A History of Germany Part 11

The Emperor, Lothar, soon discovered that he had made a bad bargain. His long and narrow empire was most difficult to govern, and in 855, weary with his annoyances and his endless marches to and fro, he abdicated and retired into a monastery, where he died within a week. The empire was divided between his three sons: Ludwig received Italy and was crowned by the Pope; to Karl was given the territory between the Rhone, the Alps and the Mediterranean, and to Lothar II. the portion extending from the Rhone to the North Sea. When the last of these died, in 869, Ludwig the German and Karl the Bald divided his territory, the line running between Verdun and Metz, then along the Vosges, and terminating at the Rhine near Basle,--almost precisely the same boundary as that which France has been forced to accept in 1871.

But the conditions of the oath taken by the two kings in 842 were not observed by either. Karl the Bald was a tyrannical and unpopular sovereign, and when he failed in preventing the Nors.e.m.e.n from ravaging all Western France, the n.o.bles determined to set him aside and invite Ludwig to take his place. The latter consented, marched into France with a large army, and was hailed as king; but when his army returned home, and he trusted to the promised support of the Frank n.o.bles, he found that Karl had repurchased their allegiance, and there was no course left to him but to retreat across the Rhine. The trouble was settled by a meeting of the two kings, which took place at Coblentz, in 860.

Ludwig the German had also, like his father, serious trouble with his sons, Karlmann and Ludwig. He had made the former Duke of Carinthia, but ere long discovered that he had entered into a conspiracy with Rast.i.tz, king of the Moravian Slavonians. Karlmann was summoned to Regensburg (Ratisbon), which was then Ludwig's capital, and was finally obliged to lead an army against his secret ally, Rast.i.tz, who was conquered. A new war with Zwentebold, king of Bohemia, who was a.s.sisted by the Sorbs, Wends, and other Slavonic tribes along the Elbe, broke out soon afterwards. Karlmann led his father's forces against the enemy, and after a struggle of four years forced Bohemia, in 873, to become tributary to Germany.

[Sidenote: 876. DEATH OF LUDWIG THE GERMAN.]

In 875, the Emperor, Ludwig II. (Lothar's son), who ruled in Italy, died without heirs. Karl the Bald and Ludwig the German immediately called their troops into the field and commenced the march to Italy, in order to divide the inheritance or fight for its sole possession. Ludwig sent his sons, but their uncle, Karl the Bald, was before them. He was acknowledged by the Lombard n.o.bles at Pavia, and crowned in Rome by the Pope, before it could be prevented. Ludwig determined upon an instant invasion of France, but in the midst of the preparations he died at Frankfort, in 876. He was seventy-one years old; as a child he had sat on the knees of Charlemagne; as an independent king of Germany, he had reigned thirty-six years, and with him the intelligence, prudence and power which had distinguished the Carolingian line came to an end.

Again the kingdom was divided among three sons, Karlmann, Ludwig the Younger, and Karl the Fat; and again there were civil wars. Karl the Bald made haste to invade Germany before the brothers were in a condition to oppose him; but he was met by Ludwig the Younger and terribly defeated, near Andernach on the Rhine. The next year he died, leaving one son, Ludwig the Stammerer, to succeed him.

The brothers, in accordance with a treaty made before their father's death, thus divided Germany: Karlmann took Bavaria, Carinthia, the provinces on the Danube, and the half-sovereignty over Bohemia and Moravia; Ludwig the Younger became king over all Northern and Central Germany, leaving Suabia (formerly Alemannia) for Karl the Fat.

Karlmann's first act was to take possession of Italy, which acknowledged his rule. He was soon afterwards struck with apoplexy, and died in 880.

Karl the Fat had already crossed the Alps; he forced the Lombard n.o.bles to accept him, and was crowned Emperor at Rome, as Karl III., in 881.

Meanwhile the Germans had recognized Ludwig the Younger as Karlmann's heir, and had given to Arnulf, the latter's illegitimate son, the Duchy of Carinthia.

[Sidenote: 882.]

Ludwig the Younger died, childless, in 882, and thus Germany and Italy became one empire under Karl the Fat. By this time Friesland and Holland were suffering from the invasions of the Nors.e.m.e.n, who had built a strong camp on the banks of the Meuse, and were beginning to threaten Germany. Karl marched against them, but, after a siege of some weeks, he shamefully purchased a truce by giving them territory in Holland, and large sums in gold and silver, and by marrying a princess of the Carolingian blood to Gottfried, their chieftain. They then sailed down the Meuse, with 200 vessels laden with plunder.

All cla.s.ses of the Germans were filled with rage and shame, at this disgrace. The Dukes and Princes who were building up their local governments profited by the state of affairs, to strengthen their power.

Karl was called to Italy to defend the Pope against the Saracens, and when he returned to Germany in 884, he found a Count Hugo almost independent in Lorraine, the Nors.e.m.e.n in possession of the Rhine nearly as far as Cologne, and Arnulf of Carinthia engaged in a fierce war with Zwentebold, king of Bohemia. Karl turned his forces against the last of these, subdued him, and then, with the help of the Frisians, expelled the Nors.e.m.e.n. The two grand-sons of Karl the Bald, Ludwig and Karlmann, died about this time, and the only remaining one, Charles (afterwards called the Silly), was still a young child. The Frank n.o.bles therefore offered the throne to Karl the Fat, who accepted it and thus restored, for a short time, the Empire of Charlemagne.

Once more he proved himself shamefully unworthy of the power confided to his hands. He suffered Paris to sustain a nine months' siege by the Nors.e.m.e.n, before he marched to its a.s.sistance, and then, instead of meeting the foemen in open field, he paid them a heavy ransom for the city and allowed them to spend the following winter in Burgundy, and plunder the land at their will. The result was a general conspiracy against his rule, in Germany as well as in France. At the head of it was Bishop Luitward, Karl's chancellor and confidential friend, who, being detected, fled to Arnulf in Carinthia, and instigated the latter to rise in rebellion. Arnulf was everywhere victorious: Karl the Fat, deserted by his army and the dependent German n.o.bles, was forced, in 887, to resign the throne and retire to an estate in Suabia, where he died the following year.

[Sidenote: 887. ARNULF OF CARINTHIA KING.]

Duke Arnulf, the grandson of Ludwig the German, though not legitimately born, now became king of Germany. Being accepted at Ratisbon and afterwards at Frankfort by the representatives of the people, he was able to keep them united under his rule, while the rest of the former Frank Empire began to fall to pieces. As early as 879, a new kingdom, called Burgundy, or Arelat, from its capital Arles, was formed between the Rhone and the Alps; Berengar, the Lombard Duke of Friuli, in Italy, usurped the inheritance of the Carolingian line there; Count Rudolf, a great-grandson of Ludwig the Pious, established the kingdom of Upper Burgundy, embracing a part of Eastern France, with Western Switzerland; and Count Odo of Paris, who gallantly defended the city against the Nors.e.m.e.n, was chosen king of France by a large party of the n.o.bles.

King Arnulf, who seems to have possessed as much wisdom as bravery, did not interfere with the pretensions of these new rulers, so long as they forbore to trespa.s.s on his German territory, and he thereby secured the friendship of all. He devoted himself to the liberation of Germany from the repeated invasions of the Danes and Nors.e.m.e.n on the north, and the Bohemians on the east. The former had entrenched themselves strongly among the marshes near Louvain, where Arnulf's best troops, which were cavalry, could not reach them. He set an example to his army by dismounting and advancing on foot to the attack: the Germans followed with such impetuosity that the Norse camp was taken, and nearly all its defenders slaughtered. From that day Germany was free from Northern invasion.

Arnulf next marched against his old enemy, Zwentebold (in some histories the name is written _Sviatopulk_) of Bohemia. This king and his people had recently been converted to Christianity by the missionary Methodius, but it had made no change in their predatory habits. They were the more easily conquered by Arnulf, because the Magyars, a branch of the Finnish race who had pressed into Hungary from the east, attacked them at the same time. The Magyars were called "Hungarians" by the Germans of that day--as they are at present--because they had taken possession of the territory which had been occupied by the Huns, more than four centuries before; but they were a distinct race, resembling the Huns only in their fierceness and daring. They were believed to be cannibals, who drank the blood and devoured the hearts of their slain enemies; and the panic they created throughout Germany was as great as that which went before Attila and his barbarian hordes.

[Sidenote: 894.]

After the subjection of the Bohemians, Arnulf was summoned to Italy, in the year 894, where he a.s.sisted Berengar, king of Lombardy, to maintain his power against a rival. He then marched against Rudolf, king of Upper Burgundy, who had been conspiring against him, and ravaged his land. By this time, it appears, his personal ambition was excited by his successes: he determined to become Emperor, and as a means of securing the favor of the Pope, he granted the most extraordinary privileges to the Church in Germany. He ordered that all civil officers should execute the orders of the clerical tribunals; that excommunication should affect the civil rights of those on whom it fell; that matters of dispute between clergy and laymen should be decided by the Bishops, without calling witnesses,--with other decrees of the same character, which practically set the Church above the civil authorities.

The Popes, by this time, had embraced the idea of becoming temporal sovereigns, and the dissensions among the rulers of the Carolingian line already enabled them to secure a power, of which the former Bishops of Rome had never dreamed. In the early part of the ninth century, the so-called "Isidorian Decretals" (because they bore the name of Bishop Isidor, of Seville) came to light. They were forged doc.u.ments, purporting to be decrees of the ancient Councils of the Church, which claimed for the Bishop of Rome (the Pope) the office of Vicar of Christ and Vicegerent of G.o.d upon earth, with supreme power not only over all Bishops, priests and individual souls, but also over all civil authorities. The policy of the Papal chair was determined by these doc.u.ments, and several centuries elapsed before their fict.i.tious character was discovered.

Arnulf, after these concessions to the Church, went to Italy in 895. He found the Pope, Formosus, in the power of a Lombard prince, whom the former had been compelled against his will, to crown as Emperor. Arnulf took Rome by force of arms, liberated the Pope, and in return was crowned Roman Emperor. He fell dangerously ill immediately afterwards, and it was believed that he had been poisoned. Formosus, who died the following year, was declared "accurst" by his successor, Stephen VII., and his body was dug up and cast into the Tiber, after it had lain nine months in the grave.

[Sidenote: 899. LUDWIG THE CHILD.]

Arnulf returned to Germany as Emperor, but weak and broken in body and mind. He never recovered from the effects of the poison, but lingered for three years longer, seeing his Empire becoming more and more weak and disorderly. He died in 899, leaving one son, Ludwig, only seven years old. This son, known in history as "Ludwig the Child," was the last of the Carolingian line in Germany. In France, the same line, now represented by Charles the Silly, was also approaching its end.

At a Diet held at Forchheim (near Nuremberg), Ludwig the Child was accepted as king of Germany, and solemnly crowned. On account of his tender years, he was placed in charge of Archbishop Hatto of Mayence, who was appointed, with Duke Otto of Saxony, to govern temporarily in his stead. An insurrection in Lorraine was suppressed; but now a more formidable danger approached from the East. The Hungarians invaded Northern Italy in 899, and ravaged part of Bavaria on their return to the Danube. Like the Huns, they destroyed everything in their way, leaving a wilderness behind their march.

The Bavarians, with little a.s.sistance from the rest of Germany, fought the Hungarians until 907, when their Duke, Luitpold, was slain in battle, and his son Arnulf purchased peace by a heavy tribute. Then the Hungarians invaded Thuringia, whose Duke, Burkhard, also fell fighting against them, after which they plundered a part of Saxony. Finally, in 910, the whole strength of Germany was called into the field; Ludwig, eighteen years old, took command, met the Hungarians on the banks of the Inn, and was utterly defeated. He fled from the field, and was forced, thenceforth, to pay tribute to Hungary. He died in 911, and Germany was left without a hereditary ruler.

CHAPTER XIII.

KING KONRAD, AND THE SAXON RULERS, HENRY I. AND OTTO THE GREAT.

(912--973.)

Growth of Small Princ.i.p.alities in Germany. --Changes in the Lehen, or Royal Estates. --Diet at Forchheim. --The Frank Duke, Konrad, chosen King. --Events of his Reign. --The Saxon, Henry the Fowler, succeeds him. --Henry's Policy towards Bavaria, Lorraine and France. --His Truce with the Hungarians. --His Military Preparations. --Defeat of the Hungarians. --Henry's Achievements.

--His Death. --Coronation of Otto. --His first War. --Revolt of Duke Eberhard and Prince Henry. --War with Louis IV. of France.

--Otto's Victories. --Henry pardoned. --Conquest of Jutland.

--Otto's Empire. --His March to Italy. --Marriage with Adelheid of Burgundy. --Revolt of Ludolf and Konrad. --The Hungarian Army destroyed. --The Pope calls for Otto's Aid. --Otto crowned Roman Emperor. --Quarrel with the Pope. --Third Visit to Italy. --His Son married to an Eastern Princess. --His Triumph and Death.

[Sidenote: 912.]

When Ludwig the Child died, the state of affairs in Germany had greatly changed. The direct dependence of the n.o.bility and clergy upon the Emperor, established by the political system of Charlemagne, was almost at an end; the country was covered with petty sovereignties, which stood between the chief ruler and the people. The estates which were formerly given to the bishops, abbots, n.o.bles, and others who had rendered special service to the Empire, were called _Lehen_, or "liens" of the monarch (as explained in Chapter X.); they were granted for a term of years, or for life, and afterwards reverted to the royal hands. In return for such grants, the endowed lords were obliged to secure the loyalty of their retainers, the people dwelling upon their lands, and, in case of war, to follow the Emperor's banner with their proportion of fighting men.

So long as the wars were with external foes, with opportunities for both glory and plunder, the service was willingly performed; but when they came as a consequence of family quarrels, and every portion of the empire was liable to be wasted in its turn, the Emperor's "va.s.sals,"

both spiritual and temporal, began to grow restive. Their military service subjected them to the chance of losing their _Lehen_, and they therefore demanded to have absolute possession of the lands. The next and natural step was to have the possession, and the privileges connected with it, made hereditary in their families; and these claims were very generally secured, throughout Germany, during the reign of Karl the Fat. Only in Saxony and Friesland, and among the Alps, were the common people proprietors of the soil.

[Sidenote: 912. THE WARS OF KING KONRAD.]

The n.o.bles, or large land-owners, for their common defence against the exercise of the Imperial power, united under the rule of Counts or Dukes, by whom the former division of the population into separate tribes or nations was continued. The Emperors, also, found this division convenient, but they always claimed the right to set aside the smaller rulers, or to change the boundaries of their states for reasons of policy.

Charles the Silly, of the Carolingian line, reigned in France in 911, and was therefore, according to the family compact, the heir to Ludwig the Child. Moreover, the Pope, Stephen IV., had threatened with the curse of the Church all those who should give allegiance to an Emperor who was not of Carolingian blood. Nevertheless, the German princes and n.o.bles were now independent enough to defy both tradition and Papal authority. They held a Diet at Forchheim, and decided to elect their own king. They would have chosen Otto, Duke of the Saxons,--a man of great valor, prudence and n.o.bility of character--but he felt himself to be too old for the duties of the royal office, and he asked the Diet to confer it on Konrad, Duke of the Franks. The latter was then almost unanimously chosen, and immediately crowned by Archbishop Hatto of Mayence.

Konrad was a brave, gay, generous monarch, who soon rose into high favor with the people. His difficulty lay in the jealousy of other princes, who tried to strengthen themselves by restricting his authority. He first lost the greater part of Lorraine, and then, on attempting to divide Thuringia and Saxony, which were united under Henry, the son of Duke Otto, his army was literally cut to pieces. A Saxon song of victory, written at the time, says, "The lower world was too small to receive the throngs of the enemies slain."

[Sidenote: 917.]

Arnulf of Bavaria and the Counts Berthold and Erchanger of Suabia defeated the Hungarians in a great battle near the river Inn, in 913, and felt themselves strong enough to defy Konrad. He succeeded in defeating and deposing them; but Arnulf fled to the Hungarians and incited them to a new invasion of Germany. They came in two bodies, one of which marched through Bavaria and Suabia to the Rhine, the other through Thuringia and Saxony to Bremen, plundering, burning and slaying on their way. The condition of the Empire became so desperate that Konrad appealed for a.s.sistance to the Pope, who ordered an Episcopal Synod to be held in 917, but not much was done by the Bishops except to insist upon the payment of t.i.thes to the Church. Then Konrad, wounded in repelling a new invasion of the Hungarians, looked forward to death as a release from his trouble. Feeling his end approaching, he summoned his brother Eberhard, gave him the royal crown and sceptre, and bade him carry them to Duke Henry of Saxony, the enemy of his throne, declaring that the latter was the only man with power and intelligence enough to rule Germany.

Henry was already popular as the son of Otto, and it was probably quite as much their respect for his character as for Konrad's last request, which led many of the German n.o.bles to accompany Eberhard and join him in offering the crown. They found Henry in a pleasant valley near the Hartz, engaged in catching finches, and he was thenceforth generally called "Henry the Fowler" by the people. He at once accepted the trust confided to his hands: a Diet of the Franks and Saxons was held at Fritzlar the next year, 919, and he was there lifted upon the shield and hailed as King. But when Archbishop Hatto proposed to anoint him king with the usual religious ceremonies, he declined, a.s.serting that he did not consider himself worthy to be more than a king of the people. Both he and his wife Mathilde were descendants of Wittekind, the foe and almost the conqueror of Charlemagne.

Neither Suabia nor Bavaria were represented at the Diet of Fritzlar.

This meant resistance to Henry's authority, and he accordingly marched at once into Southern Germany. Burkhard, Duke of Suabia, gave in his submission without delay; but Arnulf of Bavaria made preparations for resistance. The two armies came together near Ratisbon: all was ready for battle, when king Henry summoned Arnulf to meet him alone, between their camps. At this interview he spoke with so much wisdom and persuasion that Arnulf finally yielded, and Henry's rights were established without the shedding of blood.

[Sidenote: 921. TREATY WITH FRANCE.]

In the meantime Lorraine, under its Duke, Giselbert, had revolted, and Charles the Silly, by unexpectedly crossing the frontier, gained possession of Alsatia, as far as the Rhine. Henry marched against him, but, as in the case of Arnulf, asked for a personal interview before engaging in battle. The two kings met on an island in the Rhine, near Bonn: the French army was encamped on the western, and the German army on the eastern bank of the river, awaiting the result. Charles the Silly was soon brought to terms by his shrewd, intelligent rival: on the 7th of November, 921, a treaty was signed by which the former boundary between France and Germany was reaffirmed. Soon afterwards, Giselbert of Lorraine was sent as a prisoner to Henry, but the latter, pleased with his character, set him free, gave him his daughter in marriage, and thus secured his allegiance to the German throne.

In this manner, within five or six years after he was chosen king, Henry had accomplished his difficult task. Chiefly by peaceful means, by a combination of energy, patience and forbearance, he had subdued the elements of disorder in Germany, and united both princes and people under his rule. He was now called upon to encounter the Hungarians, who, in 924, again invaded both Northern and Southern Germany. The walled and fortified cities, such as Ratisbon, Augsburg and Constance, were safe from their attacks, but in the open field they were so powerful that Henry found himself unable to cope with them. His troops only dared to engage in skirmishes with the smaller roving bands, in one of which, by great good fortune, they captured one of the Hungarian chiefs, or princes. A large amount of treasure was offered for his ransom, but Henry refused it, and asked for a truce of nine years, instead. The Hungarians finally agreed to this, on condition that an annual tribute should be paid to them during the time.

This was the bravest and wisest act of king Henry's life. He took upon himself the disgrace of the tribute, and then at once set about organizing his people and developing their strength. The truce of nine years was not too long for the work upon which he entered. He began by forcing the people to observe a stricter military discipline, by teaching his Saxon foot-soldiers to fight on horseback, and by strengthening the defences along his eastern frontier. Hamburg, Magdeburg and Halle were at this time the most eastern German towns, and beyond or between them, especially towards the south, there were no strong points which could resist invasion. Henry carefully surveyed the ground and began the erection of a series of fortified enclosures. Every ninth man of the district was called upon to serve as garrison-soldier, while the remaining eight cultivated the land. One-third of the harvests was stored in these fortresses, wherein, also, the people were required to hold their markets and their festivals. Thus Quedlinburg, Merseburg, Meissen and other towns soon arose within the fortified limits. From these achievements Henry is often called in German History, "the Founder of Cities."

[Sidenote: 928.]