CHARLEMAGNE IN ITALY.—Some of the most memorable incidents in Charlemagne's career are connected with Italy. While he was busy in the Saxon war, he had been summoned to protect Pope Hadrian I. (772-795) from the attack of the Lombards. To please his mother, Charles had married, but he had afterwards divorced, the daughter of the Lombard king Desiderius. She was the first in the series of Charlemagne's wives, who, it is said, were nine in number. By the divorce he incurred the resentment of Desiderius, who required the Pope to anoint the sons of Carloman as kings of the Franks. In 772 Charlemagne crossed the Alps by the Mont Cenis and the St. Bernard, captured Pavia, and shut up Desiderius in a Frank monastery. The king of the Franks became king of the Lombards, and lord of all Italy, except the Venetian Islands and the southern extremity of Calabria, which remained subject to the Greeks. The German king and the Pope were now, in point of fact, dominant in the West. A woman, Irene, who had put out the eyes of her son that she herself might reign, sat on the throne at Constantinople. This was a fair pretext for throwing off the Byzantine rule, which afforded no protection to Italians. Once more Charles visited Italy, to restore to the papal chair Leo III., who had been expelled by an adverse party, and, at Charles's camp at Paderborn, had implored his assistance. On Christmas Day in the year 800, during the celebration of mass in the old Basilica of St. Peter, Leo III. advanced to Charlemagne, and placed a crown on his head, saluting him, amid the acclamations of the people, as Roman emperor.

MEANING OF CHARLES'S CORONATION.—The coronation of Charlemagne made him the successor of Augustus and of Constantine. It was not imagined that the empire had ever ceased to be. The Byzantine emperors had been acknowledged in form as the rulers of the West: not even now was it conceived that the empire was divided. In the imagination and feeling of men, the creation of the Caesars remained an indivisible unity. The new emperor in the West could therefore only be regarded as a rival and usurper by the Byzantine rulers; but Charlemagne professed a friendly feeling, and addressed them as his brothers,—as if they and he were exercising a joint sovereignty. In point of fact, there had come to be a new center of wide-spread dominion in Western Europe. The diversity in beliefs and rites between Roman Christianity and that of the Greeks had been growing. The popes and Charlemagne were united by mutual sympathy and common interests. The assumption by him of the imperial title at their instance, and by the call of the Roman people, was the natural issue of all the circumstances.

CHARLES'S SYSTEM OF GOVERNMENT.—Charlemagne showed himself a statesman bent on organization and social improvement. There was a system of local officers. The border districts of the kingdom were made into Marks, under Margraves or Marquesses, for defense against the outlying tribes. One of them, to the east of Bavaria, was afterwards called Austria. Dukes governed provinces, some of which afterwards became kingdoms. Their power the emperor tried to reduce. The empire was divided into districts, in each of which a Count (Graf) ruled, with inferior officers, either territorial or in cities. Bishops had large domains, and great privileges and immunities. The officers held their places at the king's pleasure: they became possessed of landed estates, and the tendency was, for the offices to become hereditary.

The old German word Graf is of uncertain derivation, but means the same as count (from the Latin comes). Mark is a word found in all the Teutonic languages. From the signification of boundary, it came to be applied, like its synonym march, to a frontier district. A margrave (Mark-Graf) was a mark-count, or an officer ruling for the king in such a district. A viscount (vicecomes) was an officer subordinate to a count. Pfalz, meaning originally palace (from the Latin palatium), was the term for any one of the king's estates. The palsgrave (Pfalz-Graf) was first his representative in charge of one of these domains. The stallgrave (Stall-Graf) corresponded to the constable (comes stabuli) in English and French. It signifies the officer in charge of the king's stables, the groom. He had a military command. A later designation of the same office is marshal (from two old German words, one of which means a horse, as seen in our word mare, having the same etymology, and the other means a servant).

Imperial deputies, or missi, lay and ecclesiastical together, visited all parts of the kingdom to examine and report as to their condition, to hold courts, and to redress wrongs. There were appeals from them to the imperial tribunal, over which the Palsgrave presided. Twice in the year great Assemblies were held of the chiefs and people, to give advice as to the framing of laws. The enactments of these assemblies are collected in the Capitularies of the Frank kings. In the Church, Charlemagne tried to secure order, which had sadly fallen away, and had given place to confusion and worldliness. He himself exercised high ecclesiastical prerogatives, especially after he became emperor.

LEARNING AND CULTURE.—One of the chief distinctions of Charlemagne is the encouragement which he gave to learning. In his own palace at Aachen (Aix), he collected scholars from different quarters. Of these the most eminent is Alcuin, from the school of York in England. He was familiar with many of the Latin writers, and while at the head of the school in the palace, and later, when abbot of St. Martin in Tours, exerted a strong influence in promoting study. Charlemagne himself spoke Latin with facility, but not until late in life did he try to learn to write. It was his custom to be read to while he sat at meals. Augustine's City of God was one of the books of which he was fond. In the great sees and monasteries, schools were founded, the benefits of which were very soon felt.

CHARLES'S PERSONAL TRAITS.—Charlemagne was seven feet in height, and of noble presence. His eyes were large and animated, and his voice clear, but not so strong as his frame would have led one to expect. His bearing was manly and dignified. He was exceedingly fond of riding, hunting, and of swimming. Eginhard, his friend and biographer, says of him, "In all his undertakings and enterprises, there was nothing he shrank from because of the toil, and nothing that he feared because of the danger." He died, at the age of seventy, on Jan. 28, 814. He had built at Aix la Chapelle a stately church, the columns and marbles of which were brought from Ravenna and Rome. Beneath its floor, under the dome, was his tomb. There he was placed in a sitting posture, in his royal robes, with the crown on his head, and his horn, sword, and book of the Gospels on his knee. In this posture his majestic figure was found when his tomb was opened by Otto III., near the end of the tenth century. The marble chair in which the dead monarch sat is still in the cathedral at Aix: the other relics are at Vienna. The splendor of Charlemagne's reign made it a favorite theme of romance among the poets of Italy: a mass of poetic legends gathered about it.

EXTENT OF THE EMPIRE.—Charlemagne's empire comprised all Gaul, and Spain to the Ebro, all that was then Germany, and the greater part of Italy. Slavonic nations along the Elbe were his allies. Pannonia, Dacia, Istria, Liburnia, Dalmatia,—except the sea-coast towns, which were held by the Greeks,—were subject to him. He had numerous other allies and friends. Even Harunal-Rashid, the famous Caliph of Bagdad, held him in high honor. Among the most valued presents which were said to have come from the Caliph were an elephant, and a curious water-clock, which was so made, that, at the end of the hours, twelve horsemen came out of twelve windows, and closed up twelve other windows. This gift filled the inmates of the palace at Aix with wonder.

CONDITION OF THE PEOPLE.—The number of free Franks diminished under Charlemagne. They were thinned out in the wars, or sunk into vassalage. The warnings and rebukes in the Capitularies, or body of laws, show that the upper clergy were often sensual and greedy of gain. The bishops would often lead in person their contingent of troops, until they were forbidden to do so by law. Nine-tenths of the population of Gaul were slaves. Charlemagne made Alcuin the present of an estate on which there were twenty thousand slaves. Especially in times of scarcity, as in 805 and 806, their lot was a miserable one. At such times, they fled in crowds to the monasteries. The social state was that of feudalism "in all but the development of that independence in the greater lords, which was delayed by the strength of Karl, but fostered, at the same time, by his wars and his policy towards the higher clergy."

CONVERSION OF GERMANY: BONIFACE.—The most active missionaries in the seventh and eighth centuries were, from the British islands. At first they were from Ireland and Scotland. Columban, who died in 615, and his pupil Gallus, labored, not without success, among the Alemanni. Gallus established himself as a hermit near Lake Constance. He founded the Abbey of St. Gall. The Saxon missionaries from England were still more effective. The most eminent of these was Winfrid, who received from Rome the name of Bonifacius (680-755). He converted the Hessians, and founded monasteries, among them the great monastery of Fulda. There his disciple, Sturm, "through a long series of years, directed the energies of four thousand monks, by whose unsparing labors the wilderness was gradually reclaimed, and brought into a state of cultivation." Boniface had proved the impotence of the heathen gods by felling with the axe an aged oak at Geismar, which was held sacred by their worshipers. Among the Thuringians, Bavarians, and other tribes, he extirpated paganism by peaceful means. He organized the German Church under the guidance of the popes, and, in 743, was made archbishop of Meniz, and primate. But his Christian ardor moved him to carry the gospel in person to the savage Frisians, by whom he was slain. He thus crowned his long career with martyrdom.

CONVERSION OF THE SCANDINAVIANS.—The apostle of the Scandinavians was Ansgar (801-865). The archbishopric of Hamburg was founded for him by Louis the Pious, with the papal consent; but, as Hamburg was soon plundered by pirates, he became bishop of Bremen (849). In that region he preached with success. Two visits he made to Sweden, the first with little permanent result; but, at the second visit (855), the new faith was tolerated, and took root. The triumph of the religion of the cross, which Ansgar had planted in Denmark, was secured there when Canute became king of England. The first Christian king in Sweden was Olaf Schooskonig (1008). In Norway, Christianity was much resisted; but when Olaf the Thick, who was a devoted adherent of the Christian faith, had perished in battle (1033), his people, who held him in honor, fell in with the church arrangements which he had ordained; and he became St. Olaf, the patron saint of Norway.

THE BENEDICTINES.—Benedict, born at Nursia, in Umbria, in 480, the founder of the monastery of Monte Cassino, north-west of Naples, was the most influential agent in organizing monasticism in Western Europe. He was too wise to adopt the extreme asceticism that had often prevailed in the East, and his judicious regulations combined manual labor with study and devotion. They not only came to be the law for the multitude of monasteries of his own order, but also served as the general pattern, on the basis of which numerous other orders in later times were constituted. His societies of monks were at first made up of laics, but afterwards of priests. The three vows of the monk were chastity, including abstinence from marriage; poverty, or the renunciation of personal possessions; and obedience to superiors. The Benedictine cloisters long continued to be asylums for the distressed, schools of education for the clergy, and teachers of agriculture and the useful arts to the people in the regions where they were planted. Their abbots rose to great dignity and influence, and stood on a level with the highest ecclesiastics.



CHAPTER II. DISSOLUTION OP CHARLEMAGNE'S EMPIRE: RISE OF THE KINGDOMS OF FRANCE, GERMANY, AND ITALY.

DIVISIONS IN THE EMPIRE.—The influence of Charlemagne was permanent; not so his empire. It had one religion and one government, but it was discordant in language and in laws. The Gallo-Romans and the Italians spoke the Romance language, with variations of dialect. The Germans used the Teutonic tongue. Charlemagne left to the Lombards, to the Saxons, and to other peoples, their own special laws. The great bond of unity had been the force of his own character and the vigor of his administration. His death was, therefore, the signal for confusion and division. The tendency to dismemberment was aided by the ambition of the princes of the imperial family. The Austrasian Franks, to whom Charlemagne belonged, craved unity. The Gallo-Romans in the West, the Teutons in the East, aspired after independence.

Louis the Pious (814-840), Charlemagne's youngest son,—who, in consequence of the death of his elder brothers, was the sole successor of his father,—lacked the energy requisite for so difficult a place. He was better adapted to a cloister than to a throne. He had been crowned at Aix before his father's death; but he consented to be crowned anew by Pope Stephen IV. at Rheims, in 816. His troubles began with a premature division of his states between his sons, Lothar, Pipin, and Louis. His nephew, Bernhard, who was to reign in Italy in subordination to his uncle, rebelled, but was captured and killed (818). In order to provide for his son Charles the Bald, whose mother Judith he had married for his second wife, he made a new division in 829. The elder sons at once revolted against their father, and Judith and her son were shut up in a cloister (830). Louis the son repented, the Saxons and East Franks supported the emperor, and he was restored. In 833 he took away Aquitaine from Pipin, and gave it to Charles. The rebellious sons again rose up against him. In company with Pope Gregory IV., who joined them, they took their father prisoner on the plains of Alsace, his troops having deserted him. The place was long known as the "Field of Lies." He was compelled by the bishops to confess his sins in the cathedral at Soissons, reading the list aloud. Once more Louis was released, and forgave his sons; but partition after partition of territory, with continued discord, followed until his death. The quarrels of his surviving sons, Lothar, Louis the German, and Charles the Bald, brought on, in 841, the great battle of Fontenailles. The contest was occasioned by the ambition of Lothar, the eldest, who claimed for himself the whole imperial inheritance. There was great carnage, and Lothar was defeated. The bishops present saw in the result a verdict of God in favor of his two adversaries. The result was the Treaty of Verdun for the division of the empire.

TERMS OF THE TREATY OF VERDUN.—Louis the German took the Eastern and German Franks, and Charles the Bald the Western and Latinized Franks. Lothar, who retained the imperial title, received the middle portion of the Frank territory, including Italy and a long, narrow strip of territory between the dominions of his brothers, and extending to the North Sea. This land took later the name of Lotharingia, or Lorraine. It always had the character of a border-land. While Louis's share comprised only German-speaking peoples, Charles's kingdom was made up almost exclusively of Gallo-Roman inhabitants; while under Lothar the two races were mingled. This division marks the birth of the German and French nations as such. The German-speaking peoples in the East, who were affiliated in language, customs, and spirit, more and more grew together into a nation. In like manner, the subjects of the Western kingdom more and more were resolved into a Franco-Roman nationality. Lothar ruled at Aix-la-Chapelle, and was styled emperor; but each of the other kingdoms was independent, and the empire of Charlemagne was dissolved. Only for a short time, under Charles the Fat (881-887), nearly the whole monarchy of Charlemagne was united under one scepter. When he was deposed it was again broken in pieces; and four distinct kingdoms emerged,—those of the Eastern and Western Franks, "the forerunners of Germany and France," and the kingdoms of Italy and of Burgundy, in South-eastern Gaul, which were sometimes united and sometimes separate. Lotharingia was attached now to the Eastern and now to the Western Frank kingdom. In theory there was not a severance, but a sharing, of the common possession which had been the object of contention.

EASTERN CARLOVINGIANS.—Charles the Fat was a weak and sluggish prince. He offered no effectual resistance to the destructive ravages of the Normans, or Scandinavian Northmen. He was deposed in 887, and died in the following year on an island in the Lake of Constance. His successor, the grandson of Louis the German, Arnulf, duke of Carinthia, became king of the Germans, (887-899) and emperor; and, after his short reign, the line of Louis died out in Louis the Child, the weak son of Arnulf (900-911). The house of Charlemagne survived only among the Western Franks.

During the reign of Louis the Child, Hatto (I.), archbishop of Mentz and primate of Germany, was regent and guardian of the king. He was a bold defender of the unity of the empire. He was charged, truly or falsely, with taking the life of Adalbert, a Frank nobleman whom he had enticed into his castle. There was a popular tradition that the devil seized Hatto's corpse, and threw it into the crater of Mount AEtna. The mistake is often made of connecting the popular legend of the "Mouse-tower" at Bingen on the Rhine, with him. It was told of a later Hatto (Hatto II.), who was likewise archbishop of Mentz (968). He was charged with shutting up the poor in a barn, in a time of famine, and of burning them there. As the story runs, he called them "rats who ate the corn." Numberless mice swam to the tower which he had built in the midst of the stream, and devoured him. Southey has put the tale into a ballad,—"God's Judgment on a Wicked Bishop."

KINGDOM OF FRANCE.—In 841 Rouen fell into the hands of the Normans, and Paris lay open to their attacks. In 861 Charles the Bald invested a brave soldier, Robert the Strong, whose descent is not known, with the county of Paris, that he might resist the invaders. He held the country between the Seine and the Loire, under the name of the Duchy of France. The other Francia, east of the Rhine, continued to be an important part of Germany, the district called Franconia. Robert was the greatgrandfather of Hugh Capet, the founder of the kingdom of France. Under the imbecile Charles the Fat, the audacious Northmen (885-886) laid siege to Paris. It was Odo, or Eudes, count of Paris, who led the citizens in their heroic and successful resistance. Him the nobles of France chose to be their king. His family were called "Dukes of the French." Their duchy—Western or Latin Francia—was the strongest state north of the Loire. The feudal lords were growing mightier, and the imperial or royal power was becoming weaker. After Odo of Paris was elected to the Western kingdom, there followed a period of about a hundred years during which there was a king sometimes from his house and sometimes from the family of the Carlovingians. The latter still spoke German, and, when they had the power, reigned at Laon in the northeastern corner of the kingdom. Odo ruled from 888 until 898. He had to leave the southern part of France independent. During the last five years of his life he was obliged to contend with Charles the Simple (893-929), who was elected king by the Carlovingian party of the north. The most noted of the Carlovingian kings at Laon was Louis "from beyond seas" (936-954), Charles's son, who had been carried to England for safety. His reign was a constant struggle with Hugh the Great, duke of the French, the nephew of King Odo. Hugh would not accept the crown himself. On the death of Louis V. (986-987), the direct line of Charlemagne became extinct. The only Carlovingian heir was his uncle, Charles, duke of Lorraine. His claim the barons would not recognize, but elected Hugh Capet, duke of France, to be king, who, on the 1st (or the 3d) of July, 987, was solemnly crowned in the cathedral of Noyon, by the archbishop of Rheims. Just at this juncture, when the contest was between the dukes of the French and Charles of Lorraine, the Carlovingian claimant to the sovereignty, the adhesion and support of Duke Richard of Normandy (943-996) was of decisive effect. The Normans had been on the side of Laon; now they turned the scale in favor of the elevation of the Duke of France. The German party at Laon could not withstand the combined power of Rouen and Paris. Thus with Hugh Capet, the founder of the Capetian line, the kingdom of France began, having Paris for its capital; and the name of France came gradually to be applied to the greater part of Gaul. But when Hugh Capet became king, the great feudal states were almost independent of the royal control. Eight were above the rest in power and extent. "The counts of Flanders, Champagne, and Vermandois, and the dukes of Normandy, Brittany, Burgundy, and Aquitaine, regarded themselves as the new king's peers or equals." Lorraine, Arles, and Franche Comte—parts of modern France—"held of the emperor, and were, in fact, German." Hugh Capet's dukedom was divided by the Seine. He was lay abbot of St. Denis, the most important church in France.

THE GERMAN KINGDOM.—With the death of Louis the Child (911) the German branch of the Carlovingian line was extinguished. The Germans had to choose a king from another family. Germany, like France, was now composed of great fiefs. But there were two parties, differing from one another in their character and manners. The one consisted of the older Alemannic and Austrasian unions, where the traces of Roman influence continued, where the large cities were situated, and the principal sees. Here were formed the duchies of Swabia and Bavaria, and Franconia (Austrasian France). To the other, consisting chiefly of the duchy of Saxony, were attached Thuringia and a part of Frisia. In France the royal power, at the start, was so weak, that, not being dreaded, it was suffered to grow. In Germany the royal power was so strong that there was a constant effort to reduce it. Hence in France the result was centralization; in Germany the tendency was to division. In France the long continuance of the family of Hugh Capet made the monarchy hereditary. In Germany the frequent changes of dynasty helped to make it elective.

CONRAD I.—When Louis died, Conrad of Franconia (911-918) was chosen king by the clerical and secular nobles of the five duchies, in which the counts elevated themselves to the rank of dukes,—Franconia, Saxony, Lorraine, Swabia, and Bavaria. Germany thus became an elective kingdom; but since, as a rule, the sovereignty was continued in one family, the electoral principle was qualified by an hereditary element. Conrad began the struggle against the great feudatories, which went on through the Middle Ages. The dukes always chafed under the rule of a king; yet, for the glory of the nation and for their own safety against attacks from abroad, they were anxious to preserve it from extinction. The Hungarians, to whom Louis the Child had consented to pay tribute, renewed their incursions. They marched in force as far as Bremen. Conrad had wished to reduce the power of Saxony, and to detach from it Thuringia. He was constantly at war with his own subjects. Yet on his death-bed he showed his disinterested regard to the interests of the kingdom. He called to him his brother Eberhard, and charged him to carry his crown and crown jewels to his enemy Henry, duke of the Saxons, who was most capable of defending the country against the Hungarian invaders.

ITALY.—After the empire of Charles the Fat was broken up, a strong anti-German feeling was manifest in Italy. The people wanted the king of Italy, and, if possible, the emperor of the Romans, to be of their own nation. But they could not agree: there was a violent contest between the supporters of Berengar of Friuli and the supporters of Guido of Spoleto. Arnulf came twice into Italy to quell the disturbance, and on his second visit, in 896, was crowned emperor. Civil war soon broke out again. Within twenty years the crown had been given to five different aspirants. They were Germans, or were Italians only in name. Berengar I. (888-924) was crowned emperor by the Pope, but had to fight against a competitor, Rudolph, king of Burgundy, whom the turbulent nobles set up in his place. Berengar was finally defeated and assassinated. His grandson, Berengar II. (of Ivrea) (950-961), had to fly to Germany (943) to escape a competitor for the throne, Hugh, count of Provence, brother of Ermengarde, Berengar's step-mother, to whom she had given the crown. His relations with Otto I. (the Great) led to very important consequences, to be narrated hereafter.

STATE OF LEARNING IN THE TENTH CENTURY.—Under Charles the Bald, there were not wanting signs of intellectual activity. John Scotus Erigena,—or John Scot, Erinborn,—who was at the head of his palace-school, was an acute philosopher, who, in his speculations in the vein of New Platonism, tended to pantheistic doctrine. His opinions were condemned at the instance of Hincmar, the eminent archbishop of Rheims. But after the deposition of Charles the Fat (887), there followed a period of darkness throughout the West. The universal political disorder was enough to account for this prevalent ignorance. But, in addition, the Latin language ceased to be spoken by the people, while the new vernacular tongues were not reduced to writing. Latin could only be learned in the schools; and these fell more and more into decay, in the confusion of the times. The mental stimulus which the study of the Latin had communicated, there was nothing, as yet, in the new languages to replace.

THE PAPACY IN THE NINTH AND TENTH CENTURIES.—While Italy was under the rule of Justinian and his successors, the popes were subject to the tyranny of the Eastern emperors. After the Lombard conquest, their position, difficult as it was on account of the small protection afforded them from Constantinople, was favorable to the growth of their influence and authority. By their connection with Pipin and Charlemagne, they were recognized as having a spiritual headship, the counterpart of the secular supremacy of the emperor. The election of the Pope was to be sanctioned by the emperor, and that of the emperor by the Pope. But Charlemagne was supreme ruler over all classes and persons in Italy, as in his own immediate dominions. In the disorder that ensued upon his death, the imperial authority in all directions was reduced. The Frank bishops were frequently appealed to as umpires among the contending Carolingian princes. The growth of the power of the great bishops carried in it the exaltation of the highest bishop of all, the Roman pontiff. A pallium, or mantle, was sent by the Pope to all archbishops on their accession, and was considered to be a badge of the papal authority. In the earlier part of the ninth century, there appeared what are called the pseudo-Isidorian decretals, consisting of forged ecclesiastical documents purporting to belong to the early Christian centuries, which afforded a sanction to the highest claims of the chief rulers of the Church. These are universally known to be an invention; but, in that uncritical day, this was not suspected. They contained not much in behalf of hierarchical claims which had not, at one time or another, been actually asserted and maintained. In the spirit of the decretals Pope Nicholas I. (858-867) acted, when this energetic pontiff overruled the iniquitous decision of two German synods, and obliged Lothar, king of Lotharingia, to take back his lawful wife, Theutberga, whom he had divorced out of regard to a mistress, Waldrada. In the tenth century (904-962), when Italy, in the absence of imperial restraint, was torn by violent factions, the Papacy was for half a century disposed of by the Tuscan party, and especially by two depraved women belonging to it, Theodora, and her daughter Maria (or Marozia). The scandals belonging to this dismal period in the history of the papal institution are to be ascribed to the anarchy prevailing in Italy, and to the vileness of the individuals who usurped power at Rome.



CHAPTER III. INVASIONS OF THE NORTHMEN AND OTHERS: THE FEUDAL SYSTEM.

INCURSIONS OF THE NORTHMEN.—The Scandinavians, or Northmen, were a Teutonic people, by whom were gradually formed the kingdoms of Denmark, Norway, and Sweden. Their incursions, prior to Charlemagne, were towards the Rhine, but at length assumed more the character of piracy. They coasted along the shores in their little fleets, and lay in wait for their enemies in creeks and bays; whence they were called vikings, or children of the bays. By degrees they ventured out farther on the sea, and became bolder in their depredations. They sent their light vessels along the rivers of France, and established themselves in bands of five or six hundred at convenient stations, whence they sallied out to plunder the neighboring cities and country places. They did not cause, but they hastened, the fall of the Frank Empire. In 841 they burned Rouen; in 843 they plundered Nantes, Saintes, and Bordeaux. Hastings, a famous leader of these hardy sea-robbers, sailed along the coast of the Spanish peninsula, took Lisbon and pillaged it, and burned Seville. Making a descent upon Tuscany, he captured, by stratagem, and plundered the city of Luna, which he at first mistook for Rome. In 853 the daring rovers captured Tours, and burned the Abbey of St. Martin; and, three years later, they appeared at Orleans. In 857 they burned the churches of Paris, and carried away as captive the abbot of St. Denis. As pagans they had no scruple about attacking churches and abbeys, to which fugitives resorted for safety and for the hiding of their treasures. Robert the Strong fell in fighting these marauders (866). Their devastations continued down to the year 911, in the reign of Charles the Simple; then the same arrangement was made which the Romans had adopted in relation to the Germanic invaders. By the advice of his nobles, Charles decided to abandon to the Northmen, territory where they could settle, and which they could cultivate as their own. Rolf, or Rollo, one of their most formidable chiefs, accepted the offer; and the Northmen established themselves (911) in the district known afterwards as Normandy. Rollo received baptism, wore the title of duke, and thus became the liege of King Charles, who reigned at Laon, and whom he loyally served. Later the Normans joined hands with ducal France, and helped Paris to throw off its dependence on royal France and the house of Charlemagne which had ruled at Laon. It was by Norman help that the duchy of France was raised to the rank of a kingdom, and Hugh Capet, in the room of being a vassal of kings of German lineage, became the founder of French sovereigns. Under the Normans, tillage flourished; and the feudal system was established with greater regularity than elsewhere.

THE DANES IN ENGLAND.—When, in 827, Egbert, the king of Wessex, united all the Saxons in England under his rule, the Danish attacks had already begun. In his later years these ravages increased. Alfred (871-901) was reduced to such straits in 878, that, with a few followers, he hid himself among the swamps and woods of Somersetshire. It was then, according to the legend, that he was scolded by the woman, who, not knowing him, had set him to watch her cakes, but found that he, absorbed in other thoughts, had allowed them to burn. Later, Alfred gained advantages over the Danes; but, in the treaty that was made with them, they received, as vassals of the West Saxon king, East Anglia, and part of Essex and Mercia. Already they had a lodgment in Northumberland, so that the larger part of England had fallen into Danish hands. The names of towns ending in by, as Whitby, are of Danish origin. Alfred compiled a body of laws called dooms, founded monasteries, and fostered learning. He himself translated many books from the Latin. His bravery in conflict with the Danes enabled him to spend his last years in quiet. Athelstan, the grandson of Alfred (925-940), was victorious over the Danes, and over the Scotch and Welsh of the North. Under Edgar (959-975), the power of England was at its height. He kept up a strong fleet; but, in the time of Aethelred II. (the Unready), the Danish invasions were renewed. He and his bad advisers adopted the practice of buying off the invaders at a large price. In 994 Swegen invaded the country. He had been baptized, but had gone back to heathenism. In 1013 England was completely conquered by him. Aethelred fled to Duke Richard the Good of Normandy.

CANUTE.—The son of Aethelred, Edmund, surnamed Ironside, after the death of Swegen, kept up the war with his son Cnut, or Canute. After fighting six pitched battles with him, Edmund consented to divide the kingdom with him; but in the same year (1016) the English king died. Canute (1017-1035) now became king of all England. He had professed Christianity, and unexpectedly proved himself, after his accession, to be a good ruler. One of the legends about him is, that he once had a seat placed for himself by the seashore, and ordered the rising tide not to dare to wet his feet. Not being obeyed by the dashing waves, he said, "Let all men know how empty and worthless is the power of kings, for there is none worthy of the name but He whom heaven, earth, and sea obey by eternal laws." After that he never wore his crown, but left it on the image of Jesus on the cross. Canute inherited the crown of Denmark, and won Norway and part of Sweden; so that he was the most powerful prince of his time. His sons, however, did not rule well; and in 1042 the English chose for king one of their own people, Edward, called the Confessor, the son of Aethelred. In the time of Canute, the power of the Danes, and of the Northmen generally, was at its height. Denmark, Norway, Sweden, and England were ruled by them; and Scandinavian princes by descent governed in Normandy and in Russia. Although a most vigorous race, the Northmen showed a wonderful facility in adopting the language and manners of the people among whom they settled. The effect of their migrations was to diminish the strength and importance of their native countries which they had left.

OTHER SETTLEMENTS OF NORTHMEN.—The Northmen made many other voyages which have not yet been mentioned. As early as 852 there was a Scandinavian king in Dublin. They early conquered the Shetland Isles, the Orkneys, and the Hebrides. On the northern coast of Scotland, they founded the kingdom of Caithness, which they held to the end of the twelfth century. Iceland was discovered by the Northmen, and was settled by them in 874. About the same time Greenland was discovered, and towards the end of the tenth century a colony was planted there. This led to the discovery of the mainland of America, and to the occupation, for a time, of Vinland, which is supposed to have been the coast of New England. In Russia, where the Northmen were called Varangians, Rurik, one of their leaders, occupied Novgorod in 862, and founded a line of sovereigns, which continued until 1598.

INCURSIONS OF SARACENS.—The Saracens were marauders in Italy, as the Northmen were in France. From Cairoan (in Tunis), as we have seen, they sent out their piratical fleets, which ravaged Malta, Sicily, and other islands of the Mediterranean. These corsairs, checked for the moment by the fleets of Charlemagne, afterwards began anew their conquests. From Sicily, of which they made themselves masters in 831, they passed over to the Italian mainland. Among their deeds are included the burning of Ostia, Civita Vecchia, and the wealthy abbey of Monte Cassino, They landed on the shores of Provence, established a military colony there, pillaged Arles and Marseilles, and continued their depredations in Southern France and Switzerland.

INCURSIONS OF HUNGARIANS.—The Magyars, called by the Greeks Hungarians, a warlike people of the Turanian group of nations, crossed the Carpathian Mountains about 889. They overran the whole of Hungary and Transylvania. In 900, in the course of their predatory invasions, they penetrated into Bavaria, and the king of Germany paid them tribute. They carried their incursions into Lombardy and into Southern Italy. They even crossed the Rhine, and devastated Alsace, Lorraine, and Burgundy. Such terror did they excite that their name remained in France a synonym of detestable ferocity.

CHARACTER OF THE LATER INVASIONS.—The incursions in the ninth century differed from the great Germanic invasions which had subverted the Roman Empire. The Northmen and the Saracens moved in small bands, whose main object was plunder, and not either permanent conquest, or, as was the aim of the Arabians, the spread of a religion by the sword. The Hungarians alone established themselves in the valley of the Theiss and the Danube, after the manner of the Franks, the Burgundians, and the Goths; and there they remained. The great effect of the last invasion was to accelerate the breaking up of political unity, and the introduction of feudal organization, or the preponderance of local rule as opposed to centralized power.



THE NORTHMEN IN ENGLAND AND ITALY.

Later than the events narrated above, there were two great achievements of the Northmen, which it is most convenient to describe here, although they occurred in the eleventh century. They are the conquest of England, and the founding of the kingdom of Naples and Sicily.



I. THE NORMAN CONQUEST OF ENGLAND.

The NORMAN INVASION.—The duchy of Normandy had become very strong and prosperous, and, under the French-speaking Northmen, or Normans, had grown to be one of the principal states in Western Europe. Edward, king of England, surnamed the Confessor, or Saint (1042-1066) had been brought up in Normandy, and favored his own Norman friends by lavish gifts of honors and offices. The party opposed to the foreigners was led by Godwin, earl of the West Saxons. After being once banished, he returned in arms; and Norman knights and priests were glad to escape from the country. Edward's wife was Edith, daughter of Godwin. They had no children; and on his death-bed he recommended that Earl Harold, the son of Godwin, should be his successor. The Normans claimed that he had promised that their duke, William, should reign after him. It was said that Harold himself, on a visit to William, had, either willingly or unwillingly, sworn to give him his support. Edward, who was devout in his ways, though a negligent ruler, was buried in the monastery called Westminster, which he had built, and which was the precursor of the magnificent church bearing the same name that was built afterwards by King Henry III. Harold was now crowned. Duke William, full of wrath, appealed to the sword; and, under the influence of the archdeacon Hildebrand, Pope Alexander II. took his side, and sanctioned his enterprise of conquest. At the same time the north of England was invaded by the king of the Norwegians, a man of gigantic stature, named Hardrada. The Norman invaders landed without resistance on the shore of Sussex, on the 28th of September, 1066, and occupied Hastings. Harold encamped on the heights of Senlac. On the 14th of October the great battle took place in which the Normans were completely victorious. The English stood on a hill in a compact mass, with their shields in front and a palisade before them. They repulsed the Norman charges. But the Normans pretended to retreat. This moved the Saxons to break their array in order to pursue. The Normans then turned back, and rushed through the palisade in a fierce onset. An arrow pierced the eye of Harold, and he was cut to pieces by four French knights. The Norman duke, William the Conqueror, was crowned king on Christmas Day; but it was four years before he overcame all resistance, and got full control over the country. The largest estates and principal offices in England he allotted to Normans and other foreigners. The crown of William was handed down to his descendants, and gradually the conquerors and the conquered became mingled together as one people.



EFFECT OF THE NORMAN CONQUEST.

CHARACTER OF THE SAXONS.—The Saxons at the time of the Conquest were a strong and hardy race, hospitable, and fond of good cheer, which was apt to run into gluttony and revels. Their dwellings were poor, compared with those of the better class of Normans. They were enthusiastic in out-door sports, such as wrestling and hunting. They fought on foot, armed with the shield and axe. The common soldier, however, often had no better weapon than a fork or a sharpened stick. The ordeals in vogue, as a test of guilt and innocence when one was accused of a crime, were, plunging the arm into boiling water, or holding a hot iron in the hand for three paces. London was fast growing to be the chief town, and eclipsing Winchester, the old Saxon capital. A king like Alfred, and scholars like Bede and Alcuin, not to speak of old chronicles and ballads, show that literature was valued; but the Danish invasions in Northumberland, where schools and letters had flourished, did much to blight the beginnings of literary progress.

THE NORMAN SPIRIT AND INFLUENCE.—The tapestry at Bayeux represents in a series of pictures the course of the Norman conquest. There we see the costume of the combatants. The Norman gentlemen were mounted, and fought with lance and sword. Of their bravery and military skill, their success affords abundant proof. Although the Normans were victors and masters in England, not only was the conquest gradual, but the result of it was the amalgamation of the one people with the other. The very title of conqueror, attached to William, was a legal term (conquaestor), and meant purchaser or acquirer. There was an observance of legal forms in the establishment and administration of his government. The folkland, or the public land, was appropriated by him, and became crown-land. So all the land of the English was considered to be forfeited, and estates were given out liberally to Norman gentlemen. The nobility became mainly Norman, and the same was true of the ecclesiastics and other great officers. All the land was held as a grant from the king. In 1085 the making of Domesday was decreed, which was a complete statistical survey of all the estates and property in England. The object was to furnish a basis for taxation. The Domesday Book is one of the most curious and valuable monuments of English history. Among the changes in law made by William was the introduction of the Norman wager of battle, or the duel, by the side of the Saxon methods of ordeal described above. In most of the changes, there was not so much an uprooting as a great transformation of former rules and customs.

ENGLAND AND THE CONTINENT.—One of the most important results of the Norman Conquest was the bringing of England into much more intimate relations with the continent. The horizon of English thought and life was widened. One incidental consequence was the closer connection of the English Church with the Papacy. Foreign ecclesiastics, some of them men of eminence and of learning, were brought in. It was this connection with the continent that led England to take so important a part in the Crusades.

THEN NORMAN GOVERNMENT.—As regards feudalism, one vital feature of it—the holding of land by a military tenure, or on condition of military service—was reduced to a system by the conquest. But William took care not to be overshadowed or endangered by his great vassals. He levied taxes on all, and maintained the place of lord of all his subjects. He was king of the English, and sovereign lord of the Norman nobles. He summoned to the Witan, or Great Assembly, those whom he chose to call. This summons, and the right to receive it, became the foundation of the Peerage. Out of the old Saxon Witan, there grew in this way the House of Lords. The lower orders, when summoned at all, were summoned in a mass; afterwards we shall find that they were called by representatives; and, in—the end, when the privilege of appearing in this way was converted into a right, the House of Commons came into being. In like manner, the King's Court gradually came to be, in the room of the Assembly itself, a judicial and governing Committee of the Assembly. From this body of the king's immediate counselors emerged in time the Privy Council and the Courts of Law. Out of the Privy Council grew, in modern times, the Cabinet, composed of what are really "those privy councilors who are specially summoned." Committees of the National Assembly, in the course of English history, acquired "separate being and separate powers, as the legislative, judicial, and executive branches of the government." Thus the English Constitution is the product of a steady growth.

MINGLING OF BLOOD AND LANGUAGES.—A multitude of Normans emigrated into England, especially to London. The Normans became Englishmen, as a natural consequence. But they affected the spirit and manners of the people by whom they were absorbed. By opening avenues for French influence, chivalry, with its peculiar ideas and ways, was brought into England. But it must never be forgotten that the Normans were kinsfolk of the Saxons. Both conquerors and conquered were Teutons. The conquest was very different, in this particular, from what the conquest of Germany by France, or of France by Germany, would be. The French language which the Normans spoke had been acquired by them in their adopted home across the channel. To this source the Latin element, or words of Latin etymology, in our English tongue is mainly due. The loss of the old Saxon inflections is another marked change; but this is not due, to so large an extent, solely to the influence of Norman speech. But the English language continued to be essentially Teutonic in its structure. For a long time the two tongues lived side by side. At the end of the twelfth century, if French was the language of polite intercourse, English was the language of common conversation and of popular writings. Learned men spoke, or could speak, and they wrote, in Latin.

NORMAN BUILDINGS.—The Normans built the cathedrals and castles. Down to the eleventh century, the Romanesque, or "round-arched" architecture, derived from Italy, had been the one prevalent style in Western Europe. In the modification of it, called the Norman style, we find the round arch associated with massive piers and narrow windows. Durham cathedral is an example of the Norman Romanesque type of building. The Norman conquerors covered England with castles, of which the White Tower of London, built by William, is a noted specimen. Sometimes they were square, and sometimes polygonal; but, except in the palaces of the kings, they afforded little room for artistic beauty of form or decoration. They were erected as fortresses, and were regarded by the people with execration as strongholds of oppression.



II. THE NORMANS IN ITALY AND SICILY.

THE NORMAN KINGDOM OF NAPLES AND SICILY.—Early in the eleventh century, knights from Normandy wandered into Southern Italy, and gave their aid to different states in battle against the Greeks and Saracens. In 1027 the ruler of Naples gave them a fertile district, where they built the city of Aversa. By the reports of their victories and good fortune, troops of pilgrims and warriors were attracted to join them. The valiant sons of the old count, Tancred of Hauteville, were among the number. They supported the Greek viceroy in an attack on the Arabs in Sicily; but, on his failing duly to reward them, they turned against him, and conquered Apulia for themselves. Under Robert Guiscard (1057-1085), they made themselves masters of all Southern Italy. They had already defeated Pope Leo IX. at Civitella, and received from him as fiefs their present and anticipated conquests in Apulia, Calabria, and Sicily. Twelve years after, Robert, with the help of his brother Roger, wrested Sicily, with its capital, Palermo, from the Saracens, who were divided among themselves (1072). The seaports of Otranto and Bari were also taken by Robert. He even entered on the grand scheme of conquering the Byzantine Empire, but his death frustrated this endeavor. His nephew Roger II. (1130-1154) took the remaining possessions of the Greeks in Southern Italy and Sicily, united them in the kingdom of Naples and Sicily, and received from the Pope the title of king. In this kingdom the feudal system was established, and trade and industry flourished. In culture and prosperity it surpassed all the other Italian communities. At Salerno was a famous school of medicine and natural science; at Amalfi and Naples were schools of law. But the Norman nobility was corrupted and enervated by the luxury of the South, and by the influence of Mohammedan customs, and modes of thought. During fifty-six years Roger and his two successors, William the Bad (1154-1166) and William the Good (1166-1189), ruled this flourishing kingdom, which then fell by inheritance to the Hohenstaufen German princes. On the mainland and in Sicily, numerous stately buildings and ruined castles and towers point back to the romantic period of Norman rule.

NORMAN TRAITS.—It is a remarkable fact, that the Normans, although so distinguished as rovers and conquerors, have vanished from the face of the earth. They were lost in the kingdoms which they founded. They adopted the languages of the nations which they subdued. But while in England they were merged in the English, and modified the national character, this effect was not produced in Italy and Sicily. In Sicily they found Greek-speaking Christians and Arabic-speaking Mussulmans; and Italians came into the island in the track of the conquerors. The Normans did not find there a nation as in England; and they created not a nation, but a kingdom of a composite sort, beneficent while it lasted, but leaving no permanent traces behind. "The Normans in Sicily," says Mr. Freeman, "so far as they did not die out, were merged, not in a Sicilian nation, for that did not exist, but in the common mass of settlers of Latin speech and rite, as distinguished from the older inhabitants, Greek and Saracen." Independent, enterprising, impatient of restraint, gifted with a rare imitative power which imparted a peculiar tinge and a peculiar grace to whatever they adopted from others, they lacked originality, and the power to maintain their own distinctive type of character and of speech.

Mr. Freeman has eloquently described the spread of the Normans, "the Saracens of Christendom," in all corners of the world. They fought in the East against the Turks. "North, south, east, the Norman lances were lifted." The Norman "ransacked Europe for scholars, poets, theologians, and artists. At Rouen, at Palermo, and at Winchester he welcomed merit in men of every race and every language." "And yet that race, as a race, has vanished." "The Scottish Brace or the Irish Geraldine passed from Scandinavia to Gaul, from Gaul to England, from England to his own portion of our islands; but at each migration, he ceased to be Scandinavian, French, or English: his patriotism was in each case transferred to his new country, and his historic being belongs to his last acquired home." Norman blood was in the veins of the Crusaders who first stood on the battlements of Jerusalem, and of the great German emperor, Frederic II.



THE NORMANS.

TANCRED OF HAUTEVILLE. + Robert Guiscard, Duke of Apulia, d. 1085. SICILY + ROGER, the Great Count, d. 1101 + Roger (of Apulia, 1127; king, 1130), 1101-1154. + WILLIAM I the Bad, 1154-1166, m. Margaret, daughter of Garcia IV of Navarre. + WILLIAM II the Good, 1166-1189, m. Joanna, daughter of Henry II of England. + CONSTANCE (d. 1198), m. Emperor Henry VI.



THE FEUDAL SYSTEM.

ORIGIN OF FEUDALISM.—When the Franks conquered Gaul, they divided the land among themselves. This estate each free German held as allodial property, or as a free-hold. The king took the largest share. His palaces were dwellings connected with large farms or hunting-grounds, and he went with his courtiers from one to another. To his personal followers and officers he allotted lands. These benefices, it seems, were granted at first with the understanding that he might resume them at will. As holders of them, the recipients owed to him personal support. Other chiefs, and land-owners of a minor grade, took the same course. This was the germ of feudalism. More and more it grew to be the characteristic method of living and of government in Western Europe after the fall of Charlemagne's empire. The inheritors of his dominion were not the kings of France, of Germany, or of Italy, but the numerous feudal lords. Against the invasions of the Norman, Saracen, and Hungarian plunderers, the kings and the counts proved themselves incapable of defending territory or people. Meantime, the principle of heredity—the principle that benefices should go down from father to son, or to the next heir—had gained a firm footing. Another fact was that the royal offices became hereditary, and were transmitted to the heirs of allodial property. Thus the exercise of government and the possession of land were linked together. In times of danger, small proprietors more and more put themselves under the protection of the richer and stronger: that is, allodial property became feudal. This custom had begun long before, in the decadence of the Roman empire, when not only poor freemen, but also men of moderate means, ruined by taxation, put themselves under the protection of the great, and settled on their lands. They became thus colons (coloni). In the later times of disorder of which we are now speaking, farmhouses in the country gave place to fortified castles on hill-tops or other defensible sites, about which clustered in villages the dependents of the lord, who tilled his land, fought for him, and, in turn, were protected by him.

THE SUBSTANCE OF FEUDALISM.—"Feudality recognizes two principles, the land and the sword, riches and force,—two principles on which every thing depends, to which every thing is related, and which are united and identified with one another; since it is necessary to possess land in order to have the right to use the sword in one's own name (that is to say, to have the right of private war), and since the possession of land imposes the duty of drawing the sword for the suzerain, and in the name of the suzerain of whom the land is held." Feudalism is a social system in which there is a kind of hierarchy of lands in the hands of warriors, who hold of one another in a gradation. There is a chain reaching up from the tower of the simple gentleman to the royal chateau, or castle. In this social organization, there are the two grand classes of the seigneurs and the serfs; but the seigneur, even if he be a king, may also hold fiefs as a vassal.

SUZERAIN AND VASSAL.—The suzerain and the vassal, or liege, were bound together by reciprocal obligations. The vassal owed (1) military service on the demand of the lord; (2) such aid as the suzerain called for in the administration of justice within his jurisdiction; (3) other aids, such as, when he was a prisoner, to pay the ransom for his release; and pecuniary contributions when he armed his eldest son, and when he married his eldest daughter. These were legal or required aids. They took the place of taxation in modern states. There were other things that the vassal was expected to do which were gracious or voluntary. If the liege died without heirs, or forfeited the fief by a violation of the conditions on which it was held, it reverted to the lord. The liege was invested with the fief. He knelt before the suzerain, put his hands within the hands of the suzerain, and took an oath to be his man. This was homage,—from homo in the Latin, and homme in French, signifying man. The suzerain might at any time require its renewal. Under the feudal system, every thing was turned into a fief. The right to hunt in a forest, or to fish in a river, or to have an escort on the roads, might be granted as a fief, on the condition of loyalty, and of the homage just described.

PRIVATE WAR.—The vassal had the right to be tried by his peers; that is, by vassals on the same level as himself. He might, if treated with injustice, go to the superior: he might appeal to the suzerain of his immediate lord. But suzerains preferred to take justice into their own hands. Hence the custom of private war prevailed, and of judicial combats, or duels, so common in the middle ages.

ENTANGLEMENTS OF FEUDALISM.—Many suzerains were mutually vassals, each holding certain lands of the other. The same baron often held lands of different suzerains, who might be at war with each other, so that each required his service. The sovereign prince might be bound to do homage to a petty feudal lord on account of lands which the prince had inherited or otherwise acquired. The power of the suzerain depended on a variety of circumstances. The king might be weak, since feudalism grew out of the overthrow of royal power. The king of France, with the exception of titular prerogatives and some rights with regard to churches, which were often disputed, had no means of attack or defense beyond what the duchy of France furnished him. Yet logically and by a natural tendency, the king was the supreme suzerain. "Feudalism carried hid in its bosom the arms by which it was one day to be struck down."

ECCLESIASTICAL FEUDALISM.—The clergy were included in the feudal system. The bishop was often made the count, and, as such, was the suzerain of all the nobles in his diocese. Cities were often under the suzerainty of bishops. Besides their tithes, the clergy had immense landed possessions. The abbots and bishops often availed themselves of the protection of powerful vassals, of whom they were the suzerains. On the other hand, bishops, who were also themselves dukes or counts, sometimes did homage for their temporalities to lay suzerains, especially to the king. In France and in England, in the middle ages, the feudal clergy possessed a fifth of all the land; in Germany, a third. The church, through bequests of the dying and donations from the living, constantly increased its possessions. It might be despoiled, but it could defend itself by the terrible weapon of excommunication.

SERFS AND VILLAINS.—In the eleventh century Europe was thus covered with a multitude of petty sovereigns. Below the body of rulers, or the holders of fiefs, was the mass of the people. These were the serfs,—the tillers of the ground, who enjoyed some of the privileges of freemen, and who, since they were attached to the seigneurie, could not be sold as slaves. The villains were a grade above the serfs. The term (from villae) originally meant villagers. They paid rent for the land which the proprietor allowed them to till; but they were subject, like the serfs, to the will of the suzerain; and the constant tendency was for them to sink into the inferior condition. Slavery, as distinguished from serfdom, gradually passed away under the emancipating spirit fostered by Christianity and the Church.

THE INHERITANCE OF FIEFS.—At first the Salic principle, which excluded females from inheriting fiefs, prevailed. But that gave way, and daughters were preferred in law to collateral male relatives. When a female inherited, the fief was occupied by the suzerain up to the time of her marriage. It never ceased to be under the protection of the sword. In France, the right of primogeniture was established, but with important qualifications, which varied in different portions of the country. The eldest, however, always had the largest portion. In Germany, the tendency to the division of fiefs was more prevalent. Among the Normans in England, and under their influence in Palestine, the law of inheritance by the eldest was established in its full rigor.

SPIRIT OF FEUDALISM.—Feudalism had more vitality than the system of absorbing all the land by a few great proprietors, which existed in the period of the decline of the Roman Empire. Individuality, courage, the proud sense of belonging to an aristocratic order, were widely diffused among the numerous feudal landowners. The feeling of loyalty among them was a great advance upon the blind subjection of the slave to his master. But the weight of feudalism was heavy on the lower strata of society. The lord was an autocrat, whose will there was neither the power nor the right to resist, and who could lay hold of as much of the labor and the earnings of the subject as he might choose to exact. The petty suzerain, because his needs were greater, was often more oppressive than the prince. The serf could not change his abode, he could not marry, he could not bequeath his goods, without the permission of his lord.



THE SAXON, FRANCONIAN, AND HOHENSTAUFEN IMPERIAL HOUSES.

HENRY I [1] 918-936. + OTTO I, 936-973, Emperor, 962, m. 1, Eadgyth, d. of Edward the Elder; + Liutgarde. 2, Adelheid, [2] d. of Rudolph II, King of Burgundy. + OTTO II, 973-983, m. Theophania, daughter of Romanus II, Eastern Emperor. + OTTO III, 983-1002. + Henry the Wrangler, Duke of Bavaria. + Henry the Wrangler. + (St.) HENRY II, 1002-1024, m. Cunigunda of Luxemburg.

CONRAD I, [1] 911-918. + C. Werner (?) m. daughter. + Conrad the Red, (killed at the Lechfeld, 955) m. Liutgarde, daughter of Eadgyth and Otto I. + Otto. + Henry. + CONRAD II, the Salic, 1024-1039, m. Gisela, d. of Hermann II, Duke of Swabia. + HENRY III, 1039-1056, m. 1, Gunhilda, daughter of Cnut; 2, Agnes, daughter of William, Count of Poitiers. + HENRY IV, 1056-1106, m. 1, Bertha, daughter of Otto, Marquis of Susa; + HENRY V, 1106-1125, m. Matilda, d. of Henry I of England. + Agnes, m. 1, Frederick of Hohenstaufen, Duke of Swabia, 1080-1105; + Frederick the One-eyed, Duke of Swabia, d. 1147, m. 1, Judith, daughter of Henry the Black. + FREDERICK I, Barbarossa, 1152-1190. + HENRY VI, 1190-1197, m. Constance of Sicily, d. 1198. + FREDERICK II, 1214-1250, m. 1, Constance, d. of Alfonso II of Aragon; + CONRAD IV, 1250-1254, m. Elizabeth, daughter of Otto II of Bavaria. + Conradin, d. 1268. + Manfred,[5] d. 1266. 2, Iolande de Brienne; 3, Isabella, d. of John of England. + PHILIP, 1198-1208, m. Irene, d. of Isaac II, Angelus, Eastern Emperor. + Beatrix, m. OTTO IV,[4] 1208-1214, d. 1218. + CONRAD III,[3] 1137-1152.

2, Leopold III, Marquis of Austria, d. 1136.

2, Adelaide, a Russian princess.

1 Conrad I and Henry I seem to have been related. By one account their mothers were the daughters of Emperor Arnulf.

2 Widow of Lothar, King of Italy.

3 Elected 1127 in opposition to Lotharl accepted as his successor.

4 Elected in opposition to Philip; accepted as his successor, 1208; ruined by battle of Bouvines.

5 King of Naples and Sicily after Conrad IV; killed in battle at Benevento against Charles of Anjou. Manfred's mother was Bianca Langia, daughter of a Lombard noble.



PERIOD III. FROM THE ESTABLISHMENT OF THE ROMANO-GERMANIC EMPIRE TO THE END OF THE CRUSADES. (A.D. 962-1270.)



CHAPTER I. THE CHURCH AND THE EMPIRE: PREDOMINANCE OF THE EMPIRE: TO THE CRUSADES, A.D. 1096.

I. KINGS AND EMPERORS OF THE SAXON HOUSE (918-1024).

HENRY THE FOWLER (918-936).—The envoys who carried to Duke Henry of Saxony the announcement of his election as king of Germany are said to have found him in the Hartz Mountains with a falcon on his wrist: hence he was called Henry the Fowler. He is a great figure in mediaeval history, and did much to make Germany a nation. He won back Lorraine, which had broken off from the kingdom. With it the Netherlands—Holland, Flanders, etc.—came to Germany. He united all the five great dukedoms, and governed with wisdom and moderation. At the end of five years, the Hungarians poured in with irresistible force. There was no alternative but to conclude with them a truce for nine years, during which he was to pay tribute. He set to work at once, however, to strengthen the defenses of his kingdom. He built walled towns and fortresses in the eastern districts of Saxony and Thuringia, and drafted one out of nine of the men from the population in the marches for military service. The fortresses were to be kept stored with provisions. The oldest towns of Saxony and of Thuringia are of this date. Then he disciplined his soldiers, and trained them to fight, like the Hungarians, on horseback. He conquered the Slavonian Wends who dwelt east of the Elbe and the Saale, and established the margraviate of Meissen to repel their attacks. His victory over the Slaves at Lenzen (929) made the north-eastern frontiers of Germany secure. Eadgyth, the daughter of Edward, king of England, was given in marriage to his eldest son, Otto. Henry now felt himself strong enough to throw off the Hungarian yoke, and answered with defiance their demand for the annual tribute. The struggle with them was hard; but they were completely vanquished at Merseburg in 933, and their camp taken. Henry founded the mark of Schleswig as a defense against the Danes. This wise and vigorous monarch laid the foundations of the German Empire. He was not only a mighty warrior: he built up industry and trade. He was buried at Quedlinburg in the abbey which he had founded.

OTTO I.: THE PALSGRAVES.—Otto I. (936-973) carried forward with equal energy the work which his father had begun. Having been chosen king by the German princes and chiefs at Aix, he was presented to the people in the church by the archbishop of Mentz; and they gave their assent to the election by raising the hand. Otto had a contest before him to maintain the unity of the kingdom. He aimed to make the office of duke an office to be allotted by the king, and thus to sap the power of his turbulent lieges. The dukes of Bavaria and Franconia, with Lorraine, and with the support of Louis IV., king of France, rose in arms against him. He subdued them; and the great duchies which had revolted against him becoming vacant, he placed in them members of his own family. He confirmed his authority by extending the power of the palsgraves, or counts palatine,—royal officers who superintended the domains of the king in the several duchies, and dispensed justice in his name. He favored the great ecclesiastics as a check to the aspiring lay lords. He invested the bishops and abbots with ring and staff, and they took the oath of fealty to him.

WARS OF OTTO I—Against the Hungarians, Otto achieved a triumph. He gained a victory over them at Augsburg in 955, in which they were said to have lost a hundred thousand men. This put an end to their incursions into Germany. He was likewise the victor in conflict with Slavonians. He subdued Boleslav I. of Bohemia, who had thrown off the German suzerainty, and obliged him to pay a tribute. Under the pious Boleslav II., Christianity was established there, and a bishopric founded at Prague (967). The Duke of Poland was forced to do homage to him, and to permit the founding of the bishopric of Posen. Against the Danish king, Harold the Blue-toothed, he carried his arms to the sea, the northern boundary of Jutland. He erected three new bishoprics among the Danes, and founded the archbishopric of Magdeburg, with subordinate sees in the valleys of the Elbe and the Oder. These achievements gave Otto great renown in Western Europe. The kings sent ambassadors to him, and presents came from the sovereigns at Constantinople and Cordova.

OTTO I. IN ITALY.—Otto now turned his eyes to Italy. After Arnulf, the Carlovingian emperor, left Italy (in 896), that country had been left to sixty years of anarchy. The demoralization and disorder of Italy, the profligacy of the Romans and of the pontiffs,— every thing being then subject to the riotous aristocratic factions, —rendered unity impossible. For a time (926-945) Hugh of Provence was called king: then followed his son Lothar (945-950). The next Italian king, Berengar II. of Ivrea (950), who, like his two predecessors, was an offshoot of the Carlovingian house, tried to force Adelheid, the beautiful young widow of Lothar, into a marriage with his son Adalbert. She (being then nineteen years of age) escaped with great difficulty from the prison where she was confined, took refuge in the castle of Canossa, and appealed to the great Otto, king of the Germans, for help,—to Otto, "that model of knightly virtue which was beginning to show itself after the fierce brutality of the last age." He descended into Italy, married the injured queen, and obliged Berengar to own him as suzerain (951). Berengar proved faithless and rebellious. Once more Otto entered Italy with an overpowering force, and was proclaimed king of the Lombards at Pavia. Pope John XII. had proposed to him to assume the imperial office. He was crowned, with his queen, in St. Peter's, in 962. He had engaged to confirm the gifts of previous emperors to the popes. When John XII. reversed his steps, allied himself with Berengar, and tried to stir up the Greeks, and even the Hungarians, against the emperor, Otto came down from Lombardy, and captured Rome. He caused John to be deposed by a synod for his crimes, and Leo VIII. to be appointed in his place (963). But, while Otto was again absent, Leo was driven out by the Romans, and John returned; but, soon after, he died. The Romans then elected Benedict pope. Otto captured Rome once more, deposed him, and restored Leo. Benedict was held in custody, and died in Hamburg. On a third journey to Italy, in 966, Otto crushed the factions which had so long degraded Rome and the Church. On this occasion, he negotiated a marriage between Theophano, a Greek princess, and his son, also named Otto. Thus he acquired the southern extremity of Italy.

THE HOLY ROMAN EMPIRE.—Otto had taken Charlemagne for his model. The "Holy Roman Empire of the German nation," the great political institution of the middle ages, was now established. In theory it was the union of the world-state and the world-church,—an undivided community under Emperor and Pope, its heaven-appointed secular and spiritual heads. As an actual political fact, it was the political union of Germany and Italy, in one sovereignty, which was in the hands of the German king. The junction of the two peoples was not without its advantages to both. It was, however, fruitful of evils. The strength of Germany was spent in endless struggles abroad, which stood in the way of the building up of a compact kingdom at home. For Italy it was the rule of foreigners, of which she might feel the need, but to which she was never reconciled.

OTTO II.: OTTO III.: HENRY II.—Otto II. (973-983) was highly gifted intellectually, but lacked his father's energy and decision. Henry the Quarrelsome, duke of Bavaria, revolted, but was put down, and deprived of his duchy. Otto obliged Lothar, the West Frankish king, to give up his claim to Lotharingia, which he attempted to seize. Otto, in 980, went to Italy, and, in the effort to conquer Southern Italy from the Greeks and Saracens, barely escaped with his life. This was in 982. He never returned to Germany. While Otto III. (983-1002) was a child, his mother, Theophano, was regent for a time in Germany, and his grandmother, Adelheid, in Italy. One of Otto's tutors was Gerbert, an eminent scholar and theologian. The proficiency of the young prince caused him to be styled the "Wonder of the World." He was crowned emperor in Rome in 996, when he was only sixteen years old. He dreamed of making Rome once more the center of the world, for his interest was chiefly in Italy. But his schemes were ended by his early death. At this time and afterward, there was deep agitation manifested in Europe, owing to the general expectation that before long the world would come to an end. On this account pilgrims flocked to Rome. Henry II. (1002-1024), as nearest of kin to the Saxon house, was the next emperor. Besides waging war with his own insurgent lieges, he had to carry on a contest for fourteen years with Bokslav, king of Poland, who had to give up Bohemia and Meissen. He founded the bishopric of Bamberg (1007). From this time the German kings, before their coronation as emperors, took the title of King of the Romans. The highest nobles were styled "Princes." The nobles lived in the castles, which were built for strongholds, as the power of the lords grew, and private wars became more common.

II. THE FRANCONIAN OR SALIAN EMPERORS (1024-1125).

CONRAD II.: BURGUNDY: the POLES.—At a great assembly of dukes, counts, and prelates at Oppenheim on the Rhine, Conrad, a Franconian nobleman (Conrad II.), was elected emperor (1024-1039). He was in the prime of life, and went to work vigorously to repress disorder in his kingdom. He had the support of the cities, which were now increasing in importance. At his coronation in Rome, in 1027, there were two kings present, Canute of England and Denmark, and Rudolph III. of Burgundy (or Arles, as the kingdom was called which had been formed by Rudolph II., by uniting Burgundy with a great part of Provence). After the death of Rudolph, who had appointed Conrad his successor, the emperor was crowned king of Arles, which remained thus attached to Germany. But at a later time the Romance, or non-German portions, were absorbed by France. The Duchy of Burgundy, a fief of the French king, was not included in the kingdom. The Poles invaded Germany in great force. Miesko, their leader, was repelled, and obliged to do homage for his crown, and to give up Lusatia, which had been received by Boleslav from Henry II. In Italy, Conrad issued an edict making the smaller fiefs there hereditary. He seems to have designed to do away with dukes, and to make the allegiance of all vassals to the king immediate.

HENRY III.: THE TRUCE OF GOD.—With Henry III. (1039-1056) the imperial power reached its height. He was for a time duke of Bavaria, Swabia, and Franconia, as well as emperor. In Hungary he conquered the enemies of Peter the king, and restored him to the throne, receiving his homage as vassal of the empire. He had great success in putting down private war. In 1043 he proclaimed a general peace in his kingdom. He favored the attempt to bring in the Truce of God. This originated in Aquitaine, where the bishops, in 1041, ordered that no private feuds should be prosecuted between the sunset of Wednesday and the sunrise of Monday, the period covered by the most sacred events in the life of Jesus. This "truce," which was afterwards extended to embrace certain other holy seasons and festivals, spread from land to land. It shows the influence of Christianity in those dark and troublous times. Although it was imperfectly carried out, it was most beneficent in its influence, and specially welcome to the classes not capable of defending themselves against violence.

SYNOD OF SUTRI.—In 1046 Henry was called into Italy by the well-disposed of all parties, to put an end to the reign of vice and disorder at Rome. He caused the three rival popes to be deposed by a synod at Sutri, and a German prelate, Suidger, bishop of Bamberg, to be appointed under the name of Clement II., by whom he was crowned emperor. After Clement died, Henry raised to the Papacy three German popes in succession. While in the full exercise of his great authority, and when he was not quite forty years of age, he died.

HENRY IV.: HIS CONTESTS IN GERMANY.—Henry IV. (1056-1106), at his father's death, was but six years old. He had been crowned king at the age of four. Agnes of Poitou, his mother, the regent, had no ability to curb the princes, who were now released from restraint, and eager for independence. By a bold stratagem, an ambitious prelate, Hanno, archbishop of Cologne, carried off the young king, and assumed the guardianship over him. He had a rival in the person of Adalbert, archbishop of Bremen, whom Henry liked best, as being more indulgent and complaisant, and who at length became his chosen guide. But in 1066 the princes caused Adalbert to be banished from court. They obliged Henry to marry Bertha, the daughter of the margrave of Turin, to whom he had been betrothed by his father. The union was repugnant to him, and he sought a divorce; although her patience eventually won the victory, and she became a cherished wife. Henry, arrived at man's estate, was involved in a contest with three of the great dukes. It was evident that he meant to tread in the footsteps of his father, and to reduce the princes to submission. Hostility arose, especially between the young king and the Saxons, who did not relish the transfer of the imperial office to the Franconian line. The passionate and wilful disposition of Henry, and his sensual propensities, were his worst enemies. The strongholds which he erected among the Saxons, in themselves a menace, were made haunts of his boon companions and comrades in the chase. The extortion and depredations to which the Saxons were a prey provoked a great insurrection, which at first prevailed; but the excesses of the elated insurgents—as seen, for example, in the plundering and burning of churches—caused a reaction. Henry suppressed the revolt, and dealt with the Saxons with the utmost harshness, treating their dukedom as conquered territory. The Saxon chiefs were now in durance: his enemies on every side had willingly yielded, or were prostrate. The hour seemed to have come for Henry to exercise that sovereignty as Roman emperor over Church and State which his father had wielded; but he found himself confronted by a new and powerful antagonist in the celebrated Pope Hilde-brand, or Gregory VII. (1073-1085).

HILDEBRAND: INVESTITURES.—The state of affairs in the Roman Church had called into existence a party of reform, the life and soul of which was Hildebrand. He was the son of a carpenter of Soano, a small town in Tuscany, and was born in 1018. He was educated in a monastery in Rome, and spent some time in France, in the great monastery of Cluny. He became the influential adviser of the popes who immediately preceded him. The great aim of Hildebrand and of his supporters—one of the most prominent of whom was the zealous Peter Damiani, bishop of Ostia—was to abolish simony and the marriage of priests. By simony was meant the purchase and sale of benefices, which had come to prevail in the different countries. The old church laws requiring celibacy had been disregarded, and great numbers of the inferior clergy were living with their wives. In Hildebrand's view, there could be no purity and no just discipline in the Church without a strict enforcement of the neglected rule. The priests must put away their wives. Connected with these reforms was the broader design of wholly emancipating the Church from the control of the secular power, and of subordinating the State to the Church. For this end there must be an abolition of investiture by lay hands. This demand it was that kindled a prolonged and terrible controversy between the emperors and the popes. The great ecclesiastics had temporal estates and a temporal jurisdiction, which placed them in a feudal relation, and made them powerful subjects. It was the custom of the kings to invest them with these temporalities by giving to them the ring and the staff. This enabled the kings to keep out of the benefices persons not acceptable to them, who might be elected by the clergy. On the other hand, it was complained that this custom put the bishops and other high ecclesiastics into a relation of dependence on the lay authority; and, moreover, that, the ring and staff being badges of a spiritual function, it was sacrilegious for a layman to bestow them.

CONTEST OF HILDEBRAND AND HENRY IV.—In the period of lawlessness at Rome, Hildebrand had welcomed the intervention of Henry III., and even of Henry IV., at the beginning of his reign. But this he regarded as only a provisional remedy made necessary by a desperate disorder. On acceding to the Papacy, he began to put in force his leading ideas. The attempt to abolish the marriage of priests was resisted, and stirred up great commotion in all the countries. The legates of the Pope set themselves to stem the tide of opposition by inveighing, in addresses to the common people, against the married clergy, as unfit to minister at the altar. By this means, a popular party in favor of the reform was created. In 1075, in a synod at Rome, Hildebrand pronounced the ban against five councilors of Henry IV. for simony. At the same time he threatened Philip of France with a similar penalty. He forbade princes to invest with any spiritual office. To oaths of allegiance he did not object, but to any investiture of a spiritual kind. Gregory selected Henry IV. as the antagonist with whom to fight out the battle. Henry's ecclesiastical appointments were not simoniacal in fact, although they violated the papal decrees against simony. His real offense was his determination to make the appointments himself. Moreover, in 1075, he ventured to name Germans to the sees of Ferno and Spoleto. Unfortunately he was weakened by the disaffection of the German princes, and, most of all, of the Saxons. The fire of rebellion in Saxony had not been quenched: it was still smouldering. Gregory summoned Henry to Rome to answer to the charges made against him. In three German synods held in 1076, the incensed emperor caused empty accusations to be brought against the Pope, and a declaration to be passed deposing him. He sent to the pontiff a letter filled with denunciation, and addressed "to the false monk, Hildebrand." Gregory issued decrees excommunicating Henry, deposing him, and declaring his subjects free from their obligation of allegiance. It was the received doctrine, that a heretic or a heathen could not reign over Christian people. The discontented German princes took sides with Gregory. In an assembly at Tribur in 1076, they invited the Pope to come to Augsburg, and to judge in the case of Henry: he was to live as a private man; and, if he remained excommunicate for a year, he was to cease to be king altogether.

HUMILIATION OF HENRY IV.—Henry was now as anxious for reconciliation with the Pope as before he had been bold in his defiance. In the midst of winter, with his wife and child and a few attendants, he crossed the Mt. Cenis pass, undergoing extreme difficulty and hardship, and presented himself as a penitent before Gregory, who had arrived, on his way to Augsburg, at the strongly fortified castle of Canossa. The Pope kept him waiting long, it is said, barefoot and bareheaded in the court-yard of the castle. Finally he was admitted and absolved, but only on the condition that Gregory was to adjust the matters in dispute between the emperor and his subjects.

CONTINUED CONFLICT.—When Henry found that his imperial rights were still withheld, his fiery spirit rebounded from this depth of humiliation. The Lombards, with whom Gregory was unpopular, joined him. A majority of the German princes, adhering to the Pope, in 1077 elected Rudolph, duke of Swabia, emperor. The Pope took up his cause, and in 1080 once more excommunicated and deposed Henry. The emperor proclaimed anew, through synods, the Pope's deposition, and things were back in the former state. The emperor's party appointed a counter-pope, Guibert, archbishop of Ravenna, under the name of Clement III. Rudolph was killed in battle (1080). Henry's power now vastly increased. He invaded Italy (1081), and laid waste the territory of Matilda, countess of Tuscany, a fast friend of Gregory. In 1084 he captured Rome. The Pope had found a defender in Robert Guiscard, the Norman duke of Lower Italy, whom he had excommunicated, but whom (in 1080) he forgave, and took into his service. Robert released Gregory, who had been besieged in the Castle of St. Angelo. Hildebrand died at Salerno, May 25, 1085. When near his end he uttered the words which are inscribed on his tomb: "I have loved righteousness, and hated iniquity; therefore do I die in exile." Of the rectitude of his intentions, there is no room for doubt, whatever view is taken of the expediency of his measures. He united with an unbending will the power of accommodating himself to circumstances, as is witnessed in his treatment of Robert Guiscard, and in his forbearance towards William the Conqueror, king of England, with whom he did not wish to break.

Of this great pontiff, Sir James Stephen says: "He found the Papacy dependent on the empire: he sustained it by alliances almost commensurate with the Italian peninsula. He found the Papacy electoral by the Roman people and clergy: he left it electoral by a college of papal nomination. He found the emperor the virtual patron of the holy see: he wrested that power from his hands. He found the secular clergy the allies and dependants of the secular power: he converted them into the inalienable auxiliaries of his own. He found the higher ecclesiastics in servitude to the temporal sovereigns: he delivered them from that yoke to subjugate them to the Roman tiara. He found the patronage of the Church the mere desecrated spoil and merchandise of princes: he reduced it within the dominion of the supreme pontiff. He is celebrated as the reformer of the impure and profane abuses of his age: he is more justly entitled to the praise of having left the impress of his own gigantic character on the history of all the ages which have succeeded him."

LAST DAYS OF HENRY IV.—In 1085 Henry IV. returned to Germany, having been crowned emperor by his Pope, Clement III. The Saxons were tired of strife; and, on the assurance that their ancient privileges should be restored, they were pacified. Hermann of Luxemburg, whom they had recognized as their king, had resigned the crown (1088). The last days of Henry were clouded by the rebellion of his sons, first of Conrad (1093), and then of Henry (1104), who was supported by the Pope, Paschal II. The emperor was taken prisoner, and obliged to sign his own abdication at Ingelheim in 1105. The duke of Lotharingia and others came to his support, and a civil war was threatened; but Henry died at Luettich in 1106. His body was placed in a stone coffin, where it lay in an unconsecrated chapel, at Spires, until the removal of the excommunication (1111).

CONCORDAT OF WORMS.—Henry V. (1106-1125) was not in the least disposed to yield up the right of investiture. Hence he was soon engaged in a controversy with Paschal II. Henry went to Rome with an army in 1110, and obliged the Pope to crown him emperor, and to concede to him the right in question. When he went back to Germany, the Pope revoked the concession, and excommunicated him. The German princes, as might be expected, sided with the pontiff. The conflict in Germany went on. The emperor's authority, which was established in the South by means of his powerful supporters, was not secured in the North; but, during the last three years of his life, he was at peace with the Church. By the Concordat of Worms in 1122, it was agreed that investiture should take place in the presence of the emperor or of his deputies; that the emperor should first invest with the scepter, and then consecration should take place by the Church, with the bestowal of the ring and the staff. All holders of secular benefices were to perform feudal obligations.

LOTHAR OF SAXONY.—The princes over whom Henry V. had exercised a severe control opposed the elevation of Frederick of Hohenstaufen, the son of his sister Agnes. At a brilliant assembly at Mentz, Lothar of Saxony was chosen emperor (1125-1137). He allowed all the Pope's claims, and was crowned at Rome by Innocent II., accepting the allodial possessions of Matilda of Tuscany, as a fief from the pontiff. He carried on a war with the Hohenstaufen princes, Frederick of Swabia, and his brother Conrad, who finally yielded. Lothar was helped in the conflict by Henry the Proud, the duke of Bavaria, who also became duke of Saxony. Germany under Lothar extended its influence in the north and east.

CULTURE IN THE ELEVENTH CENTURY.—The tenth century, owing to causes which have been explained, was a dark age. In the eleventh century circumstances were more favorable for culture. Under the Saxon emperors, intercourse was renewed with the Greek Empire. There was some intercourse with the Arabs in Spain, among whom several of the sciences were cultivated, especially mathematics, astronomy, and medicine (p. 232). The study of the Roman law was revived in the Lombard cities, and this had a disciplinary value. The restoration of order in the Church, after the synod of Sutri (1046), had likewise a wholesome influence in respect to culture. There were several schools of high repute in France, especially those at Rheims, Chartres, Tours, and in the monastery of Bec, in Normandy, where Lanfranc, an Italian by birth, a man of wisdom and piety, was the abbot.



CHAPTER II. THE CHURCH AND THE EMPIRE: PREDOMINANCE OF THE CHURCH: TO THE END OF THE CRUSADES, A.D. 1270.