CHAMBERS'S INFORMATION FOR THE PEOPLE. 



torn and disunited, and spread like a network 

 from the Mediterranean to the Icy Sea. 



Struggle of Emperors and Popes, We have 

 already seen by what steps the sovereigns of Ger- 

 many had risen into ascendency, and acquired 

 the title of Emperors of the West Their right to 

 this title was recognised by all the sovereigns of 

 Europe ; there was not a king of Northern Europe 

 who did not regard the German emperor as the 

 political head of the civilised nations, and Ger- 

 many as the ruling power ; and the notion began 

 to gain ground, and was sedulously inculcated both 

 by the emperors themselves and the popes, that 

 all Christendom consisted in reality of one great 

 confederation of states, of which the emperors were 

 the secular, and the popes the spiritual chiefs. No 

 one can understand the state of Europe at this 

 time, without keeping distinctly before his mind 

 the two words pofx and emperor^ with the mean- 

 thus attached to them. 



The political position of the German emperor 

 was inherently weak. Not only was the office 

 elective, but it depended on the concurrence of 

 the ' states ' or nobles to supply the emperor with 

 troops to carry out his schemes. The dukes, 

 counts, and margraves, who governed the prov- 

 inces or defended the marches, had been at first 

 rded as imperial officers, removable by the 

 emperor ; but they gradually contrived to render 

 their offices or fiefs hereditary, and became almost 

 independent princes. The same was the case with 

 the great dignitaries of the German Church ; they 

 became temporal nobles with permanent juris- 

 dictions. 



But the weakest point of the German Empire 

 was Italy. When Otho had established his 

 authority over the chaos of fragments into which 

 the kingdom of Italy had fallen, he and his suc- 

 cessors not unnaturally conferred the fiefs and 

 other honours on Germans, rather than on native 

 Italians ; and hence there was kept alive a spirit 

 of vehement hostility to German influence. This 

 anti-German feeling naturally gathered round the 

 pope, who, as temporal magistrate of Rome, was 

 a vassal of the German crown, but, as spiritual 

 head of Christendom, had an advantage over all 

 the other temporal lords owing allegiance to the 

 emperors. Thus the dealings of the popes with 

 the emperors, and of the emperors with the popes, 

 assumed in the eyes of all parties a high degree 

 of importance ; and the struggle that arose between 

 them affected the whole history of Europe for 

 several centuries. 



The election of the popes as bishops of Rome 

 had from the earliest times been vested in the 

 college of cardinals, composed of the principal 

 clergy of Rome ; their choice being confirmed or 

 annulled by the acclamations of the people in the 

 streets. In the anarchical period between Charle- 

 magne and Otho (814-962), the elections had been 

 the occasion of much turbulence and bloodshed ; 

 and the papal chair had been generally filled by 

 profligates, or by men of weak minds managed by 

 others. At one time, the papacy was actually in 

 the patronage of two sisters, women of infamous 

 character, named Marozia and Theodora, who 

 appointed their paramours and illegitimate chil- 

 dren. The extension of the German power into 

 Italy produced a change in this state of things. 

 The ratification of the German emperor was made 

 necessary to the election of a pope, and the em- 

 120 



perors naturally sought to have popes elected that 

 were favourable to their views. This policy was 

 fully carried out by Henry III. of the house of 

 l-Y.mconia, under whom the empire attained the 

 highest prosperity. He looked upon the popes as 

 his viziers in spiritual things ; and on the occasion 

 of a contention for the papal chair (1046), he set 

 all the parties aside, and appointed a German 

 bishop, Clement II. whose three successors were 

 also nominees of Henry. 



But the imperial policy was thwarted by the 

 most illustrious man of the middle ages Hilde- 

 brand, who became pope as Gregory VII. in 1073. 

 The first blow he struck was at the right of inves- 

 titure claimed by the temporal sovereigns that 

 is, the right of bestowing on bishops and abbots 

 the ring and staff, which were the symbols of their 

 office, a right by virtue of which the sovereign had 

 the clergy completely under his control. A papal 

 decree was now issued (1074) forbidding, under 

 pain of excommunication, all sovereigns from 

 exercising investiture, and all ecclesiastics from 

 accepting it at the hands of laymen. At the same 

 time, he pursued another measure tending to 

 detach the church from worldly influences. The 

 celibacy of the clergy had long been a favourite 

 doctrine of the Church of Rome ; but though 

 encouraged, it had never become a positive rule, 

 and it was as common, especially in the north of 

 Christendom, for a priest to have a wife as not 

 Gregory now (1074) decreed that all the married 

 clergy must either quit their wives or renounce 

 the priestly order. The decree was violently 

 resisted ; but with the aid of the monks and of 

 the populace who, strange to say, sided with them 

 against the married clergy Gregory triumphed, 

 and celibacy became the law of the church. 



The emperor Henry IV. at first set the decree 

 against the right of investiture at defiance. Gregory 

 thundered out a sentence of excommunication and 

 suspension against him ; and such was the appal- 

 ling effect, that Henry, whose tyrannical conduct 

 had made him many enemies, seeing the universal 

 defection, was obliged to submit. Humiliated and 

 grieved, he crossed the Alps in the depth of winter 

 (1077), to seek the pardon of his pontifical enemy. 

 He found the pope in the Modenese territory, 

 where he was residing with the Countess Matilda 

 of Tuscany, one of the most devout friends of the 

 church, at her castle of Canossa. Here it was only 

 after the most abject confessions of his error, and 

 standing as a penitent for three days in an outer 

 court of the castle, barefooted, and clad only in a 

 woollen shirt, that he obtained absolution, and the 

 removal of the sentence of interdict. Such a spec- 

 tacle had never before been seen in Europe. 



Gregory henceforth asserted the superiority of 

 the spiritual over the temporal power ; he urged 

 on all kings the duty of acknowledging themselves 

 vassals of the Holy See, and even demanded 

 tribute in the name of ' Peter's pence.' Many of 

 the minor princes actually made the required sub- 

 mission, and all were careful not to offend the 

 pope by any display of independence. But Henry 

 IV. had not forgot his humiliation at Canossa. 

 Having defeated a rival emperor, set up by the 

 pope's party, he declared Gregory deposed, 

 appointed a new pope, Clement III. (1080), 

 marched into Italy, took Rome after a siege of 

 three years, and was crowned by the anti-pope, 

 Gregory being obliged to take refuge with Guiscard 



