72 HISTORY AND ETHNOLOGY. 



emperor, however, soon escaped. At Liege he marshalled an army to 

 punish his son ; but in the midst of this campaign he died, 1106 A.D. 



Henry Y., now no longer requiring the assistance of the pope, at once 

 laid aside the mask, and began a contest with the pope in regard to the 

 right of investiture, which continued until 1122, when a final adjustment 

 of the question was made under the successor of Paschal, Pope Calixtus. 

 At the conclusion of this dispute, Henry found himself embroiled anew with 

 the nobility of the empire. His whole life was thus disturbed, and in 1125, 

 in the flower of his age, he died without heirs, and was the last of the 

 Franconio-Salian house. 



The Eastroman empire was governed at Byzantium, from 802 until 

 1078, by two empresses and twenty-four emperors. Frequent ruptures 

 occurred between themselves and the barbarians, and every treaty 

 contributed to the weakening of the empire. Disastrous alliances were 

 concluded with the Bulgarians, Arabs, and Turks, to the latter of whom 

 province after province was ceded. Spain, on the contrary, made noble 

 efforts to deliver herself from the yoke of her oppressors, the Arabs. In 

 this enterprise the Spanish hero, Podrigo Diaz, Count of Bivar, usually 

 called the Cid (Lord), shone conspicuously. After a series of adventures, 

 this chieftain conquered Valencia, and rendered the Saracen princes of 

 Toledo and Seville tributary to his master. King Ferdinand, who reigned 

 from 1035 to 1065. The kingdom of Portugal, near the end of the eleventh 

 century, was taken from the Moors, but acquired its independence from 

 Spain only in 1109. 



In England, King Alfred the Great (871-901) fought against the 

 Normans from Denmark, who made frequent attacks upon the country. 

 Alfred in the beginning was defeated, and fled ; but collecting reinforcements 

 he again took the field, and was victorious. Under his successor the war 

 was renewed by the Danish king, Sven, who, with his son Canute, and 

 Olaff of Norway, invaded the island, plundered it without mercy, and finally 

 placed himself on the throne of England. To his three kingdoms, Denmark, 

 Norway (of which he was liege lord), and England, Sven added South 

 Scotland. He died in 1035. After ruling England for twenty-five years, 

 the Danes were expelled, and Edward the Confessor obtained the English 

 crown, 1041, and with his death (1066) the house of Alfred became extinct. 

 He was succeeded by William, duke of Normandy, who won the crown, 

 to which he had only remote claim, on the battle-field of Hastings. He 

 had repeated rebellions to quell, for the English submitted to the foreign 

 - dynasty with great reluctance. 



As Normandy had been a fief of France, and a vassal could not lawfully 

 conquer for himself, the French kings declared England tributary to 

 France. This claim was resisted : and thus arose those fearful and bloody 

 contests which lasted four hundred years. 



The Normans also took possession of Lower Italy. Even the founding 



of the Pussian empire is ascribed to them ; for a Norman tribe called 



Waregers, under Purik, Oskold, Dir, Sineus, and Truwor, coming from the 



Baltic, entered the provinces near the Neva, Dnieper, and Wolga, about the 



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