lausitz, and
the Elbe had here ceased to be a German river. Then Boleslav appeared
at the diet of Merseburg to make sure of his conquest. But his offer to
Henry of a large sum for the retention of Meissen was rejected: and
Gunzelin, brother of the late Eckhard and half-brother of Boleslav, was
invested by the king with the mark of Meissen, while Boleslav himself
was allowed to keep only the districts to the east of the Black Elster.
Thenceforth the Polish duke became Henry's determined foe. He
found support at once in German disaffection. The Babenberg Henry of
Schweinfurt, Margrave of the Nordgau, hitherto a staunch adherent of the
king, claimed investiture with the duchy of Bavaria as the promised reward
for his aid in the succession contest. Incensed by the king's hesitation in
granting the request, the margrave now made common cause with Boleslav,
whose own wrath was further inflamed by an assault made upon
himself
and his followers, though without the privity of the king, on their depar-
ture from Merseburg.
And the opportunity soon came to Boleslav for revenge. In Bohemia
there had ruled for the last three years, as a tributary of the German
crown, his cousin and namesake, Duke Boleslav the Red, a tyrant whose
jealousy had sent his half-brothers, Jaromir and Udalrich, with their
mother, into exile, and whose cruelty now impelled his subjects to drive
him out and to set up his kinsman Vladivoi as duke. While Vladivoi, to
## p. 223 (#269) ############################################
Bohemia; the Babenbergs
223
secure himself, took investiture from King Henry, the dispossessed prince
sought refuge in Poland. But when Vladivoi's own vices brought his rule
to an end early in 1003 and the Bohemians recalled Jaromir and Udalrich,
the Polish duke intervened by force, drove the two princes a second time
into banishment, and reinstated Boleslav the Red. It was not long before
the ferocious vengeance which the restored duke took upon his enemies
constrained the Bohemians in terror to implore protection from Boleslav
of Poland. Seizing the desired occasion, Boleslav craftily enticed his
kinsman into his power, caused him to be blinded, and then, hastening
to Prague, secured his own acceptance as duke by the Bohemians. The act
was an insolent defiance of Henry's authority; but the king, controlling
his indignation, sent envoys to Boleslav offering recognition if the duke
would acknowledge himself his vassal. Boleslav, however, haughtily re-
jected the proposal, and for the time Bohemia was lost to the German
crown.
Nothing, indeed, could be done as yet for its recovery because of
serious trouble in Germany itself. Already, early in the year, Henry had
had to suppress disaffection in Lorraine with a strong hand; and now he
learnt that the Margrave Henry, secretly aided by the Polish duke, was
in open revolt in the Nordgau. From Bavaria the king took vigorous
action against the rebel. But the margrave found two unexpected allies
in his cousin Ernest of Babenberg and the king's own brother Bruno.
Between King Henry and these three men a petty war was waged during
the autumn of 1003, of which the Nordgau, the wide district lying north
of the Danube between Bohemia and East Franconia, was the scene.
Here the Babenbergs were firmly established; but the king's energy soon
forced the margrave to forsake his strongholds for lurking places in the
country-side. The operations culminated in the siege of Creussen, a forti-
fied town near the sources of the Main, which was valiantly held against
the royal forces by Bucco, the brother of the margrave, while the latter
himself harassed the besiegers from outside. A surprise attack on his
camp drove the margrave into flight, scattered his followers, and delivered
Ernest a prisoner into the hands of the king. Thereupon Bucco sur-
rendered Creussen. Boleslav endeavoured first to seduce Gunzelin into
betraying Meissen to him, and on his refusal laid waste an entire
gau
west of the Elbe. But this diversion brought no relief to the duke's
confederates. The margrave gave up further resistance, and, accompanied
by Bruno and other rebels, sought safety with Boleslav. Though hostili-
ties were renewed early in 1004 by a fierce attack by Boleslav upon
Bavaria, replied to by Henry with an incursion into the Upper Lausitz,
which was frustrated by a change of weather, the confederacy was soon
after dissolved. Impelled by remorse, the two German nobles sought
forgiveness of the king; Bruno through his brother-in-law King Stephen
of Hungary, Margrave Henry of Schweinfurt through powerful friends
at home. The margrave suffered imprisonment for some months, but both
CH. X.
## p. 224 (#270) ############################################
224
Henry's first expedition to Italy
1
he and his adherents were spared the forfeiture of their lands. Bruno
also was pardoned, and having later been ordained, became his brother's
chancellor and eventually Bishop of Augsburg.
With the failure of this domestic revolt Henry was free for action
abroad. The recovery of Italy and of Bohemia were equally urgent tasks;
but the entreaties of certain Lombard magnates, including a special
emissary from the Marquess Tedald and the faithful Leo of Vercelli, pre-
vailed; and Henry, leaving the Saxons and Bavarians to hold Boleslav in
check, started from Augsburg late in March at the head of an expedi-
tionary force composed of Lorrainers, Franks, and Swabians, and after
severe toil reached Trent on Palm Sunday, 9 April. In the face of this
grave peril King Ardoin sent forward to secure the passes, while he
himself gathered troops and took post as before in the plain of Verona.
Henry thus found his advance checked along the Adige, and turning
eastwards into the valley of the Brenta, seized a pass from the Val
Sugana by surprise, and pitched camp on the left bank of the river.
There he celebrated Easter (16 April). At the critical moment Ardoin
had been deserted by most of the Italian leaders, and he had then no
choice but to retreat hurriedly to the West. Henry entered Verona, and
advanced thence by Brescia and Bergamo to Pavia, being joined at each
stage of his march by successive groups of Italian magnates, of whom
the Archbishops of Milan and Ravenna, and the Marquess Tedald, were
'the chief.
army and even fought a slight engagement on the banks of the Aisne.
In the next year Lothair involved himself in a local dispute in Flanders,
but finally sought an interview with the Emperor at Margut on the
Chiers (980), where he agreed to abandon all claim to Lorraine.
During the first seven years of his reign Otto had been fairly successful.
He had settled the troubles with which he was confronted in Bavaria at
the outset of his reign; he had maintained his position in Lorraine in
the face of repeated rebellions and attempts of Lothair to recover it for
the West Frankish crown; he had subdued the Danes, the Bohemians,
and the Poles. Under his rule the work of conversion of the heathen
races on the eastern frontier made rapid progress. Bishoprics were
established for Bohemia at Prague, for Moravia at Olmütz and for
Denmark at Odense on the island of Fyn. Even the Hungarians, in
spite of intermittent warfare in which Liutpold succeeded in extending
the East March as far as the Wienerwald, were inclined to be on better
terms with Germany and permitted Bishop Pilgrim of Passau to pursue
his missionary labours among the heathen Magyars.
The affairs of Germany were at last sufficiently settled to justify the
Emperor's absence in Italy. In November 980 he crossed the Alps
accompanied by his wife, his infant son (Otto III was born in July 980),
and his nephew Otto of Swabia.
The disastrous end of Otto's Italian campaign of 980-9831 led to
revolts all along the German frontier, accompanied by a heathen
reaction. Duke Bernard of Saxony on his way to the diet of Verona
(983) was summoned back by the news that Svein who had deposed his
father, Harold Bluetooth, had overrun the Danish March. The Lusa-
tians broke into rebellion, destroyed the churches of Havelberg and
Brandenburg and put many Christians to the sword. Hamburg was
plundered and burnt by the Obotrites, Zeitz by an army of Bohemians.
The faith of Christ and St Peter, says Thietmar, was forsaken for
the worship of demons. A combined movement of the Saxon princes
East Franks, and King Lothair turned it to the S. E. indicating that the West Frankish
king was lord over Germany. But Thietmar 11. 8 says the opposite. “It was the
custom of all who possessed this place to turn it (the eagle) towards their country";
that is, if it pointed east it indicated that the German king was lord of Aix-la-
Chapelle.
1 Vide supra, pp. 168–70.
## p. 209 (#255) ############################################
Accession of Otto III
209
under the Margrave Dietrich, the Archbishop of Magdeburg and the
Bishop of Halberstadt succeeded in checking the advance in a battle
fought at Belkesheim, just west of the Elbe, but they failed to re-
establish German influence or Christianity among the heathen tribes.
The work of Otto the Great, carried on so successfully in the earlier
years of his son's reign, received a blow from which it did not recover
for more than a century.
It only remains to notice the complete reversal of German policy
which is marked by the diet held at Verona in June 983. The death of
Otto, Duke of Swabia and Bavaria, at Lucca on his way back to Germany
necessitated a new arrangement for the southern duchies. His death,
combined with the disasters in Germany and Italy, involved the ruin of
the party represented by the descendants of Otto the Great's first
marriage, the two Duke Ottos, and the ascendancy of what we may call
the Adelaide party. The Emperor was not strong enough to stand
against the powerful influences of his mother. Not only did he make
her regent in Italy, but further he deposed Otto of Carinthia from his
duchy which, reunited with Bavaria, he gave to Henry the Younger.
The unfortunate Otto was therefore kept from his duchy through no
fault of his own, until Otto III, taking advantage of another vacancy in
995, reinstated him in his former dignity. Swabia was granted to
Conrad of the Franconian family. At the same diet the infant son of
the Emperor was chosen as the successor to the throne.
Misfortune and the Italian climate combined to ruin the Emperor's
health. After a short illness he died at Rome on 7 December 983 in
his twenty-eighth year and was buried in the church of St Peter.
Otto III, then three years old, was being crowned at the Christmas
festival at Aix-la-Chapelle when news arrived of his father's death at
Rome. The question of the regency at once arose. It would, according
to German practice, fall to Henry the Wrangler, the deposed and im-
prisoned Duke of Bavaria, but Byzantine custom favoured the Empress
Mother and it was not likely that Theophano would allow her claim to
be lightly passed over. Henry, who was immediately set at liberty by
the Bishop of Utrecht, took prompt action. Moreover, it soon became
evident that he was aiming not at the regency but at the crown. He
hurried to Cologne and before his opponents had time to consider the
situation, he had taken the young Otto out of the hands of Archbishop
Willigis of Mayence. Though he won the support of the powerful
Archbishops of Cologne, Trèves and Magdeburg and the Bishop of Metz,
yet a strong party in Lorraine collected to withstand him. The strength
of this party lay in the influential family of Godfrey, the Count of
Hainault and Verdun. His son Adalbero was Bishop of Verdun, his
brother, also Adalbero, was Archbishop of Rheims. With the arch-
bishop worked the most remarkable man of the tenth century, Gerbert
of Aurillac. In 983 Otto II had made him abbot of the Lombard
C. JED, H. VOL. III, CHIX.
14
## p. 210 (#256) ############################################
210
The Regency
.
monastery of Bobbio, but disgusted at the lack of discipline of the
monks, he had just returned to resume his former work of Scholasticus
at the cathedral school of Rheims. From his correspondence for these
years we can gather how indefatigably he laboured in the interests of
the
young
Otto.
The situation was rendered more complex by the unexpected appear-
ance of Lothair as a candidate for the regency. Perhaps his real motive
was to induce Henry to give up Lorraine in return for the abandon-
ment of his claim, which, being upheld by the Lotharingian aristocracy,
by his brother Charles, and by Hugh Capet, was sufficiently formidable
to cause alarm. Soon he actually made this proposal to Henry and
entered into a secret compact with him, by which he agreed to support
the duke's claim to the throne in return for the duchy. The Lotharin-
gian nobles, alienated by the altered circumstances, at once prepared to
resist Lothair's attempt to occupy the duchy. Verdun fell before the
French attack (March 984) and Godfrey, who bravely defended it, was
captured. The stout resistance of Godfrey's sons, Herman and Adalbero,
prevented Lothair from making further progress, and the hostility of
Hugh Capet made it necessary for him to turn his attention to his own
kingdom. With the departure of the King of France, the centre of
action shifted to the east. In Saxony Henry's efforts met with no
success. Though he had himself proclaimed king by his supporters at
the Easter festival at Quedlinburg, where he received oaths of fealty from
the princes of the Bohemians, Poles and Obotrites, he was formally
renounced by an assembly of Saxon princes. Loyal to the representative
of the Saxon dynasty, they even prepared to resist the usurper with arms.
Failing to reconcile them, though succeeding in staving off a war by a
truce, Henry withdrew to his old duchy of Bavaria, where he found
himself firmly withstood by his cousin Henry the Younger.
Lothair had made no headway in Lorraine. The loyalty of the
Saxons and the energy of Conrad of Swabia and Willigis of Mayence,
the leaders of Otto's party, prevented Henry from gaining ground in the
other duchies; he was in no position to attempt to win the crown by
force of arms. Driven by pressure of circumstances he submitted his
claim to a diet of German princes. The assembly which met at Bürstadt
near Worms decided unanimously in favour of the young Otto. Henry
engaged to deliver the boy to the care of his mother and grandmother
at a diet to be held at Rara (perhaps Rohr, near Meiningen) on 29 June.
In the interval Henry, supported by Boleslav, prince of the Bohemians,
tried his fortunes in Thuringia but with similar lack of success. At
the diet of Rara, on the guarantee that he would be compensated
with Bavaria, Henry handed over the young king to the charge of
Theophano and Adelaide, who had been summoned from Italy. Henry
the Younger made some show of resistance at being ousted from his
duchy of Bavaria, but a final pacification took place early in the year
a
a
## p. 211 (#257) ############################################
War on the Eastern Frontier
211
985 at Frankfort. Henry was re-established in Bavaria and his cousin
was forced to content himself with Carinthia and the March of Verona,
now again formed into a separate duchy. At first Theophano and
Adelaide acted as joint regents, but the influence of the former soon
became predominant. In the administration of the kingdom she was
assisted by Willigis, Archbishop of Mayence, who took charge of affairs
in Germany during her absence in Italy in 989. The minority fell at a
critical time. The death of King Lothair of France in 986, followed a
year later by the death of his son, Louis V, without an heir, plunged
France into a civil war, during which the opposing parties of Hugh
Capet and Charles of Lower Lorraine, the representative of the Caro-
lingian house, each sought to win the help of the regents of Germany.
Theophano succeeded in maintaining a neutral attitude ; but the dynastic
question was no sooner settled in favour of Hugh, than another hot
dispute broke out as the result of the decision of the synod held at the
monastery of St Basle de Verzy near Rheims (June 991). The Arch-
bishop Arnulf of Rheims, the natural son of Lothair, was deposed from
his see and Gerbert was appointed in his place. Germany was again
called
upon to play a part in the affairs of France. A synod of German
bishops held at Ingelheim in 994 declared against the decisions of
St Basle. The controversy dragged on until 998, when Otto solved
the problem by making Gerbert Archbishop of Ravenna, thus leaving
Rheims in undisputed possession of Arnulf.
Still more serious was the general state of unrest on the Eastern
frontier. During the years 985-987 there was continual fighting against
the Wends and Bohemians. With the help of Mesco, Duke of the
Poles, Meissen was recovered for the Margrave Eckhard. When in 990
a war broke out between the Poles and Bohemians Theophano supported
Mesco while Boleslav was allied with the Lusatians. The Bohemians,
fearing to engage with the Germans, treated for peace. The Saxons
acted as mediators but barely escaped destruction through the treachery
of the barbarians. It was Boleslav, and not their ally Mesco, who
enabled the Saxon army to escape in safety to Magdeburg. On 15 June
991 Theophano died. Adelaide, who now returned from Italy and
undertook the regency, had neither the energy nor the statesmanlike
qualities of the younger Empress, and the weakness of her rule soon
became apparent in the frontier warfare. Brandenburg in 991 became
the centre of operations. The young king captured it with the help of
Mesco, but no sooner was his back turned than it was reconquered for
the Lusatians by a Saxon named Kiso. Otto renewed the attack in the
following year with the help of Henry of Bavaria and Boleslav of
Bohemia ; Boleslav, who had succeeded his father Mesco as prince of the
Poles, being threatened with a war with the Russians, was unable to
accompany the king in person but sent troops to his assistance. But not
till the spring of 993 was the fortress recovered, and then not by the
CH, Tx.
14-2
## p. 212 (#258) ############################################
212
Ambitions of Otto III
ineffectual efforts of his motley army, but by the same means as it was
lost, the treachery of Kiso. His faithless conduct brought on an attack
of the Lusatians; they fell upon and scattered an army sent to Kiso's
support under the Margrave Eckhard of Meissen. However, when the
king took the field himself they were quickly dispersed. A brief notice
of the Quedlinburg annalist informs us of a general rising of the Wends:
“All the Slavs except the Sorbs revolted from the Saxons" (994).
After a short campaign in the following year Otto seems to have
patched up some kind of a truce, and restored order sufficient to permit
him to leave Germany, and fulfil his cherished wish of visiting Italy.
Unfortunately the disturbances were not confined to the eastern
frontier. In 991 the Northmen, taking advantage of the internal
weakness of Germany, renewed their piratical descents on the Frisian
coast. In 994 they actually sailed up the river Elbe and carried their
devastations into Saxony. In an engagement fought at Stade a small
band of Saxons was defeated and their leaders were captured. While
the Saxon chiefs lay bound hand and foot on the ships, the Northmen
ravaged the country at will. Of the captives, some were ransomed, the
Margrave Siegfried effected his escape by making his capturers intoxi-
cated, the remainder, after shameful mutilation, were cast, more dead
than alive, upon the shore. The pirates renewed their inroads in the
next year, but the defensive measures taken by Bishop Bernward of
Hildesheim successfully checked their aggressions.
Our brief summary of the events of the frontier campaigns illustrates
the difficulties of the situation in Germany; it shews how fatal and how
lasting had been the effects of Otto II's Italian policy, how unwise the
high imperial aims of Otto III. Fortunately for the regents the southern
duchies had given no trouble since the baffled attempt of Henry the
Wrangler to obtain the crown for himself. Changes however had taken
place in their administration. On the death of Henry the Younger in
989 Carinthia and the March of Verona had been re-attached to the
duchy of Bavaria. But when Henry the Wrangler died in 995, they did
not pass with Bavaria to his son Henry, afterwards the Emperor Henry II,
but were restored to Otto, the son of Conrad the Red'.
Otto's first object was to visit Italy. He had taken the government
into his own hands in 994 when he was fourteen years of age, but owing
to the unsettled state of Germany it was not until 996 that he was able
to achieve his purpose. It was after his return from his first expedition
across the Alps that he began to develop that ambitious and somewhat
fantastic policy, for which perhaps he has been too severely censured. It
must be remembered that from his earliest boyhood he had come under
the influence of foreigners. The blame must rest equally on all those
who had charge of his education. His mother, the Empress Theophano,
and his tutor John, Abbot of the monastery of Nonantula, a Calabrian by
1 According to some authorities Otto was not restored to his duchy till 1002.
## p. 213 (#259) ############################################
Visit to the tomb of Charlemagne
213
>
birth, had taught him Latin and Greek, taught him to despise “Saxon
rusticity” and to prefer “our Greek subtility? . " They had also made
him familiar with the elaborate ceremonial of the Byzantine court. His
intimacy with Gerbert, when he was still at an impressionable age, had
moulded him into the ideals of the Roman Empire.
He was now in 996 Holy Roman Emperor, and the title had for
him a greater meaning than for his predecessors. The legend on one
of his seals, i renovatio imperii Romanorum,” shews clearly that he
realised that he was making a change in the imperial position. The
change is most apparent in the ordering of the institution where the
business of the Empire was transacted, the imperial chancery. Otto the
Great had not revived the system which had prevailed under the Caro-
lingians of treating Italy as a part of the Empire under the same
administrative machinery. He had established a separate chancery for
Italy. Germany and Italy were to be two distinct governments under one
ruler. When a vacancy occurred in 994 in the chancellorship of Italy,
Otto had appointed his chaplain Heribert. On the death of the German
chancellor, Hildibald of Worms, in 998, Heribert was placed at the
head of the German chancery also. Otto had departed from the system
established by his grandfather and, working on a definite plan, he returned
to the Carolingian tradition of a combined chancery for the whole
Empire. The two titular heads, the arch-chancellors of Germany and
Italy, remained, but their offices were sinecures ; the business of the
Empire was done by a single chancellor in a single chancery. Equally
significant is Otto's choice of counsellors. He completely emancipated
himself from the control of those men who had conducted the administra-
tion during his minority. Willigis of Mayence, Hildibald of Worms,
were replaced by an entirely new body of men. With the exception
of the chancellor Heribert, who was appointed Archbishop of Cologne
in 999, the men who exercised the most influence at court were foreigners.
Gerbert of Aurillac, Marquess Hugh of Tuscany, Peter, Bishop of Como,
the arch-chancellor of Italy, form the Emperor's intimate circle of
advisers.
The reverential, though perhaps over inquisitive, visit of the Emperor
to the tomb of Charles the Great at Aix-la-Chapelle in the year 1000 is
symbolic of his attitude and policy. The famous story of the opening of
the tomb is recorded by the chronicler of the monastery of Novalesa in
Lombardy, who, though writing more than half a century later, gives
his information on the authority of Otto, Count of Lomello, who is said
to have been present on the occasion. “We entered in," he said, “unto
Charles. He was not lying down, as is the manner with the bodies of
other dead men, but sat on a certain chair as though he lived. He was
crowned with a golden crown, and held a sceptre in his hands, the same
being covered with gloves, through which the nails had grown and
1 Gerbert, Epist. (ed. Julien Havet), no. 186.
CH. I.
## p. 214 (#260) ############################################
214
Failure and Death of Otto III
pierced. And above him was a tabernacle compact of brass and marble
exceedingly. Now when we were come in unto the tomb, we brake and
made straightway an opening in it. And when we entered into it, we
perceived a vehement savour. So we did worship forthwith to him with
bended thighs and knees; and straightway Otto the Emperor clad him
with white raiment, and pared his nails, and made good all that was
lacking about him. But none of his members had corrupted and fallen
away, except a little piece of the end of his nose, which he caused at
once to be restored with gold ; and he took from his mouth one tooth,
and built the tabernacle again and departed 1. ”
The Emperor's genuine aim was to unite the interests of Germany and
Italy. The appointments of his cousin Bruno (Gregory V) in 996 and of
Gerbert (Silvester II) in 999 to the papal chair were intended to advance
this end. But this policy in reality amounted to a neglect of Germany.
Since 996 he had spent only a few months on German soil. It is not
surprising, therefore, that he was regarded with distrust. The older
generation of German prelates had their grievance; they disliked his
close connexion with the Papacy, they had been ousted from their
former influential positions by foreigners and they resented it. Otto's
premature death alone prevented an open outbreak in Germany. He
himself realised that he had set his ambitions too high, that he had
sacrificed Germany without gaining any material compensation. • Are
you not my Romans? ” he is reported to have said in bitter reproach.
“For you I have left my country and my kindred. For love of you I
have abandoned my Saxons, and all the Germans, my own blood. . . I have
adopted you as sons, I have preferred you to all. For your sake I
I
have brought upon myself the envy and hatred of all. And now
you have cast out your father. You have encompassed my servants
with a cruel death, you have closed your gates against me. ” These
are the words of a disappointed man. He died in his twenty-second
year at Paterno on 24 January 1002 from an attack of the small-
pox. It was his wish that he should be buried in the Carolingian
capital. After fighting a way through the lines of the hostile Romans,
his followers succeeded in bringing his body safely to Aix-la-Chapelle,
where it was buried in the centre of the choir of the church of St Mary.
1 Chronicon Novaliciense ini. 32: the truth of this narrative has been much
controverted. The smaller details may have been invented, but the central facts
are probably historical and are in part supported by Thietmar (Chronicon iv. 46).
See an article by Professor Grauert, Historisches Jahrbuch, xiv. 302 f. At the same
time it must be admitted that the chronicler of Novalesa, although truthful, had
the inborn gift of romance.
## p. 215 (#261) ############################################
215
CHAPTER X.
THE EMPEROR HENRY II.
When Otto III, still a youth, expired at Paterno in January 1002, it
seemed as if the life work of his grandfather Otto the Great had been com-
pletely undone. Animosity pursued the Emperor even after death; for
only by hard fighting could his friends succeed in transporting his remains
through the plain of Lombardy for interment in Germany. The fate there-
fore, alike of the Western Empire and of the German kingdom upon which
it was based, depended far more than usual upon the qualities of the man
who might be called to occupy the vacant throne.
To this grave crisis there was added the misfortune of a disputed
succession. Otto III, the last descendant in the male line of Otto the
Great, had died unmarried; nor was there any one person naturally des-
tined to succeed him. Descent and election were the two factors by which
accession to the throne was legally determined; but the relative influence
of these varied according to circumstances. On the present occasion it
was election, in practice confined to the magnates, which was bound to
be preponderant. For though a candidate was forthcoming from the
royal house, he was met at once by powerful opponents. And his claim
in itself was not indisputable. The true representative of the Ottos was
the son of the late Emperor's only wedded sister Matilda, wife of Ezo,
son of Herman, Count Palatine in Lorraine. But this heir was a child,
and was the offspring of a marriage which had been deemed unequal.
Matilda's son therefore was now passed over in silence. There were also
two men who could assert some right to be accepted as head of the
Liudolfing house. The one was Otto, Duke of Carinthia, grandson (through
his mother Liutgard) of Otto the Great, and son of the famous Conrad,
once Duke of Lorraine, who had fallen gloriously at the Lechfeld. To his
great position Otto added the personal qualities of dignity and upright-
ness. He must have been at this time at least fifty years of age. The other
was a far younger man, Henry, Duke of Bavaria, son of Duke Henry "the
Wrangler," and grandson of that earlier Henry, the younger brother of
Otto the Great, who was the first of his family to rule in Bavaria. The
present duke therefore was the actual representative in the male line of
King Henry "the Fowler," the first of the Saxon kings. As it happened,
CH. X.
## p. 216 (#262) ############################################
216
Rival candidates
of
no rivalry arose between the two kinsmen. For when Henry expressed
his readiness to accept Otto as king, the latter declined to come forward
and, acknowledging Henry to be the fitter man, urged him to secure
election for himself.
But election also was legally necessary; and the magnates were not
disposed to let slip the present opportunity of choosing a king at their own
pleasure. When therefore the funeral train of the late Emperor reached
Augsburg on its way to Aix, Henry, anxious to assert his claim, first
took forcible possession of the imperial insignia, and then sought by
profuse promises to win over the attendant magnates for the support of
his cause, but he met with little success.
Already indeed a formidable rival had appeared. The chief men of
Saxony had met at Frohse, and there the Margrave Eckhard of Meissen
had revealed his purpose of gaining the throne. He was the foremost
warrior of his time; he had fought with distinction against the Saracens
in Italy, and at Rome in 998 it was he who had brought about the sur-
render of the castle of Sant' Angelo and the death of its defender
Crescentius. As Margrave of Meissen he had repelled the Wends, reduced
Bohemia to vassalage, and restrained the Polish duke Boleslav from
assailing the kingdom. Though not of royal descent, he was sprung
an ancient Thuringian stock, and was connected with the Billungs, the
new ducal house of Saxony. But a powerful enemy, the Margrave Liuthar
of the North Mark, now set himself to frustrate Eckhard's ambitious
design. Having secured a sworn promise from most of the Saxon mag-
nates to take no part in electing a king until a further conference, Liuthar
secretly visited the Duke of Bavaria, upon whom he urged the necessity
of sending an envoy to represent his interests at the postponed meeting.
And so skilfully did Henry's emissary, by means of lavish promises, work
upon the Saxon nobles when they met at Werla, that he won from them a
unanimous recognition of Henry's hereditary right to the throne and a
solemn pledge of service. Eckhard's haughty abstention from the meeting
had ruined his cause.
By this time a third competitor for the crown was in the field. This
was Herman II, Duke of Swabia. Timorous and retiring by nature, Her-
man had come forward at the suggestion of others. After the obsequies
of Otto III had been performed at Aix on 5 April, most of the magnates
there present had expressed their disinclination to accept Henry of Bavaria
as his successor. In the Duke of Swabia they saw a candidate more to their
liking; and certainly Herman's descent from a great Franconian house,
one member of which had formerly occupied the throne, and his position
as ruler of one of the chief races of Germany were plausible reasons for
his elevation. In reality it was his very gentleness of character that
reconimended him to his proposers, who might hope to find in him a
king to be obeyed or not as they pleased.
Through the Duke of Swabia Eckhard hoped to revenge himself upon
## p. 217 (#263) ############################################
Recognition of Henry II
217
Henry. But on his way to Duisburg, where Herman then was, he received
an intimation that he would not be admitted to the counsels of the
Swabian party. Returning homewards after this second rebuff, he was
waylaid at Pöhlde on the night of 30 April by four brothers who cherished
a private grudge against him, and was slain.
This tragic event removed a dangerous enemy from Henry's path, but
the contention with Duke Herman proved long and bitter. Henry could
count upon the magnates of Bavaria, of East Franconia, and of Saxony,
while Herman had the support only of those of Swabia and of West
Franconia. The Swabian faction, however, was resolute, and the Lor-
rainers were still doubtful. Archbishop Willigis of Mayence, the mainstay
of the last two Emperors, now stood for the principle of legitimate suc-
cession. At the beginning of June, Henry, with his Bavarian and
Franconian adherents, approached the Rhine at Worms, evaded Herman,
and entered Mayence. There his election followed; and on 7 June that
act was ratified by his solemn unction and coronation.
This success decided the wavering Dietrich, Duke of Upper Lorraine.
But the election had been carried through in haste by a few partisans of
the new king; and not only did the Duke of Swabia and his friends remain
defiant, but the nobles of Lower Lorraine still held aloof, while those of
Saxony took umbrage at their total exclusion from the proceedings at
Mayence. To force Herman to submission Henry turned southwards and
began to ravage Swabia. But the duke retaliated by assaulting and
sacking his own city of Strasbourg, whose bishop had declared for his
rival, and refused to be drawn into a decision by battle. Baffled in the
South, Henry proceeded to make sure of the rest of the kingdom. In
Thuringia, in July, he received full acknowledgment from Count William
of Weimar and the other chief men, and gratefully abolished the ancient
tribute of swine, due from the Thuringians to the crown. But from the
Saxon magnates Henry obtained a less easy recognition. There had
assembled to meet him at Merseburg on 23 July a great company of the
bishops and counts of Saxony, at whose head stood the Archbishops of
Bremen and Magdeburg with their Duke Bernard and the Margraves
Liuthar and Gero. Duke Boleslav of Poland also, fresh from an attack on
the mark of Meissen made after the death of Eckhard, presumed to appear
among them. These men, though they received the new king with defer-
ence, were not prepared to offer him an unconditional allegiance. They
stood upon their separate rights, and the next day, before any homage was
paid, Bernard came forward in their name and in that of the Saxon people
to assert their peculiar claims, and to demand of Henry how far he would
pledge himself to respect them. Henry replied by extolling the steadfast
loyalty of the Saxons to their kings; it was only with their approval that
he now came among them as king; and so far from infringing their law
he would be careful to observe it at all points, and would do his utmost
to fulfil their reasonable wishes. The speech satisfied the magnates; and
CH, X.
## p. 218 (#264) ############################################
218
Henry's earlier life
Duke Bernard taking the sacred lance in his hands, delivered it to the
king; their homage and oath of fealty then followed. From Merseburg
Henry hastened to Lower Lorraine. In the course of his journey he was
joined by his wife Kunigunda, whom he saw crowned queen at Paderborn
on 10 August by Archbishop Willigis. A fierce conflict, which broke out
between the king's Bavarian followers and the Saxon inhabitants of the
city, marred the rejoicings. In Lower Lorraine Henry found no ready
acceptance. Two bishops only received him; others hesitated to join
them; and Archbishop Heribert of Cologne, indulging a personal grudge,
purposely held aloof. At length the prelates concurred in choosing Henry
to be king, and after tendering him their oath of fealty, accompanied
him to Aix. There, on 8 September, the remaining Lorrainer magnates
joined in placing Henry on the coronation chair of his predecessors, and
in paying him homage. Nothing therefore was now wanting but the
submission of the Duke of Swabia. Herman, however, finding himself now
so far outmatched, was already prepared to yield. Through mediators he
besought the king's grace for himself and his adherents; and then on
1 October appeared in person before Henry at Bruchsal. On swearing
allegiance, Herman was suffered to retain both his duchy and his fiefs,
but was required to make good the damage he had caused to the city
of Strasbourg
Henry's title to reign, thus acknowledged in Germany, was also
accepted by peoples outside. The Venetians renewed with Henry the
treaty of friendship concluded with Otto II. In the vassal state of
Bohemia a revolution had lately set up a new ruler who at once sought
formal investiture at the hands of Henry. Lastly, from Italy, there came
letters and envoys of the imperialist party, urging Henry to intervene in
rebellious Lombardy.
Henry of Bavaria, the fifth of his house to occupy the German throne,
is known in history as Henry II, both as King and Emperor. He was
born on 6 May 973, and had therefore lately completed his twenty-ninth
year when he was crowned at Mayence in June 1002. His early life had
been moulded by adversity. By the rebellion of his father, Duke Henry
“the Wrangler," he had been deprived of his home; and after some time
spent under the care of Abraham, Bishop of Freising, he had been sent, still
a child, to be brought up at Hildesheim. There he received his first
grounding in an education which made him in all ways a cultivated man,
well learned both in Holy Scripture and in ecclesiastical lore. He be-
came acquainted at the same time with the methods of church govern-
ment, as he was meant for the clerical career; but his father's restoration
in 985 brought him back to Bavaria. Further training under Bishop
Wolfgang of Ratisbon helped to form those decided ideas upon Church
and State which afterwards shaped his policy as king. Upon the death
of his father in August 995 Henry succeeded without question to the duchy
of Bavaria. The last exhortation of the repentant Wrangler to his son
а
## p. 219 (#265) ############################################
Character of Henry
219
a
had been to remain ever loyal to his king; and by that advice Henry
steadily walked during the next six years. Otto III had no more faithful
subject than his cousin of Bavaria, who twice accompanied him to Italy,
and on the second occasion was instrumental, with Marquess Hugh of
Tuscany, in saving him from the wrath of the Roman mob. Moreover,
when the German magnates were scheming to dethrone the absent
Emperor, Henry refused to take any part in their conspiracy. Until
Otto's premature death opened to him the prospect of succession, he
had been, as Duke of Bavaria, a just and vigorous ruler.
Of Henry's outward appearance nothing certain is known. Later tradi-
tion indeed gives him the attribute of “the Lame," and two varying legends
profess to account for the supposed infirmity. A real hindrance, however,
was the liability to severe attacks of a painful internal complaint; Henry
was in truth a sickly man, and his bodily weakness may have sometimes
interfered with his plans. His life and actions were regulated by a strict
conscientiousness and by a piety sober and restrained. The Christian faith
and its Founder, the saints and their sanctuaries, the German church and
its officers, were the objects of his reverence; he punctually attended,
and sometimes took part in, the ceremonies of the Church; he was the
determined foe of ecclesiastical abuses; and if he shared the prevailing
superstition in regard to relics, this was balanced by an ungrudging
liberality to the poor and a splendid munificence in the founding and
maintenance of religious institutions. With all this, Henry was no mere
devotee. He was sociable, and took pleasure in the ordinary amusements
of his day; he was not above playing a practical joke on a troublesome
bishop, and once even incurred rebuke for encouraging a brutal form of
sport. The chase was to him a welcome recreation. Henry was thus
utterly unlike Otto III. He loved his ancestral land of Saxony; the
glamour of Italy did not entice him away from his proper task as a German
king; nor did he entertain any visionary idea of universal dominion under
the form of a revived Roman Empire. The whole bent of his mind was
practical; his undertakings were limited in scope and were pursued with
caution. Prudence indeed was the quality by which he most impressed his
contemporaries. Yet he was not without the kingly ideals of his day. He
had a passion for law and order; and in his conception of the kingly office
a
he was the guardian of the realm against attack from without and against
disturbance within, the champion of the weak and the enemy of all wrong-
doers, the defender of the Church and the promoter of its spiritual work.
No king before him was more untiring in travel to dispense justice among
his people; no ruler could be more stern on occasion in executing judg-
ment on rebels and lawbreakers. In spite of his weak health he did not
shrink from taking his full share in the dangers and hardships of a cam-
paign. And with this courage there was joined a royal humanity which
could shew mercy to the vanquished. Alike in the limitation of his aims
and the steady persistency of his rule, he shewed no little resemblance
CH, X.
## p. 220 (#266) ############################################
220
General character of Henry's reign
to the earliest Henry of his race. In moral dignity, it may be safely said,
he excelled any monarch of the Saxon house.
The Empire presented a complication of difficulties such as only
patience and prudence could overcome. Nearly every province was
seething in unrest. Not only were the lay magnates, as ever, at feud
with their ecclesiastical neighbours, but each order was rent by quarrels
among its own members. Among the clergy of every degree, worldliness
and neglect of duty, avarice and loose living, were widely prevalent. It
was a heavy task, therefore, that Henry undertook, and he had now to
restore by his own efforts the sovereign power in face of men who had
hitherto been his equals.
In these adverse circumstances the new reign began, and by them its
course was set. The history of the reign is confused; but through it all
may be traced the king's unwavering purpose of bringing about a more
settled state of things. The large measure of success that he achieved
therein entitles Henry to a high place among the sovereigns of Germany;
but his zeal for the suppression of ecclesiastical abuses was felt over a
wider sphere, and has set him among the reformers of the Western Church.
And it is in the ecclesiastical policy that he pursued, combining as it did
the political system of Otto the Great with the reforming energy of
Henry the Third, and thus linking him with both those monarchs, that
the chief interest of his career is to be found.
The beginning of Henry's reign was marked by two grave losses to
the Empire; in the South, of the Lombard kingdom; in the East, of the
tributary duchy of Bohemia. The former event, indeed, had taken place
even before Henry had become a candidate for the throne. For within a
month of the death of Otto III Lombardy broke into open revolt; and
on 15 February 1002 Ardoin, Marquess of Ivrea, was elected King of the
Lombards and crowned in the basilica of St Michael at Pavia.
This new king was nearly related to, if he did not actually spring from,
the marquesses of Turin, and was connected also with the late royal
house of Ivrea, with whose hereditary March he had been invested about
twelve
years
since. His career as marquess had been a stormy one. During
a quarrel with Peter, Bishop of Vercelli, Ardoin had taken that city by
assault, and in the tumult the bishop was slain. Soon after, his violence
towards Warmund, the Bishop of his own city of Ivrea, had brought down
upon him a severe rebuke from Pope Gregory V. Through the influence
of Leo, Bishop of Vercelli, Ardoin was summoned to Rome in 999 to
answer for his alleged misdeeds. Yet, in spite of papal censure and
imperial forfeiture, he had kept fast hold both of his March and of
his possessions until the turn of fortune raised him to the Lombard
throne.
Ardoin may have been in truth little more than a rough soldier. Yet
he proved himself a skilful leader in war; and if his reign was unfortunate
1. See supra, Chap. VII, pp. 175-6.
## p. 221 (#267) ############################################
Revolt of Lombardy
221
a
it was not through any lack on his part of energy or courage. He cer-
tainly inspired his family and his friends with a devotion that shrank from
no sacrifice. To the lay magnates he was their champion against the
domination of the prelates, some few of whom also, free from German
sympathies, were on his side. But it was chiefly the smaller nobles, the
secundi milites or lesser vavassors, holding their lands at the will of episcopal
or secular overlords, and with nothing to hope for from a foreign sovereign,
who turned naturally to a native king whose domestic enemies were their
own. Beside them stood many of the secular clergy, equally impatient of
episcopal control; while lower down were the serfs, the voiceless tillers of
church lands, many of whom had obtained their freedom, but all of
whom it was now sought to reduce to perpetual bondage. In this endea-
vour the two bishops of Vercelli, Peter and Leo, had been especially
active; and it was the latter who, but a short while before, had drafted
the terrible decree of Otto III that no serf of the Church should ever be
allowed to issue from his servitude. And to Ardoin therefore these
freedmen and bondmen now looked as their only possible saviour.
The revolt, if primarily social, was so far national that it was directed
against those elements of authority which leaned on foreign support.
The German interest in Lombardy was still strong. Some prelates, the
Archbishop of Ravenna and the bishops of Modena, Verona, and Vercelli,
were openly hostile to Ardoin from the first; and in agreement with them
was the Marquess Tedald, holder of the five counties of Reggio, Modena,
Mantua, Brescia, and Ferrara, whose family had risen to eminence by
service to the Ottos. But the real soul of the opposition was Leo of
Vercelli, a German by birth, whose energetic character, strong intellect,
and immense acquirements made him a dangerous enemy. For he was
at once an accomplished man of letters, an able lawyer, and a practised
man of affairs. Worldly-minded, though zealous for good order in the
Church, he was ever eager to advance his material interests; and the
disappearance of the imperial system would mean his own utter ruin.
His whole energies, therefore, were bent to the overthrow of the national
king.
A progress through Lombardy secured Ardoin general acknowledg-
ment, and the administration went on without break. The hostile mag-
nates were helpless; while the rest, whatever their secret inclinations, gave
outward obedience to the monarch in possession. But Ardoin's insolent
bearing enraged his opponents, and so both sides looked abroad for help.
Ardoin sent an envoy to France to obtain a promise of armed support
from King Robert; Leo of Vercelli in person, backed by the prayers of
other Italian magnates, besought Henry, now recognised as king in
Germany, to intervene in Italy. Accordingly, Henry in December 1002
dispatched a moderate force under Duke Otto of Carinthia, in whose
hands was the March of Verona, to the aid of his Italian adherents. The
latter, headed by Archbishop Frederick of Ravenna and the Marquess
CH. X.
## p. 222 (#268) ############################################
222
Boleslav of Poland
Tedald, were already on their way to join the duke, when Ardoin with
superior forces threw himself between the allies, occupied Verona, and
seized the mountain passes beyond. A few days later he made a surprise
attack upon the enemy in the valley of the Brenta, and routed them with
heavy loss. This victory for the time made Ardoin's authority secure.
Only a few weeks after Lombardy had thus asserted its independence,
Bohemia was severed from Germany. Boleslav Chrobry (the Mighty),
since succeeding his father Mesco as Duke of Poland in 992, had built up
a powerful Slav monarchy beyond the Elbe. The various tribes occupying
the plains watered by the Oder, the Warta, and the Vistula were united
under his rule; he was allied by marriage with the neighbouring princes
of Bohemia, Hungary, and Kiev; by the indulgence of the late Emperor
he had been relieved of the annual tribute due to the German crown.
Through Otto also he had secured from Pope Sylvester II the eccle-
siastical independence of his country, with the establishment of Gnesen
as a metropolitan see. Only in his vassalage to the Empire was there left
any sign of political subjection. Now Boleslav saw an opportunity for
enlarging his dominion in the West and achieving full independence. He
overran the whole of the East Mark, or Mark of Gero, as far as the Elbe;
then, turning southwards, he seized the towns of Bautzen and Strehla,
and with the aid of its Slavonic inhabitants gained possession of the city
of Meissen itself. Pushing westwards, he occupied the mark of Meissen as
far as the White Elster, securing it with Polish garrisons. He had thus
mastered all the territory known later as the Upper and Lower Lausitz, and
the Elbe had here ceased to be a German river. Then Boleslav appeared
at the diet of Merseburg to make sure of his conquest. But his offer to
Henry of a large sum for the retention of Meissen was rejected: and
Gunzelin, brother of the late Eckhard and half-brother of Boleslav, was
invested by the king with the mark of Meissen, while Boleslav himself
was allowed to keep only the districts to the east of the Black Elster.
Thenceforth the Polish duke became Henry's determined foe. He
found support at once in German disaffection. The Babenberg Henry of
Schweinfurt, Margrave of the Nordgau, hitherto a staunch adherent of the
king, claimed investiture with the duchy of Bavaria as the promised reward
for his aid in the succession contest. Incensed by the king's hesitation in
granting the request, the margrave now made common cause with Boleslav,
whose own wrath was further inflamed by an assault made upon
himself
and his followers, though without the privity of the king, on their depar-
ture from Merseburg.
And the opportunity soon came to Boleslav for revenge. In Bohemia
there had ruled for the last three years, as a tributary of the German
crown, his cousin and namesake, Duke Boleslav the Red, a tyrant whose
jealousy had sent his half-brothers, Jaromir and Udalrich, with their
mother, into exile, and whose cruelty now impelled his subjects to drive
him out and to set up his kinsman Vladivoi as duke. While Vladivoi, to
## p. 223 (#269) ############################################
Bohemia; the Babenbergs
223
secure himself, took investiture from King Henry, the dispossessed prince
sought refuge in Poland. But when Vladivoi's own vices brought his rule
to an end early in 1003 and the Bohemians recalled Jaromir and Udalrich,
the Polish duke intervened by force, drove the two princes a second time
into banishment, and reinstated Boleslav the Red. It was not long before
the ferocious vengeance which the restored duke took upon his enemies
constrained the Bohemians in terror to implore protection from Boleslav
of Poland. Seizing the desired occasion, Boleslav craftily enticed his
kinsman into his power, caused him to be blinded, and then, hastening
to Prague, secured his own acceptance as duke by the Bohemians. The act
was an insolent defiance of Henry's authority; but the king, controlling
his indignation, sent envoys to Boleslav offering recognition if the duke
would acknowledge himself his vassal. Boleslav, however, haughtily re-
jected the proposal, and for the time Bohemia was lost to the German
crown.
Nothing, indeed, could be done as yet for its recovery because of
serious trouble in Germany itself. Already, early in the year, Henry had
had to suppress disaffection in Lorraine with a strong hand; and now he
learnt that the Margrave Henry, secretly aided by the Polish duke, was
in open revolt in the Nordgau. From Bavaria the king took vigorous
action against the rebel. But the margrave found two unexpected allies
in his cousin Ernest of Babenberg and the king's own brother Bruno.
Between King Henry and these three men a petty war was waged during
the autumn of 1003, of which the Nordgau, the wide district lying north
of the Danube between Bohemia and East Franconia, was the scene.
Here the Babenbergs were firmly established; but the king's energy soon
forced the margrave to forsake his strongholds for lurking places in the
country-side. The operations culminated in the siege of Creussen, a forti-
fied town near the sources of the Main, which was valiantly held against
the royal forces by Bucco, the brother of the margrave, while the latter
himself harassed the besiegers from outside. A surprise attack on his
camp drove the margrave into flight, scattered his followers, and delivered
Ernest a prisoner into the hands of the king. Thereupon Bucco sur-
rendered Creussen. Boleslav endeavoured first to seduce Gunzelin into
betraying Meissen to him, and on his refusal laid waste an entire
gau
west of the Elbe. But this diversion brought no relief to the duke's
confederates. The margrave gave up further resistance, and, accompanied
by Bruno and other rebels, sought safety with Boleslav. Though hostili-
ties were renewed early in 1004 by a fierce attack by Boleslav upon
Bavaria, replied to by Henry with an incursion into the Upper Lausitz,
which was frustrated by a change of weather, the confederacy was soon
after dissolved. Impelled by remorse, the two German nobles sought
forgiveness of the king; Bruno through his brother-in-law King Stephen
of Hungary, Margrave Henry of Schweinfurt through powerful friends
at home. The margrave suffered imprisonment for some months, but both
CH. X.
## p. 224 (#270) ############################################
224
Henry's first expedition to Italy
1
he and his adherents were spared the forfeiture of their lands. Bruno
also was pardoned, and having later been ordained, became his brother's
chancellor and eventually Bishop of Augsburg.
With the failure of this domestic revolt Henry was free for action
abroad. The recovery of Italy and of Bohemia were equally urgent tasks;
but the entreaties of certain Lombard magnates, including a special
emissary from the Marquess Tedald and the faithful Leo of Vercelli, pre-
vailed; and Henry, leaving the Saxons and Bavarians to hold Boleslav in
check, started from Augsburg late in March at the head of an expedi-
tionary force composed of Lorrainers, Franks, and Swabians, and after
severe toil reached Trent on Palm Sunday, 9 April. In the face of this
grave peril King Ardoin sent forward to secure the passes, while he
himself gathered troops and took post as before in the plain of Verona.
Henry thus found his advance checked along the Adige, and turning
eastwards into the valley of the Brenta, seized a pass from the Val
Sugana by surprise, and pitched camp on the left bank of the river.
There he celebrated Easter (16 April). At the critical moment Ardoin
had been deserted by most of the Italian leaders, and he had then no
choice but to retreat hurriedly to the West. Henry entered Verona, and
advanced thence by Brescia and Bergamo to Pavia, being joined at each
stage of his march by successive groups of Italian magnates, of whom
the Archbishops of Milan and Ravenna, and the Marquess Tedald, were
'the chief.
