None can say how the daring dauntless spirit, which ranged through all the distances of East and West, lay behind those all-perceiving eerie eyes, nor how the mighty brain shaped the head and cheerful brow. The total impression, in spite of its broad-necked power and steel-like strength, is one of something lyrical and inspiring, which breathes even from the half-Romanised Augustales—a German trait to which neither a Caesar nor a Napoleon could lay claim.
* The Middle Ages were little interested in ethnology: Moors, Arabs, Negroes were indiscriminately nigri.—Tr.
† Elisabeth, daughter of Philip of Swabia was Frederick II’s first cousin, she married Ferdinand of Castile: this Frederick and Henry are her sons.—Tr.
VI. German Emperor
Pope and Emperor in harmony—Diet of Ravenna, 1231
—King Henry; Diet of Worms, 1231—Diet of Friuli,
1232—Growing autonomy of German Princes—
Theory of German Empire—Burgundy—Loss of
Cyprus—Frederick aids Pope against Romans—Ideal
relation of Empire and Papacy—Inquisition—The
Great Halleluja—Dominicans and Franciscans—Joachim
of Flora: Three Ages of the world—John of Vicenza
—Conrad of Marburg—King Henry’s rebellion and
treason—Fate of Henry—Frederick marries Isabella
of England—Diet and Landpeace of Mainz—Use of
German for imperial proclamation—Henry of Veldeke;
Godfrey; Wolfram; Walther von der Vogelweide—
End of Welf-Waibling feud—Jew ritual murder case—
War with Lombardy—Pope’s manoeuvres—Re-burial
of St. Elizabeth, 1236, at Marburg—“Execution of
Justice” against Lombardy—Appeal to all Christian
monarchs—Appeal to Romans—Art of war in Middle
Ages—Frederick of Babenberg “the Quarrelsome”—
Arrogance of Gregory IX—“Donation of Constantine”
—Capture of Vicenza—Diet of Vicenza—Conrad,
King of the Romans—Cortenuova, 1237—The
“Triumph” in Cremona
VI. German Emperor
Frederick II had spent more than a year in reorganising and consolidating the monarchy in Sicily. In August 1230 he had made peace with Pope Gregory, in August 1231 the collection of the Constitutions had been concluded, and a few months later the Emperor felt free to quit his hereditary kingdom and devote his attention to the affairs of the Empire. His rule in the south seemed secure and would not easily be shaken, and he could now consider the measures necessary to restore imperial power and prestige throughout the Empire, and could carry his forcefulness and fame north into Northern Italy and Germany.
The Lord of the Empire must perforce sail under very different colours from the Tyrant of Sicily. The favour or hostility of the Pope was a matter almost of indifference in the Sicilian state, which indeed throve best in open fight: the whole constitution of the Empire, on the other hand, was based on the harmony of the two powers, and the Empire at its best required a perfect balance of the two in good will and in peace. The Imperium, pillared on its secular and spiritual princes, was not incorporate in the monarch alone, as was the Sicilian state with its officials, but in the dual power of Pope and Emperor, who together constituted “a species of individual”: “two swords in one scabbard,” two vicegerents of the true King.
The picture which Frederick II strove to present to the world during the next few years was that of a Christian Imperator cooperating with the Pope in outward friendship. Never again did he so closely resemble his imperial ancestors, never was he so truly the heir of Charlemagne, Otto and Barbarossa as in these years of peace. His power, not spending its strength in threats of war, was able to make itself felt far and wide through all the countries of the Roman Empire, “whose length was vast and whose breadth ended only at the ends of the earth.” The days of the noble emperors were drawing to a glorious close; with Frederick II came the sudden crash. Just once more before the end, the world was to see what the Middle Ages considered the “correct conditions” established; once again Pope and Emperor in unison, once again the Emperor amid his princes as primus inter pares. For one last time those ideals were realised in all their fullness and maturity and clothed in classic phrases which echo pitifully as empty catchwords in later days of petty Kaisers and tiara-crowned mid-Italian landlords. For one brief moment Frederick II appeared radiant in the full majesty of the ancient Holy Roman Empire; once more, in the Palatinates of the Neckar and the Rhine, the brilliance of imperial glory lit with southern light flared dazzlingly, then was for ever quenched. Only: the Germans kept a yearning for it all.
From Foggia the Emperor moved northwards to Ravenna. He took a very modest Sicilian retinue. Berard of Palermo and Count Thomas of Aquino were the only well-known nobles who accompanied him. His immediate task was to put Lombard and German affairs in order, and the German princes had been long since invited to a Diet at Ravenna, to be held in November 1231. Frederick’s first intention had probably been to march into Northern Italy at the head of his armies; but the Pope offered him guarantees for the Lombards’ behaviour, and he abstained from any military steps, with the result that the Cremona fiasco of 1226 was, as nearly as possible, repeated. Although the Emperor announced himself as the Pope’s ambassador on a mission to suppress heresy, and although Gregory really endeavoured to influence the Lombards, the towns made not the slightest move to send envoys to the Diet which was to serve “the honour of God, of the Church and of the Empire, and the prosperity of Lombardy.” Quite the reverse. On the approach of the Emperor the League which had been gradually disintegrating immediately reconstituted itself, the mountain passes were again seized by the rebels, and passage denied to the German forces.
The Emperor was not, at the moment, in a position to intervene effectively. The Diet was adjourned till Christmas, and the Emperor killed time in the ancient town of Gothic Kings and Byzantine Emperors. He collected valuable building materials, ancient columns and statues, and despatched them to Sicily. With remarkable antiquarian zeal he instituted the first systematic excavation. This revealed the mausoleum of Galla Placidia, and brought to light the beautiful mosaics of this building which had been completely submerged under boulders and rubble. Three alabaster sarcophagi were also unearthed, containing the remains of this Empress, of her consort Theodosius II and of St. Elisha. Antiquarian research had not, however, been the Emperor’s purpose in Ravenna. Gradually German princes began to assemble in considerable numbers. Some had come by sea from Venice, some had evaded the Veronese and crossed the passes in disguise. The German Grand Master, Hermann of Salza arrived, and Gebhard of Arnstein, a Thuringian nobleman, an old acquaintance of Frederick’s who had recently been appointed imperial legate in Tuscany, came from Central Italy. The person, however, for whom more especially the Diet had been summoned was still missing: the Emperor’s son, King Henry.
*
For some time past misunderstandings had been talked of between Frederick II and the young German King, now some twenty years of age. Frederick had no serious crime with which to reproach his son, whom he had not seen for over ten years. But he had noticed a certain general indocility in the German King’s attitude, both in personal matters towards his father and in political matters towards the Emperor. He had been under the tutelage, first of Archbishop Engelbert of Cologne, and, after the archbishop’s assassination, under Duke Lewis of Bavaria; but three years ago, at the age of eighteen, he had begun to reign independently. He took after his father perhaps, who at twelve considered it “disgraceful” to be still under guardianship, and who had the good fortune to be his own master at fourteen. King Henry’s first ambition was to get quit of every sort of wardship, and to enlarge his own independence, not in the first place at the expense of the Emperor but rather at the expense of the princes who were thorns in the side of every German king. To this end he necessarily leagued himself wi
th their opponents, with the townsfolk who were increasing in importance in Germany, as elsewhere (the days of the town leagues were not far off), with the ministeriales, the lower nobility who with knightly minstrels were always to be found in great numbers in his entourage. If King Henry had in this choice been prompted by political acumen, realising that Germany’s strength and hope lay in the knights and in the towns, he would have been able to come to some agreement with his father, or at least profitably to consult with him. Any such flair for a political situation was, however, wholly foreign to his nature. He had all the amiability and charm of the Hohenstaufens, but with it an inconsequence and aimlessness which people called “frivolity.” If he favoured townsfolk and ministeriales he did so from no better reason than opposition and hostility to the princes who hemmed him in.
It was not long until this line of action on King Henry’s part became embarrassing. When the princes were staying in Italy in 1230, arranging the Peace of Ceperano between Emperor and Pope, at a moment, therefore, when Frederick was more especially beholden to the German nobles, Henry made an unmistakably hostile move. The citizens of Liège were engaged in a quarrel with their bishop, and King Henry took the townsfolk under his protection. The occasion itself was unimportant, but there was a principle at stake, and in a moment the princes turned on him to a man. Immediately after their return from Italy, in January 1231, forgetting all their mutual quarrels, united in resistance, they compelled the King to hold the unfortunate Diet at Worms in May 1231, and, confident in the Emperor’s support, forced him to surrender a great privilege. Except for a few honorary royal rights the “lords of the land” were to have well nigh unrestricted sovereignty in their own territories, especially over the towns. King Henry, who had been so eager to strengthen the Crown against the growing encroachments of the princes, had thus succeeded in weakening it beyond all precedent.
The Emperor’s policy was diametrically opposed to his son’s at every point. Frederick II could not approve Henry’s general attitude of hostility to the princes, still less this particular manifestation of it, directed against the princes who were absent in Italy in the Emperor’s service. Nothing could be less opportune for him than unrest beyond the Alps, and his son’s behaviour was calculated to conjure up an anti-Staufen alliance of the princes. On the other hand, by allowing the Privilege of Worms to be wrung from him, King Henry had wantonly flung away valuable prerogatives. Frederick himself had frequently, and that without undue regret, surrendered royal rights in favour of the princes, but never without an adequate quid pro quo. The King by his lack of address had on this occasion secured nothing. There were personal matters in question also. Henry wanted to divorce his queen, Margaret of Austria, although he had issue by her, and marry a youthful flame, Agnes of Bohemia. This had been mooted against the Emperor’s will, for Frederick had had definite political combinations in view when he negotiated the Austrian alliance. The question soon became otiose, for Agnes of Bohemia, to escape further discussion, took the veil. The affair contributed, however, to the general unpleasantness. On all these counts the Emperor considered a personal talk with his son to be necessary, and had therefore invited him to Ravenna. Whether King Henry was right or wrong his failure to accept the Emperor’s invitation was unwise. So far he might simply have passed for a somewhat unskilful diplomatist; his absence from Ravenna (though he later excused it on the pretext of the closure of the passes) made him in his father’s eyes a disobedient son. And disobedience, as he might have been aware, was not the road to Frederick’s heart.
*
In the meantime Frederick had been negotiating in Ravenna with the German princes and numerous Italian bishops, and finally had again banned the Lombard League when it continued to bar the passage over the Alps. The Emperor may not have been altogether sorry to see the Pope embarrassed by the unjustifiable recalcitrance of the confederate towns, for whose good behaviour he had gone bail while secretly fomenting their resistance. The Lombard action had clearly demonstrated that it was impossible here to assert the authority of the Empire without resort to force. The tangled skein of Northern Italy was obviously not to be unravelled by peaceful measures, for every edict of the Emperor’s introduced fresh complications. He had, for instance, given orders when outlawing the League, that the loyal towns of Lombardy should not elect their annual podesta from any of the rebel towns. This immediately caused friction with Genoa, who had just done him exceptional honour by sending a magnificent embassy; for the Genoese had appointed a podesta from Milan, and were now faced by the delicate choice of offending the League by rejecting the Milanese or offending the Emperor by retaining him. The Emperor could not permit an exception immediately after issuing his command. In spite of the strong imperial feeling in Genoa the Milanese was installed. Though he was reluctant to disturb his good relations with Genoa the Emperor at once retaliated by measures which injured the Genoese trade in Sicily. It was frankly impossible to conduct politics in Lombardy without an army.
Pope Gregory had again volunteered to mediate between Frederick and the League. The Emperor cannot have built much on his offer, for he had had some experience of papal mediation and arbitration. His misgivings were not unjustified. Though Gregory ostensibly supported the Emperor his choice of arbitrators and their line of action showed clearly in whose favour the so-called impartial verdict was to be given. The arbitrators were declared enemies of the Emperor, cardinals who were natives of the League towns. Instead of bearing to the rebels the terms proposed by the aggrieved Emperor they treated first with the confederate revolutionaries, and finally set out for Ravenna with the cut-and-dried proposals of the Leaguers. The Emperor did not wait to hear their award: he knew perfectly what to expect, but he was unwilling at the moment to fall out with the Pope. When the papal arbitrators arrived in Ravenna at the beginning of March they were surprised to find the Emperor gone. He rode out to the town one afternoon, as he was in the habit of doing. A fully-equipped galley was at anchor off the coast ready to sail; he embarked with a few attendants and disappeared. He had made all preparations long before. Foreseeing a protracted absence he had sent Thomas of Aquino back to Sicily as Captain of the kingdom, had dismissed the other participants in the Ravenna diet, only retaining the German princes, and adjourned his Court till Easter in Aquileia. He did not invite his son’s presence; he commanded his attendance in Aquileia, and betook himself thither by sea.
*
The princes who had been left behind in Ravenna soon heard the unexpected news that the Emperor was on his way first to Venice. Most of them made haste to follow him by land. As Frederick’s relations with Verona were for the moment unsatisfactory he now sought to secure Venice for his ally, and to take advantage for his own purposes of the rivalry between the two towns in the East. He had other weighty incentives. As the mountain passes were under a constant threat the road via Venice and Friuli was the only certain route to Germany, and a good understanding with the Venetians was therefore of the utmost importance. He sailed by Comacchio, Loreto and Chioggia. He halted for a short time in Loreto, and there received the envoys of the independent Republic (no appanage of the Empire) who hastened thither to greet him. To them he confided his desire to visit Venice to worship St. Mark, their patron saint. The Venetians immediately convened their Grand Council and decided to grant the Emperor’s request. Frederick, therefore, continued his journey to Chioggia. When Frederick landed on the shores of St Mark and stood beside the Doge, Jacopo Tiepolo, he brought all his charm and amiability into play. The Venetians received him with pomp and ceremony; he presented costly gifts of gold and precious stones to their saint, and received from their rich store of relics a splinter of the True Cross: he loaded them, almost against their will, with privileges and trade prerogatives for Sicily; but nothing dispelled the distrust of these traders and seafarers, a distrust equalled only by their unlimited arrogance. Thanks to their immense possessions in the Levant, especially in the Latin Empire, the Venetians felt themselves almost
the Emperor’s equals. They did not intend to be under any obligation to the Hohenstaufen. A Venetian goldsmith was commissioned by Frederick to make him a crown; the Grand Council granted permission, only on the condition that no harm should arise from it to the Republic. The Emperor’s power alarmed Venice; they wanted no dealings with him. On the first opportunity the Republic joined Frederick’s Lombard enemies: on the other hand, Venice was the first town to conclude Peace with the Emperor, when a Genoese became Pope.
At Easter 1232 the German princes were assembled in unusual numbers round Frederick II in Aquileia. King Henry at first attempted to evade his father’s command. Some of the princes, however, who were on their way back from Ravenna met the king in Augsburg, and told him of the Emperor’s mood. Their urgent representations induced Henry to appear, however reluctantly, at the Diet summoned expressly for him. The Emperor appointed the adjacent Cividale for his residence with some attendants, but ordered Aquileia to be closed to him. In a business-like way, as if negotiating with a foreign prince, Frederick conducted from Aquileia the discussions with his son. After Henry had submitted to the imperial conditions, and not before, he was permitted to see his father face to face, for the first time in ten years. As father he reproved the son; as Emperor he made heavy demands on the disobedient king. In Cividale, where the Court repaired after some weeks, King Henry was compelled solemnly to swear, in the presence of his princely opponents, to obey all commands of the Emperor in future, and to treat the German princes henceforward with due respect, as “lights and protectors of the Empire” and “apples of the Emperor’s eye.” The oath was further reinforced by a written document in which Henry himself released the princes from their oaths of fealty in case of fresh disobedience, and adjured them in that event to rise against him on the Emperor’s behalf. The Emperor pressed his advantage further, and compelled King Henry to write also to the Holy Father and inform him what oath he had sworn to the “divine Augustus,” and beg Pope Gregory to excommunicate without further notice the German King if he should break the promise made to his father. Frederick II had thus harnessed to his will the two forces which were wont to strive against the Roman Emperor—at the expense, it is true, of his recalcitrant son. For Henry the Lighthearted, under the supervision of Princes and Pope, was granted only a period of probation: an intolerable position, in comparison with which deposition would have been kinder and less severe. All royal freedom of action was denied him, who had sought to be independent and self-sufficing. The Emperor treated him as he was wont to treat a rebellious town: demanding unconditional surrender to his will, an oath of obedience, and submission to imperial supervisors. King Henry would have been no Hohenstaufen if this end of his dreams had not proved the beginning of his tragedy.
Frederick the Second Page 44
