CHAf\LOTTE M.YONCE,. l^\:. POPULAR History of Germany BY CHARLOTTE M. YONGE AUTHOR OF "the HEIR OF REDCLYPFE," "BOOK OF GOLDEN DEEDS," ETC. BOSTON ESTES AND LAURIAT priiLrsiiF.Rs Copyright by D. LoTiiROP & Company. 1S78. PREFACE. 'T^HERE is here an endeavor to sketch the main outlines of the history of the German Em- pire, though the number of states- each with a separate history, makes it difficult to trace the line clearly. The names are, for the most part, given in their German form, rather than by their English equivalents. CHARLOTTE M. YONGE. ElDEBFIELD, OTTEBBOXJIiN. 2229049 CONTENTS, Chapter. 1. — The Ancient Germans . 2.— Valhall 3. — The Germans and Romans. 4. — The Nibelonig Heroes 5.— The Franks. 496—765 . 6.— Karl the Great. 768—814 7.— Ludwig I., the Pious. 814—840 Loth air I. 840—855. Ludwig II. 855 — 875 . Karl II., the Bald. 875—876 Karloman. 876—880 Karl III., the Tliick. 880— «87 Ariuilf. 887—899 Ludwig IV., the Child. 899—012 8.— Konrad I. 912—917 Heiurich I. 917—936 Otto I., the Great. 936—973 9. — The Saxon Emperors — Otto II., the Red. 07:3—983 Otto III., the Wonder. 983—1000 St. Heinricli IL 1000—1024 . V. B.C. 60— A.D. 400 Pag«. 13 21 30 40 47 60 73 83 93 n Contents. \0. — The Franconian Line — Koniad II., the Salic. 1024—1039 Heinrich III. 1039—1054 Heinrich IV. 1054—1106 Heinrich V. 1106—1114 -Lothar II. 1125—1137 Kourad UI. 1137—1152 -Friedrichl,, Barbarossa. 1157—1178 -Friedrich I., Barbarossa (continued). Heiurich VI. 1189—1197 11. 12. 13. 1174—1 14.— •Philip. 1198—1208 Otto IV. 1209—1218 15.— Friedrich 11. 1218 16 17 Friedrich II. (continued). 1250 Koiuad IV. 1250—1254 Wilhelin. 1254—1256 Kichard. 1256—1257 18.— Eodolf. 1278. . 19.— Adolf. 1291—1298 Albrecht. 1298 20.— Heinrich VII. 1308—1313 Ludwig V. 1313—1347 21.— Gunther. 1347—1347 Karl IV. 1347—1378 22.— Wenzel. 1378—1400 23.— Kuprecht. 1400—1410. Jobst. 1410—1410 Siegmund. 1411. 24.— Albrecht II. 1438—1440 Friedrich III. 1440—1482 25.— Friedrich IH. 1482—1493 26.— Maximilian. 1493—1519 27.— Charles V. 1519—1529 28.— Charles V. 1530—1535 29.— Charles V. 1535 30.— Ferdinand I. 1556—1564 31.— Maximilian II. 1564 32.— Rudolf II. 1576—1612 33.— Matthias. 1612—1619 34.- The Eevolt in Bohemia — Ferdinand II. 1619—1621 189 i 116 . 127 } 140 I 152 . 329 Contents. viL 35.- -Gustaf Adolf and Wallenstein — Ferdinand II. 1621—1634 . 36.— Ferdinand II. 1634—1637 Ferdinand III. 1637 37. — The Siege of Vienna — Leopold I. 1657—1687 38. — War of the Succession — Leopold I. 1635—1705 39.— Joseph I. 1705—1711 40.— Karl VI. 1711—1740 41.— Karl VIL 1740 42.— Franz I. 1745—1765 . 43.— Joseph n. 1765—1790 . 44.— Leopold 11. 1790—1792 45.— Franz XL 1792 46.— Franz II. 1804—1806 47. — French Conquests — Interregnum. 1807—1815 48.— Interregnum. 1815 — 1835 49. — Interregnum. 1848 60.— Wilhelm I. 1870—1877 . 337 [ 349 . 358 . 366 . 377 . 384 . 392 . 401 . 412 . 423 . 429 . 435 . 443 . 456 . 462 LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS. Ancient German Village . - - Sacrifice to Woden . - . . Volkyria . . - - The Elves The Velleda warning Drusus Germanicus burying the Slain Brunhild's Flight - - - - Battle of Tours St. Boniface felling the Oak Elarl the Great and Witikind Karl the Great entering St. Peter's Karl the Great in his School Haroun al Raschid's Gifts Ludwig the Pious . - - - Odo appealing to Karl the Fat The Last Tribute of the Magyars - Adelheid Hiding in the Corn Otto's Flight - - . . Opening the Tomb of Karl the Great St. Henry . . . . . Heinrich IV. carried off - - Peuance of Heinrich IV. Lothar II. leading the Pope's Horse The Women of Weinsberg Friedrich I. refuses the Milanese Submission Faithfulness of Sieveneichen iz. Pagb. li n 23 27 31 3? 49 53 57 61 65 67 71 74 81 85 90 95 99 102 109 113 119 123 129 133 X. List of Illustuations. PAGE. Friedrich I., kneeling to Heinrich the Lion - 137 The Diet at Mainz - - - - - 143 Richard the Lion Heart and Heinrich VL - - 147 Heinrich VL ...... 150 Murder of Philip _ . _ . _ 155 Otto IV. finds his Bride dead - - - - 159 Friedrich II. putting on the Crown of Jerusalem - 167 Friedrich II. receiving Isabel of England - - 175 Execution of Conradin and Friedrich - - 189 German Castle ..---- 193 Mediaeval Costume . . _ _ . 210 Heinrich VIL 213 Adolf 215 KarllV. 222 Arnold von Winkelried - - - - 227 Wenzel 231 Huss at Constance . . _ . - 235 Siegmund ....... 238 AlbrechtlL - - - . - - - 244 Friedrich III. - - - - 246 Maximilian and Albert Diiro/ . . _ - 255 Maximilian ...--- 261 Luther and his Thesis - . - - - 265 Charles Y. 271 Luther at Wartburg . . . - . 275 Charles V. and Fugger _ . . _ 285 Flight of Charles V. - - . - - 293 Charles Y. in the Cloister, St. Just - - • 297 Ferdinand L 301 Maximilian II. _ - - = - - 307 Rudolf and Tycho Brahe - = - - 315 Matthias .------ 322 Friedrich V. .--.-- 327 List of Illustbations. xi^ PAGE. Ferdinand II. - - . - - 331 Wildenstein Castle - - - - 339 Guslaf Adolf - - - - - 342 Death of Walleustein - 345 Benihard of Saxe Weimar - 350 Peace of "Westphalia - 355 Leopold I. .... - 369 Friedrich I. King of Prussia (Coronation) - 369 Marlborough and Eugene - 373 Joseph I. - - - - 379 Karl YI. .... - 385 Maria Theresa .... - 393 KarlVIL .... ■ 397 The Queen of Poland - 405 Friedrich the Great and Zeithen - 409 Maria Theresa and Kaunitz - 415 Joseph II. holding the Plough - 419 Leopold II. .... - 427 Napoleon and Franz II. - 437 Queen Louise pleading with Napoleon - 445 Metternich and Napoleon - 449 The Allies entering Paris - 453 Wllheha I . 473 \rOUNG FOLKS' HISTORY OF GEEMANY CHAPTER I. THE ANCIENT GERMANS. ' I ^HE history of the German Empire rightly -^ begins with Karl the Great, but to under- stand it properly it will be better to go further back, when the Romans were beginning to know something about the wild tribes who lived to the north of Italy, and to the coast of the Gaulish or Keltic lands. Almost all the nations in Europe seem to have come out of the north-west of Asia, one tribe after another, the fiercest driving the others farther and farther to the westward before them. Tribes of Kelts or Gauls had come first, but, though they were brave and fierce, they were not so sturdy as the great people that came after them, and were thus driven up into the lands bordering on the At- lantic Ocean ; while the tribes that came behind them spread all over that middle part of Europe 13 14 Young Folks' History of Grermany, which lies between the Alps and the Baltic sea. These tribes all called themselves Deutsche which meant the people; indeed, most of them dp so still, though we English only call those Dutch who live in Holland. Sometimes they were called Ger, War, or Spear-men, just as the Romans were called Quirites; and this name. Spear-men or Germans, has come to be the usual name that is given to them together, instead of Deutsch as they call themselves, and from which the fine word Teutonic has been formed. The country was full of marshes and forests, with ranges of hills in which large rivers rose and strag- \ gled, widening down to their swampy mouths. Bears and wolves, elks and buffaloes, ran wild, and were hunted by the men of the German tribes. These men lived in villages of rude huts, surrounded by lands to which all had a right in common, and where they grew their corn and fed their cattle. Their wives were much more respected than those of other nations ; they were usually strong, brave women, able to advise their husbands and to aid them in the fight ; and the authority of fathers and mothers over their families was great. The men were either freemen or nobles, and they had slaves, generally prisoners or the people of conquered The Ancient Germans. 15 countries. The villages were formed into what were called hundreds, over which, at a meeting of the freemen from all of them, a chief was elected from among the nobles ; and many of the tribes had kings, who always belonged to one family, descended, it was thought, from their great god Woden. ANCIENT GERMAN VILLAGE. The German tribes all believe«i in the great god Woden, his brother Yxey, and his son Thor, who reigned in a gorgeous palace, and with their children were called the Asa gods. Woden was all-wise, and two ravens whispered in his ear all that passed on 16 Yoking Folks' History of Crermany, ttie earth. The sun and moon were his eyes. The moon is so dull because he gave the sight of that eye for one draught of the well of wisdom at the foot of the great ash tree of life. He was a fearful god, who had stone altars on desolate heaths, where sacrifices of men and women were offered to him, and the foiu'th day of the week was sacred to him. Frey was gentler, and friendship, faith, and free- dom were all sacred to him. There is a little con- fusion as to whether Friday is called after him or Frigga, Odin's Avife, to whom all fair things be- longed, and who had priestesses among the German maidens. Thor, or, as some tribes called him. Thunder, was the bravest and most awful of the gods, and was armed with a hammer called Miolner, or the Miller or Crusher. Thunder was thought to be caused by his swinging it through the air, and the mark in honor of him was | , meant to be a likeness of his hammer. It was signed over boys when they were washed with water imme- diately after they were born ; and in some tribes they were laid in their father's shields, and had their first food from the point of his sword. These three were always the most honored of the Asa gods, though some tribes preferred one and The Ancient Germans, 19 some the other; but Woden was always held to bt the great father of all, and there were almost as many stories about the Asir as there were about the Greek gods, though we cannot be sure that all were known to all the tribes, and they were brought to their chief fulness in the branch of the race that dwelt in the far North, and who became Clu'istians much later. Some beliefs, however, all had in com- mon, and we may understand hints about the old faith of the other tribes by the more complete northern stories. There was a great notion of battle going tlirough everything. The Asa gods were summer gods, and their enemies were the forces of cold and darkness, the giants who lived in Jotenhemi, the land of giants. All that was good was mixed up with light and summer in the old Deutsch notions ; all that was bad with, darkness and cold. Baldur, the son of Woden, was beautiful, good, and glorious ; but Loki, the chief enemy, longed to kill him. His mother, Frigga, went round and made every crea- ture and plant swear never to hurt Baldur, but she missed one plant, the mistletoe. So when all liia brothers were amusing themselves by throwing things at Baldur, knowing they could not hui"t him, Loki slyly put in the hand of his blind brother 20 Younj Folks History of G-ermany. Hodur a branch of mistletoe which struck him dead. But Frigga so wept and praj^ed that it was decreed that Baldur might live again provided everytliing would weep for him; and everything accordingly did weep, except one old hag who sat under a tree, and would shed no tears for Baldur, so he might not live, only he was given back to his mother for half the year, and then faded and van- ished again fur the other half. But Loki had his punishment, for he was chained under a crag Avith a serpent for ever dropping venom on liis brow, though his wife was always catching it in a bowl, and it could onl}^ fall on him when she was gone to empty the bowl at the stream. It is plain that Baldur meant the leaves and trees of summer, and that the weeping of everything was the melting of the ice ; but there was mixed into the notion something nnich higher and greater re- specting the struggle between good and evil. CHAPTER 11. VALHALL. THE hall of Wodeu was called Valhall, * and thither were thought to go the souls of the brave. There were believed to be maidens called Valkyr, or the choosers of the slain — Hilda, Guda, Truda, Mista, and others — Avho floated on swan's wings over the camps of armies before a battle and chose out who should be killed. Nor was such a death accounted a disaster, for to die bravely was the only way to the Hall of Woden, where the valiant enjoyed, on the other side of the rainbow bridge, the delights they cared for most in life — hunting the boar all day, and feasting on him all night ; ck-inking mead from the skulls of tlieu- conquered enemies. Shooting stars were held to be the track of weapons carried to supply the fresh *Fa/ meant a brave death in battle. 21 22 Young Folks' History of Germany, comers into Valhall. Onl}^ by dying gallantly could entrance be won there ; and men would do anything rather than not die thus, rush on swords, leap from crags, di-own themselves, and the like, for they believed that all who did not gain an en- trance to the Hall of the Slain became the prison- ers of Loki's pale daughter Hel, and had to live on in her cold, gloomy, sunless lands, sharing her bondage. For once Loki and his children, and the other Qy\\ beings of tlie mist land, had made a fierce at- tack on Woden, and had all been beaten and bound. Fenris, the son of Loki, was a terrible wolf, wlio was made prisoner and was to be bound by a chain ; but he would onl}'^ stand still on condition that Tyr or Tiw, the son of Woden, should put his right hand into his mouth in token of good faith. The moment that Fenris found that he was chained, he closed his jaws and bit off the hand of Tiw, whose image therefore only had one hand, and who is the god after whom Tuesday is named. Valhall was not, however, to last for ever. There was to come a terrible time called the Twilight of the Gods, when Loki and Fenris would burst their chains and attack the Asa gods; Woden would be slain by Fenris ; Thor would perish in the flood of Valhall 25 poison cast forth by the terrible serpent jNIidgard ; and there would be a great outburst of fire, wliich would burn up Valhall and all within, as well as the powers of evil. Only two of the gods, Vidui' and Wall, were to survive, and these would make again a new heaven and earth, in which the spirits of gods and men would lead a new and more glo- rious life. How mucli of all tliis grew up later and was caught from Clu-istianity we cannot tell ; but there is reason to thu)k that much of it was believed, and that heartily, making the German nations brave and true, and helping them to despise death. There were temples to the gods, where the tliree figures of Woden, Frey, and Thor were always together in rude carving, and sometimes with rough jewels for eyes. Woden also had sacred oaks, and the great stone altars on heaths, raised probably by an earlier race, were sacred to him. Sometimes human sacri- fices were offered there, but more often sacred horses, for liorses were the most sacred of their animals : they were kept in honor of tlie gods, augui'ies were drawn from their neigliings, and at the great yearly feasts they were offered in sacri- fice, and their flesh was eaten. There were gods of the waters, Niord, and Egir, 26 Young Folks' History of Germany, who raised the great Avave as the tide comes in at the mouth of rivers ; and his cruel daughter Rana, who went about in a sea chariot causing shipwrecks. Witches called upon her when they wanted to raise storms and drown their enemies at sea. One old German stor}^ held that Tiw * was tlie father of Man, and that man's three sons were Ing, Isk, and Er, the fathers of the chief Deutsch tribes. Isk (or Ash) was the father of the Franks and Allemans ; Ing, of the Swedes, Angles, and Saxons ; and Er, or Erman, of a tribe called by the Romans Herminiones. This same Er or Erman had a temple called Eresburg, with a marble pillar on which stood an armed warrior holding in one hand a banner bearing a rose, in the other a pair of scales; his £rest was a cock ; he had a bear on his breast, and on his shield was a lion in a field of flowers. A college of priests lived around ; and before the army went out to battle, they galloped round and round the figure in full armor, brandishing their spears and praying for victory ; and on their retiuii they offered up in sacrifice, sometmies their prisoners, sometimes cowards Avho had fled from the foe. The image was called Irmansul — huI meaning a pillar ; and two pillars or posts were the great token * The same word as tlie Greek Zeus and Latin Deus. Valhall. 27 of home and settlement to the German nations. They were planted at the gate of their villages and towns, where one was called the Ermansaiil, the other the Rolandsaul. And when a family were about to change their home, the}' uprooted the two wooden pillars of their own house and took them away. If they went by sea, they thi-ew then- pillars 1 1 1 1 I 1 m \M m ^l^^l ^^^H 1 M ^ fl;' r/aH SI H ^^^^^^^^^^^^^H Li] '11 ^M H| ^k3 ^ kI « ^m ^^^^^^^^9^B ■1 I H lii£ i.LVE6. overboard, and fixed themselves wherever these posts were cast up. Dutch fancy filled the woods, liills, and streams with spirits. There were "J^lves throughout the 28 Young Folks' History of Crermany. woods and plains, shadowy creatnres who sported m the niglit and watched over human beings for o'ood or harm. Tlie Bergmen dwelt in the hills, keeping guard over the metals and jewels hidden there, and forging wonderful swords that always struck home, and were sometmies given to lucky mortals, though they generally served for the fights in Valhall; and the waters had Necks and other spirits dangerous to those who loitered by the water-side. A great many of our best old fairy tales were part of the ancient German mythology, and have come down to our own times as stories told by parents to their children. There were German women who acted as priest- esses to Frigga, or Hertha, tlie Earth, as she was often called. She had a great temple in Rugen, an isle in the Baltic ; her image was brouglit out tlience at certain times, in a chariot drawn by white lieifers, to bless the people and be washed in the Baltic waters. Orion's belt was called her distaif, and the gossamer marked her path over the fields when she brought summer with her. When one of the northern tribes was going to start to the south to find new homes, their wives prayed to Frigga to give them good speed. She bade them stand forth the next morning in the rismg ValhalL 29 sun with their long hair let down over their chins. "Who are these long beards?" asked Woden. " Thou hast given them a name, so thou must give them the victory," said Frigga ; and henceforth the tribes were called Longbeards, or Lombards. Before a battle, the matrons used to cast lots to guess how the fortunes of the day woukl go, doing below what the Valkyr did above. Sometimes a more than commonly wise woman would arise among them, and she was called the Wala, or VeUeda, and looked up to and obeyed by all. ■n>3^^ CHAPTER m. THE GEKINIANS AND ROMAKS. B.C. 60— A. D. 400. JUST as it was with the Britons and Gauls, the first we know of the Germans was when the Romans began to fight with them. When Julius Csesar was in Gaul, there was a great chief among the tribe called Schwaben — Suevi, as the Romans made it — called Ehrfurst,* or, as in Latin, Ariovistus, who had been invited into Gaul to settle the quarrels of two tribes of Gauls in the north. This lie did by conquering them both ; but they then begged help from Caesar, and Ehrfurst was beaten by the Romans and driven back. Csesar then crossed the Rhine by a bridge of boats and ravaged the country, staying there for eighteen days. He was so struck with the bravery of the * Honor prince. 90 THE VELLEDA WARNING DRUSUS. 32 Young Folks'' History of Germany. Germans that he persuaded their young men to serve in his legions, where they were very useful ; but they also learned to fight in the Roman fashion. Germany was let alone till the time of the Em- peror Augustus, when his step-son Drusus tried to make it a province of Rome, and built fifty for- tresses along the Rhine, besides cutting a canal be- tween that river and the Yssel, and sailing along the coasts of the North sea. He three times en- tered Germany, and in the year B.C. 9, after beating the Marclmien, was just going to cross tne Elbe, when one of the Velledas, a woman of great stature, stood before the army and said, " Thou greedy rob- ber! whither wouldst thou go? The end of thy misdeeds and of thy life is at hand." The Romans turned back dismayed ; and tliirty days later Drusus was killed by a fall from his horse. Drusus' brother Tiberius went on with the at- tempt, and gained some land, while other tribes were allies of Rome, and all seemed likely to be conquered, when Quinctilius Varus, a Roman who came out to take the command, began to deal so rudely and harshly with the Germans that a young chief named Herman, of Arminius, was roused. He had secret meetings at night in the woods with other chiefs, and they swore to be faithful to one TJie Crermans and Romans. 35 mother in the name of their gods. Wlien all was ready, information -was given to Varns that a tribe in the north had revolted. He would not listen to Siegert or Segestes, the honest German who ad- vised liim to be cautious and to keep Herman as a hostage, and set out with three legions to put it dowii ; but his German guides led him into the thickest of the great Teutoberg forest, and the further they went the worse tliis grew. Trunks of trees blocked up the road, darts were hurled from behind ti'ees, and when at last an open space was gained after three days' struggling through the wood, a huge host of foes was drawn uj) there, and in the dreadfxil fight that followed almost every Roman was cut off, and Varus threw himself on hia own sword. Herman married the daughter of Siegert, and was chief on the Hartz mountains, aided by his un- cle Ingomar ; but after five years, A.D. 14, the Em- peror Tiberius sent the son of Drusus — Avho was called already, from liis father's successes, German- icus — against liim. Some of the Germans, viewing Siegert as a friend of Rome, beset his village, and were going to burn it, when Germanicus came in time to disperse them and save Siegert. Thus- nelda, the wife of Herman, was with her father, 36 Young Folks' History of Q-ermany. and was sent off as a prisoner to Rome with her baby ; while Germanicus marched into the Teuto berg wood, found the bones of the army of Varus, and burnt them on a funeral pile, making a speech calling on his men to avenge their death. But Herman's horsemen fell on him and defeated him, and if the Germans had not been so eager to plun- der they would have made a great many prisoners. They drove the Romans back across the Rhine, and the next year were ready for them, and had a tre- Inendous battle on the banks of the Weser. In this the Romans prevailed, and Herman liimself was badly wounded, and was only saved by the fleetness of his horse. However, he was not daunted, and still kept in the woods and harassed the Romans, once forcing them to take refuge in their ships. Tiberius grew jealous of the love the army bore to Germanicus, and sent for him to return to Rome. Herman thus had saved his country, but he had come to expect more power than his chiefs thought liis due, and he was slain by his own kinsmen, a.d. 19, when only thirty-seven years old. His wife and cliild had been shown in Germanicus' triumph, and he never seems to have seen them again. It was during this war that the great Roman historian The Germans and Romans. 87 Tacitus came to learn the habits and manners of the Germans, and was so struck with their simple truth and bravery that he A\Tote an account of them, which seems meant as an example for the fallen and corrupt Romans of his time. There were no more attempts to conquer Ger- many after this ; but the Germans, in the year 69, helped in the rising of a Gaulish chief named Civilis against the Romans, and a Velleda who liyed in a lonely tower in the forests near the Lippe encouraged him. He prevailed for a time, but then fell. The Germans remained terrible to the Romans for many years, and there were fights all along the line of the empire, wliich their tribes often broke through; but notliing very remarkable happened till the sixth century, when there was a movement and change of place among them. This seems to have been caused by the Huns, a savage tribe of the great Slavonic or Tartar stock of nations, who came from the East, and drove the Deutsch nation, brave as they were, before them for a time. Then it was that the Goths came over the Dan- ube, and, dividing into the Eastern and Western Goths, sacked Rome, conquered the province of Africa, and founded two kingdoms in Spain and in 38 Young Folks' History of Germany. Northern Italy. Their great king Theuderick, who reigned at Verona, was called by the Germans Dietrich of Berne, and is greatly praised and hon- ored in their old songs. Then Vandals followed the Goths, and took Africa from them ; and the Lombards, or Long- beards, after the death of Thenderick, took the lands in Northern Italy which had been held by the Goths, founded a Idngdom, and called it Lom- bardy. The Burgundians (or Burg Castle men) gained the south-east part of Gaul all round the banks of the Rhone, and founded a kingdom there ; and the Sachsen (scex or axe men) settled them- selves on the banks of the Elbe, whence went out bands of men who conquered the south of Britain. The Franks (free men) were, in the meantime, coming over the Rhine, and first plundering the north of Gaul, then settling there. All the west- ern half of the Rojnan Empire was overspread by these Deutsch nations from the shores of the Baltic to the iMediterranean, from the Atlantic Ocean to the Carpatliian Mountains; and instead of being conquered by the Romans, the Deutsch nations had conquered them. It is chiefly with the Franks, Sachsen, Schwaben, The Germans and Romans. 39 and Germans that this liistory is concerned ; but before going any further, there is a great mytho- logical story to be told, which all believed in as truth. CHAPTER IV. ' i THE NIBELONIG HEROES. '' I ^HERE are two versions of this strange -*- ancient stor}^ — a northern one made in heathen times, a German one in Christian days. According to tliis one, the tliree gods, Woden, Loki, and Hamer, came down to a river in Nibel- heim — the land of mist — to fish; and Loki killed an otter and skinned it. Now this otter was really a dwarf named Ottur, whose home was on the river bank, with his father and brothers, Fafner and Reginn, and who used to take the form of the beast when he wanted to catch fish. When his brothers saw what had befallen him, they demanded that Loki should, as the price of his blood, fill the otter's skin with gold ; and this Loki did, but when he gave it, he laid it under a curse, that it should do no good to its owner. The curse soon began to be fulfilled, for Fafner 40 The Nibelonig Heroes, 41 killed his father to gain the treasure, and then turned himself into a serpent to keep watch over it, and prevent Reginn from getting it. But Reginn had a pupil who was so strong that he used to catch wild lions and hang them by the tail over the wall of his castle. The northern people called liim Sigurd, but the Germans call him Sieg- fried,* and say that his father was the king of the Netherlands, and that he was a hero in the train of Dietrich of Berne. Reginn persuaded Siegfried to attack the dragon Fafner and kill him, after which he bade the champion bathe in the blood and eat the heart. The bath made his skin so hard that nothing could hurt him, except in one spot between his shoulders, where a leaf had stuck as it was blown down from the trees ; and the heart made liim able to understand the voices of the birds. From their song Siegfried found out that Reginn meant to slay him, and he therefore killed Reginn and himself took the treasure, in which he found a tarn cap, which made him invisible when he put it on. Serpents were called worms in old Deutsch, and the Germans said that their city of Wurms was the place where Siegfried killed the dragon. They called him Siegfried the Homy. • Conqueriug Peace. 42 Young Folks' Sistory of G-ermany. Now there was a lady^ of matchless strength named Brunhild;* but she had ojffended Woden, who touched her with his sleep-thorn, so that she fell into a charmed sleep, surrounded with a hedge 9f flame. Siegfried heard of her, broke through the circle of fire, and woke the lady, winning her heart and love ; but he had then to leave her in her castle after three days and go back to the com- mon world, carrying her ring and girdle with him. But by a magic drink, as one story says, he was thrown into a sleep in which he lost all remem- brance of Brunhild. The great song of Germany, the Nibelungen lied^ begins when Cliriemhild,f the fair daughter of the king of Burgundy, had a dream in which she saw her favorite falcon torn to pieces by two eagles. Her mother told her that this meant her future hus- band, upon which she vowed that she would never marry. Soon after, Siegfried arrived and fell in love with her ; but she feared to accept liim because of her dream. However, the fame of Brunhild's beauty had reached the court, and Chriemhild's brother Gunther wanted to wed her. She would, however, marry no one who could not overcome her in racing and leaping; and as she was really * Valkyr of the Breastplate. t Valkyr of the Hamlet The Nihelonig Heroes. 43 one of the Yalkyr, Gunther would have had no chance if Siegfried, still forgetful of all concerning Brunhild, had not put on his cap, made himself in- visible, took the leap, holding Gunther in his arms, and drew him on in the race so as to give him the victory. Then Gunther married Brunhild, and Siegfried Chriemhild, The first pair reigned in Burgundy, the second at Wurms, and all went well for ten years, when unhappily there was a great quarrel between the two ladies. The northern song says it was about which had the right to swim furthest out into the Rhine ; the German, that it was which should go first into the Cathedral. BrunhUd said that Siegfried was only Gunther's vassal ; on which Chriemhild returned that it was to Siegfried, and not to her husband, that Brunhild had yielded, and in proof showed her the ring and girdle that he had stolen from her. . Brunhild was furiously enraged, and was deter- mined to be revenged. She took council "with Haghen, her husband's uncle, a wise and far- traveled man, whom every one thought so prudent that he was the very person whom poor Chriemliild consulted on her side as to the way of saving her husband. He had ijever loved Siegfried, and 44 Young Folks' History of Germany. when his niece told liim there was only one spot where her husband could be wounded, he bade her sew a patch on his garment just where it was, that he might be sure to know where to guard him. There was a great hunting match soon after, and Haghen contrived that all the wine should be left behind, so that all the hunters growing tliirsty, lay down to drink at the stream, and thus Siegfried left " defenceless the spot marked by liis wife. There he was instantly stabbed by Haghen's con- trivance. According to the heathen northern story, Brunhild, viewing herself as his true ■wife, burnt herself on a pile with his corpse in tlie Nibe- lung. She had only repented too late. Chriemhild knew Haghen was the murderer, be- cause the body bled at his touch ; but she could not hinder him from taking away the treasure and hiding it in a cave beneath the waters of the Rhine. She laid up a vow of vengeance against liim, but she could do notliing till she was wooed and won by Etzel or Atli, king of the Huns, on condition that he woidd avenge her on all her enemies. For thirteen years she bided her time, and then she caused her husband to invite Gunther and all the other Burgundians to a great feast at Etzelburg in Hungary. There she stirred up a terrible fight, of The Nihelonig Heroes. 45 which the Nihelungen lied describes almost every blow. Dietrich of Berne at once rushed in and took King Etzel and Queen Chrienihild to a place of safety, keeping all his own men back wliile the fight went on — Folker, the mighty fiddler of Bur- gundy, fiddling wildly till he too joined in the fray, and then Dietrich's men burst in, and were all killed but old Sir Hildebrand, who, on liis side, slew the mighty fiddler, so that of all the Burgun- dians only Gunther and Haghen were left. Diet- rich then armed liimself, made them both prison- ers, and gave them up to Cliriemliild ; but in her deadly vengeance she killed them both ; where- upon Hildebrand slew her as an act of justice, and, with Etzel and Dietrich, buried the dead. I have told you this story in this place because two real personages, Attila the Hun and Theude- rick of Verona, come into it, though there is no doubt that the story was much older than their time, and that they were worked into it when it was sung later. It shows what a terrible duty all the Deutsch thought vengeance was. There are stories in the north going on with the history of Siegfried's children, and others in Germany about Dietrich. It seems he had once had to do Avith Chriemhild in her youth, for she had a garden of 46 Young Folks' History of G-ermany. roses seven miles round, guarded by twelve cham- pions, and the hero who could conquer them was to receive from her a chaplet of roses and a kiss. Dietrich, Hildebrand, and ten more knights beat , her champions, and took the crowns of roses, but would not have the kisses, because they thought Chriemhild a faithless lady ! In real truth, Attila, Idng of the Huns, lived fully one hmidred years before the great Theude- rick of Verona. CHAPTER V. THE FRANKS. 796-765. THE most famous of the German tribes were the Franks, who lived on the banks of the Rhine, and were in two divisions, the Salian, so called because they once came from the river Yssel, and Ripuarians, so called from ripUy the Latin Avord for the bank of a river. The Franks were terrible enemies to the Romans in the north-6ast corner of Gaul, and under their King Chlodio won a great many of the fifty for- tresses that Drusus had built, in especial Trier and Koln, as they shortened the old name of Colonia, a colony. Chlodio only joined with the Romans to fight against that dreadful enemy of them all, Attila the Hun, who was beaten in the battle of Soissons. After his death, those of his people who 47 48 Young Folks' History of Germany, did not go back to Asia remained on the banks of the Danube, and their country is still called Hun- gary. The kings of these Franks were called ]Meer- wings, from one of their forefathers. The only great man who rose up among them was Chlodwig,* who pushed on into Gaul, made Soissons his home, took Paris from the Gauls, and married Clotilda (famous Valkyr), the daughter of the Burgundiau king, who was a Cluistian. The other Deutsch tribes went to war with Chlodwig, the Alle- raans especially ; and it was in the midst of a battle with them, fought at Zulpich, that Chlodwig vowed that if Clotilda's God would give him the victory, he would worsliip Him rather than Freya or Woden. He did gain the victory, and was bap- tized by St. Remigius at Rheims, on Christmas Day, 496, with tlu"ee thousand of his warriors. Most likely he thought that, as Gaul was a Chris- tian country, he could only rule there by accepting the Christian's God ; but he and his sons remained very fierce and wild. He conquered the Ripuarian Franks and made them one with his own people, * The French call him Clovis, but he shall have his proper i.aine here — Chlodwig, famous war. The Franks. 51 and he also conquered the Goths in the South of France. But when he died the kingdom was broken up among his sons, and they quarreled and fought, so that the whole story of these early Franks is full of shocking deeds. There were generally two king- doms, called Oster-rik, eastern kingdom, and Ne- oster-rik, not eastern, or western kingdom, besides Bui'gundy, more to the south. The Oster-rik stretched out from the great rivers to the forests of the Allemans and Saxons, and was sometimes joined to the Ne-oster-rik. The chief freemen used to meet and settle their affairs in the month of March, and this was called a Marchfield ; but the king had great power, and used it very badly. It was never so badly used as by the widows of two ot the long-haired kings, Hilpcrik and Sieg- bert, brothers who reigned in the West and East kingdoms. Siegbert's wife, Brunhild, was the daughter of the king of the Goths in Spain ; Frede- gond, the wife of Hilperik, was only a slave girl, and hated Brunhild so much that she had Siegbert murdered. The murders Fredegond was guilty of were beyond all measure. Her step-sons were killed by her messengers, and all who offended her were poisoned. When her husband died, she 52 Young Folks' History of Germany. reigned in tlie name of her son and then of her grandson at Soissons, as Brunhild did at Metz. Brunhild really tried to do good to her country, and made some fine buildings, both churches and convents ; but she was fierce and proud, and drove away the Irish priest Columbanus, when he tried to rebuke her grandson Theuderiek for his crimes. Theuderick died in 613, leaving four sons; and then Clilotar, Fredegond's grandson, attacked the Oster-rik. Brunliild was old, and was hated by her people ; no one would fight for her, and she tried in vain to escape. One of her grandsons rode off on horseback and was never heard of more, and the other tlu-ee were seized Avith her, Frede- gond was dead, but she had brought up Chlotar in bitter hatred of Brunhild, and he accused her of having caused the death of ten kings. He paraded her through his camp on a camel, put her great-grand- childi-en to death before her eyes, and then had her tied by the body to a tree and by the feet to a Avild horse, so that she died a horrible death. After this the two kingdoms were joined to- gether ; but this wicked race of kings become so dull and stupid that they could not manage their own affairs, and they had, besides, granted away a great many of their lands in fee, as it was called, The Franks, 66 to their men, who were bound in return to do them service in war. These hinds were called fiefs, and the holders of them were called Heer Zog — that is, army leaders — Duces (Dukes) in Latin; and Grafen, which properly meant judges, and whose Latin title was Comites (comrades), commonly called Counts. A city would have a Graf or Count to rule it for the king and manage its affairs at his court; and besides these who were really officers of the king, there were the Freiherren, or free lords, who held no of&ce, and were bound only to come out when the nation was called on. They came to be also termed Barons, a word meaning man. The kings lived on great farms near the cities in a rough sort of plenty, and went about in rude wagons drawn by oxen. Tlie long-haired kings soon grew too lazy to lead the people out to war, and left everything to the chief of their officers, who was called the Mayor of the Palace. Pippin * of Landen was a very famous Mayor of the Palace in the kingdom of the East Franks or Oster-rik, and his family had the same power after him. His grandson, Pippin of Herstall, Duke of the Franks, beat the West Franks at Testri in 687, * A pet name for father. 56 Young Folks History of Germany, and ruled over both kingdoms at once, though each had its own JNIeerwing king. His son was Karl* of the Hammer, or Charles Martel, Avho was also INIayor of the Palace and Duke of the Franks, both East and West. He saved all Christendom from being overrun by the Saracen Arabs, b}^ beating them in the great battle of Tours in 731. His son was Pippin the Short, who had the same power at first, and became a great fnend and helper to the Pope, who was much distressed by the Lombard kings in Northern Italy, who tlu-eat- ened to take Rome from him. Pope Zacharias re- warded Pippin by consenting to liis becoming king of the Franks when the last of the Meerwings gave up liis crown and went into a monastery. Pippin's own subjects, the Franks, were Chris- tians ; but the tribes in Germany and Friesland still worshiped Woden and Thor. The English Church sent missionaries to them, and Pippin helped them as much as he could. The greatest was St. Boni- face, who converted so many Germans that he was made Archbishop of Mainz, and tliis iias always been the chief see in Germany. At Giesmar, the Hessians honored a great oak sacred to Thor, and * A strong man. The Franks. 69 Boniface found that even the Christians still feared the tree. He told them that if Thor was a god he would defend his own ; then, at the head of all his clergy, he cut down the tree, and the people saw that Thor was no god. When he baptized them he made them renounce not only the devil, but Woden and all false gods. At last he was martyred by the heathen Frisians in 755. CHAPTER VI. KAKL THE GREAT. 768-814. T3ECAUSE of the help Pippin gave the Pope -■-^ he was made a patrician of Rome ; and, when he died in 768, liis son Karl inherited the same rank. Karl was one of the mightiest and wisest of kings, who well deserves to be called the Great, for though he was warlike, he fought as much for liis people's good as for his own power, and tried to make all around him wise and good. Wherever he heard of a good scholar, in Italy or in England, or in any part of Gaul, he sent for him to his court, and thus had a kind of school in his palace, where he and his sons tried to set the rough, fierce young Franks the example of learning from the Romans and their pupils the old Gauls. Karl could speak and read Latin as naturally as liis own 60 Karl The Great. 63 native Deiitscli ; but he never could learn the art of writing, thougli lie used to carry about tablets and practise when he had leisure. However, he had much really deep knowledge, and a gi-eat mind that knew how to make the best use of all kinds of learning. All the German tribes were under him as king of the Franks except the Saxons, whose lands reached from the Elbe to Thuringia and the Rliine. They were heathens, who refused to listen to St. Boniface and his missionaries, and still honored the great idol at Eresbury called the Irmansaul. Karl invaded the land, overtlirew this image, and hoped he had gained the submission of the Saxons, send- ing missionaries among them to teach them the truth ; but they were still heathens at heart, and rose against him under their chief Witikind, so that the war altogether lasted thirty years. The Saxons rose against him again and again, and once so en- raged him that he caused four thousand five hun- dred who had been made prisoners to be put to death ; but still Witikind fought on till his strength was crushed. At last he submitted, and was brought to see Karl at Atigny, where they made friends, and Witikind consented to be baptized and to keep the peace. 64 Young Folks' History of Germany. When Witikind died, five years later, Karl made Saxony into eight bishoprics. He made bishops as powerful as he could, giving them guards of soldiers, and appointing them, when he covild, Counts of the chief cities of their sees, because he could trust them better than the wild, rugged Frank nobles. The great bishoprics of Metz, Trier, and Koln rose to be princely states in tliis way. While Karl was gone the first time to Saxony, the Lombard king, Desiderius, began to harass Rome again ; and the Pope, Leo III., again sent to ask aid from Karl, who crossed the Al2:)s, besieged Pavia, and sent the king into a monastery, wliile he was himself crowned with the iron crown that the Lombard kings had always worn. Then he went on to Rome, where he dismounted from his horse and walked in a grand procession to the Church of St. Peter on the Vatican hill, kissing each step of the staircase before he mounted it, in remembrance of the holy men who had trodden there before him. In the church the pope received him, while the choir chanted " Blessed be he that cometh in the Name of the Lord." But the Lombards chose the son of their late king for their leader, and there was another war wliich ended in their being quite crushed. Karl also 66 Young Folks' History of Germany. gained great victories over the Moors in Spain, ind won the whole of the country as far as the Ebro ; but the wild people of the Pyrenees, though they were Cliristians, were jealous of his power, and rose on his army as it was returning in the Pass of Roncesvalles, cutting off the liindmost of them especially Roland, the warden of the marches of Brittany, about whom there are almost as many stories as about the heroes of the Nibelung. He had another great war with the Avars and Bohemians, people of Slavonic race, who lived to the eastward of the Deutsch, and had ringforts or castles consisting of rings of liigh walls, one within another. One of the Swabians who fought under Karl was said, at the taking of one of these forts, to have run liis spear through seven of the enemy, at once ! The ringforts were taken, and Karl appointed all around the border or marches of his kingdoms March-counts, Mark-grafen, or Mar- quesses, who were to guard the people witliin from the wild tribes without. One mark was Karnthen or Carinthia, going from the Adriatic to the Danube; another was CEsterreich or Austria, the East Mark; and another was Brandenburg. All the countries in his dominion were visited four times a year by officers who made reports to him, and Karl The Great. 69 judged causes ; but if people were not satisfied, they might appeal to the Palace judge, or Pfalzgraf — Palgraf, as he was called. His lands streached from the Baltic Sea to the JMediterraneau and the Ebro, from the Bay of Biscay to the borders of the Huns and Avars; and wlieu he held his great court at Paderborn in 729 he had people there from all the countries round, and even the great Khalif Haroun al Rascliid (the same of whom we hear so much in the Arabian Nightn) being likewise an enemy of the Moors in Spain, sent gifts to the great king of the Franks — an elephant, a beautiful tent, a set of costly chessmen, and a water-clock, so arranged that at every hour a little brazen ball fell into a brass basin, and little figures of knights, from one to twelve, according to the hour, came out and paraded about in front. Pope Leo X. came likewise to Paderborn, and by liis invitation Karl made a tliird visit to Rome in the year 800, and was then made Emperor of the West. The old Roman Empire was revived in him, the citizens shouting, " Long live Carolus Augustus the Cfesar ; " and from that time Caesar, or, as the Germans call it, Kaisar, has always been the title of Karl's successors in what he called the Holy Ro- man Empire, as he held his power from the Church, 70 Young Folks' History of Germany. and meant to use it for God's glory. The empire was a gathering of kingdoms — namely, the old Frank Oster-rik and Ne-oster-rik, Germany, the kingdom of Aquitane, the kingdom of Bur- gundy, of Lombardy, and Italy. Karl was Idng of each of these, but he meant to divide them between' his sons and Bernhard, * king of Italy. The little Ludwig, at tlu-ee years old, was dressed in royal robes and sent to take possession of Aquitaine, while Karl himself reigned at Aachen, where he built a grand palace and cathedral. His two elder sons died young, and when the Kaisar fell sick at Aachen, Ludwig was his only son. He took the youth into the cathedral, made him swear to fear and love God, defend the Church, love his people, and keep a conscience void of offence, and then bade him take the crown off tlie altar and put it on his own head. Karl lived a year after this, and died in 814, one of the greatest men who ever lived. * Firm Bears. ^ CHAPTER VII. LUDWIG I., THE PIOUS, 814-840. LOTHAR I., &40-855. LUDWIG II., 855-875. KARL II., THE BALD, S75-876. KARLOM AN, 876-880. KARL III., THE THICK, 880-887. ARNULF 887-899. LUDWIG IV., THE CHILD, . . . 899-812. LUDWIG THE PIOUS is the same emperor as he whom the French call Louis the debonair, but it is better to use his real name, wliich is only a little softened from Chlodwig. He was a good, gentle man, but he had not such strength or skill as his father to rule that great empire, and he was much too easily led. He was crowned Emperor by Pope Stephen, and then gave kingdoms to his sons ; Lothar * had the Rliineland, the old home of the Franks, and was joined in the empne ^vith his father; Pippin had * Famous Warrior. 73 74 Young Folks' History of Germany. Aquitaine, and Liidwig Bavaria; but none of them were to make peace or war without consent of the Emperor. Bernhard, King of Italy, their cousin, did not choose to reign on these terms, and marched against the Emperor, but was defeated, made prisoner, condemned by the Franks, and put LUDWIG THE PIOUS. to death. Lotliar had his kingdom, and was sus- pected of having prevented him from being par- doned; but the Emperor always grieved over liis death as a great sin. In 814, Ludwig I. lost his wife, and soon after married a Bavarian lady named Judith, who had a son named Karl. Ludwig wanted a kingdom for Ludwig J., the Pious. 76 this boy, and. called a diet at Wurms, where a new kingdom called Germany was carved ont for Iiim ; but this greatly offended his brothers, who rose against their father, and overcame him. They wanted to drive him into becoming a monk, but this he would iiot do, and his German subjects rose in his favour, and set him on his throne again. He forgave his sons, and sent them back to theii kingdoms ; but in a few years they Avere all up in arms again, and met the Emperor near Colmar. All Ludwig's men deserted him when the battle was about to begin, so that the place was after- wards called the Field of Falsehood. The Emperor fell into his sons' hands, and Lothar, in the hope of keeping him from reigning again, persuaded the clergy to tell him it was his dut}' to submit to penance of the higher degree, after which nobody was allowed to command an army. The meek Emperor, who had always reproached himself for Bernhard's death, was willing to humble himself, and, stripped off his robes, he lay on a couch of sackcloth and read a list of his sins, which had been drawn up by his foes, and made him confess not only that he had been unjust to Bernhard, but that he had been a blasphemer, a perjured wretch, and fomenter of strife. Then thirty bishops, one 76 Young Folks' History of G-ermany. after the other, laid their hands on his head, while the penitential psalms were sung, and all the time Lothar looked on from a throne rejoicing in his father's humiliation. But his pride had shocked every one, and his two brothers, with a number of Franks, rose and rescued the Emperor from him, treating their father with all love and honor, and the bishops bidding him resume liis sword and belt. Even Lothar was obliged to come to him and say, " Father, I have sinned against heaven and in thy sight," and the gentle old man kissed him, and sent him to Italy. When Pippin died there was a fresh war, for the people of Aquitaine would allow no Franks to come near his son, from whom therefore Ludwig took the kingdom, and there was much fighting and many horrors, all made worse by the ravages of the heathen Northmen and Danes. At Wurms, a treaty was made by Avhich Lothar was to have all the eastern half of the empire, Karl all the western, leaving young Ludwig only Bavaria. Ludwig, in his anger, took up arms, and just as the war was beginning, the good gentle old Emperor became so ill that he retired to an island in the Rhine named Ligelheim, and there died. The priest who at- tended him asked if lie forgave his son. " Freely Ludwig /., the Pious. 77 do I forgive him," said the old man ; " but fail not to warn him that he has brought down my grey hairs with sorrow to the grave." Ludwig I. died in 840, in his sixty-third year. Karl then joined Ludwig against Lothar, and at Fontanet, near Auxerre, there was a desperate battle, 150,000 men on each side, with a front six miles long to each army. The fight lasted six hours, and Lothar was beaten ; but his brothers seem to have been shocked at their own victory over a brother and an emperor, and there was a fast of tlu-ee days after it. They soon after made peace at the treaty of Verdun, in 843, by which Ludwig had the countries between the Rhine, the North Sea, the Elbe, and the Alps — what in fact is now called Germany. Lothar had, besides Italy, all the Rhineland, and the country between the Scheldt, the Meuse, the Saone, and the Rhone. This was called Lothar's portion, or Lotharingia, and part is still called Lorraine. Karl's portion was all to the west of this, and was then called Karolingia, after his name, but it did not keep the title, and after a time came to be known as France. Ludwig IL, King of Germany, was much tor- mented, both by the Northmen and the Slavonic 78 Young Folks' History of Germany. nations to the east, Avars, Bohemians, or Czechs, as they call themselves, and the Magyars, who lived in the country once settled by Attila's Huns, and therefore called Hungary. There is a story that, when the Saxons and Thuringians came home defeated from a battle Avith these j^eople, then- wives rose up and flogged them well for theii" cowardice. Lothar I., the Emperor, died in 855, and his son Ludwig is counted as the second Kaisar of the name, but he died without children, in 875, and then there was a war between all his brothers and Ludwig, King of Germany, and Karl, of Karolingia ; ending in Karl, who was commonly called the Bald, becoming Kaisar Karl II. ; but he had many more kingdoms on liis hands than he could manage, and was terribly tormented "with the Northmen, besides having quarrels on his hands with all liis nephews. His brother Ludwig of Germany made matters worse by dividing his kingdom into three at liis death, in 876, for liis three sons. Kaiioman, the eldest of these, attacked the Kaisar, and drove him to the alps, where he died at the foot of Mount Cenis, in 877, after a miserable reign. Karloman then became Emperor. He was also King of Bavaria and of Italy, and liis next brother Karl IL, the Bald. 79 Ludwig was King of Saxony, where an old chroni- cler says that his life was useless alike to himself, the Church, and his kingdom ; and so, when Karl- oman died, the empire was given to the youngest brother, Karl III., * called der Dicke, the Thick, who turned out not to be much wiser or more active. In his time the Northmen made worse inroads than ever ; and though on the death of his cousin, called Louis the Stammerer, France likewise fell to him, he was quite unable to protect his people anywhere ; and when the Count of Paris forced his way through the Northern fleet in the Seine, and came to beg his help, he could do nothing but offer a sum of money to buy them oflp. Everybody was weary of him, and at last an assembly was held at Tribur, on the Rhine, which declared him unfit to rule, and sent him into a monastery, where he died in two months, in 888. Arnulf, a son of Karloman, was made Emperor, but the French took the brave Count of Paris for their king, and France never formed part of the empire again. Arnulf was a brave Kaiser, and so beat off the Northmen that they never greatly molested Germany again ; but he died young, in *The French call him Charles le Gros and he is generally tei-med the Fat, but Thick seems to express dullness as well as stoutness. 80 Young Folks' History of Germany, 899, when his son Ludwig III., called the Child, was only six years old. He had a stormy reign, so tormented by the Magyars, who were trying to push beyond Hungary, that he died of grief, quite worn out, in 912. CHAPTER Vm. KONKAD 1 912-917. HEIXKICII I., 917-936. OTTO I., THE GREAT, 936-973. A S the Karling line was worn out, the German ■^ ^ nobles chose another Frank, Konrad,* Count of Franconia, for their king, and when at the end of six years he died, he bade them choose in his stead Count Heinrich f of Saxony, who had been his enemy, and beat him in a great battle, but whom he thought the only man who had skill enough to defend Germany. Heinrich was hawking on the Harz Mountains when the news of this advice was brought to him, and he is therefore called Heinrich the Fowler. He was wise and brave, and brought all the great duke- doms of Germany under his rule. These were, besides Saxony, Franconia, Swabia, Bavaria, and Lorraine. His great wars were with the Magyars * Bold Speech. t Home Ruler. 83 84 Young Folks^ History of G-ermany. iu Hungary. Though he beat them in one battle, he was forced, to make a truce for nine years, and pay them tribute in gold all the time. During all that time he was preparing himself and liis people, and training his nobles to fight on horseback, by games wliich some people say were the beginning of tournaments. The men of lower rank were to be also trained to fight from the time they were thirteen years old, and to meet near the villages every tln-ee days to practise the use of arms. Be- sides, he saw that the great want was of walled cities, where the people might take shelter from their enemies ; so he built towns and walled them in, and commanded that one man out of every nine should live in a hurg^ as these fortresses were called. Thus began the burghers of Germany. The public meetings, fairs, markets, and feasts were to take place within the towns, and justice was to be dealt out there. Stores were to be kept in case of a siege, and the country people were to send in a part of their produce to supply them, and in tliis way . they were made the great gathering-places of the country. When Heinrich thought the country quite ready to fight against the Magyars, lie defied them when next they sent for tribute, by giving them nothing Meinrieh I. 87 but a wretched mangy dog. The next year they entered Germany to punish him, but he beat them at Keuschberg. Then tliey lighted beacon fires on tlie hills to rouse their people, and a great multi- tude mustered to overwhelm the Germans ; at this same place, Keuschberg, Heinrich unfohled the ban- ner of St. Micliael, and rushed on the enemy, all his men crjang out the Greek response, " Kyrle eleison^"' " Lord, have mercy," while the Magyars answered with wild shouts of " Hui ! Hui ! " but they were totally defeated, and driven back within Hungary. After this his troops hailed him as Em- peror. He also conquered the Duke of Bohemia, and made him do homagfe to the kinodom of Ger- many. He beat back the Wends, who lived on the marshes of the Baltic Sea east of tlie Saxons, and were their great enemies ; and he also tried to drive back the Danes. He tried to get these nations to become Christians, but he only succeeded with some of the Bohemians, where the good Duke Wenceslaf was a Christian, already, thanks to his mother, St. Ludmilla. He is the same of whom the pretty story is told that we have in the ballad of " Good King Wenceslas," though he was not really a king. He was murdered by his wicked brother Boleslaf, and tlie Christians were persecuted for some years. 88 Young Folks' History of Germany. The good King Heiiirich meant to go to Rome to be crowned Kaisar by the Poj3e, but he never could be spared long enough from home, and died in the year 936. His son Otto had been already chosen King of Germany, and was married to Edith, sister to the English king Athelstan, a gentle lady, who saved and petted a deer which had taken refuge in her chamber. He was crowned at Aachen by the arch- bishop of Mainz, and the great dukes Avere present in right of their offices — the Duke of Franconia, as carver ; the Duke of Lorraine, as chamberlain ; the Duke of Swabia, as cup-bearer; the Duke of Bavaria, as master of the horse. Standing in the middle aisle of the cathedral, the archbishop called on all who would have Otto for their king to hold up their right hands. Then, leading him to the Altar, he gave liim the sword to chastise the enemies of Christ, the mantle of peace, the sceptre of power, and then, anointing head, breast, arms, and hands with oil, crowned him with the golden crown of Karl the Great ; and there was a great feast, when all the dukes served him according to their offices ; but he had a stormy reign. The Dukes of Fran- conia, and Lorraine rebelled, and so did his own brothers ; but he was both brave, wise, and forgiv- Otto J., the Great. 89 ing, so he brought them all to submit, and forced Boleslaf of B.ohemia to leave o£f persecuting the Christians. The Karling King of France, Louis IV., had a great quarrel with his vassals, Hugh, Count of Paris, and Richard, Duke of Normandy, who called in the help of Harald Blue-tooth, King of Denmark. Louis had married another English princess, and Otto came to help his brother-in-law, thus beginning a war with Harald wliich ended in his making Den- mark subject to the empire ; and he also subdued the Slavonic Duchy of Poland. He founded bish- oprics, like Karl the Great, wherever he conquered heathens, and sent missions with them. Magde- burg was one of his great bishoprics. The Karling line of Kings of Italy had come to an end with King Lothar, who had been married to Adelheid, a Karling herself. She was young and beautiful, and the Lombard duke, Berenger of Iv rea, wanted to marry her to his son. When she re fused, he shut her up in a castle on the Lago di Garda ; but a good monk named Martin made a hole through the walls of her dungeon, and led her wandering about, traveling by night, and hiding by da}' in the standing corn and reeds, till she reached a fisherman's hut, where she remained for 90 Young Folks History of Germany. some days in the dress of a fisher-boy, while Brother Martin carried news to her friends. They took her to the castle of Cauossa, and sent to entreat the help of Otto. He had lost his English wife ; so Adelheid offered to marry him, and give him her ADELHEID HIDING IN THE CORN. claim to the kingdom of Italy. He collected his troops, and came down on Berenger, who was be- sieging Canossa, drove liim away, and, taking the Queen in triumph to Pavia, held at once his wed- ding and liis coronation as King of the Lombards. He was, however, not at peace, for his son Otto /., the Great. 91 Luclolf, Duke of Swabia, rebelled against him, out of jealousy of his brother Heinrich ; but he was tamed at last, and came barefoot to kneel at liis father's feet for pardon, wliich the Kmg gave him, but he forfeited his dukedom, and was sent to Italy. After this he had another terrible war with the ^Magyars, ending in a most horrible battle on the Leeh, when the river ran red with blood, and out of 60,000 ^lagyars only seven came home to tell the tale, and those with slit noses and ears. The Germans on the field of battle hailed Otto as Kaisar ; and as he was soon after called into Italy to set to rights the disorder caused by Ludolf's bad management, he went to Rome, and was crowned Emperor, while his son Otto was crowned King of the Germans, at Aachen, in 961. Things were in a sad state at Rome. The Popes were now so powerful that ambitious men wanted to be Popes, and there was bribery, fightmg, and murder to gain the holy office. So Otto called a council of Bishops, and tried to bring things into better order, but when he went away they soon fell back again, and great crimes were committed. Otto had nearly as large an empire as Karl the Great, for if he had less to the west and south, he had more to the north and east. He was well I 92 Young Folks' History of Germany. named the great, for he was a good and pious, wise and warlike man. He spent his last years mostly in Italy, but he died, in 973, at Memleben, while kneeling before the altar in the church, so peace- fully that he was thought to be only asleep. He was buried at Magdeburg, beside his first wife, the English Edith. ■ 1 CHAPTER IX. THE SAXON EMPERORS. OTTO II., THE RED, 973- 983. OTTO III., THE WONDER, 983-1000. ST. HEINRICH II., 1000-1024. /^~\TTO II. was called the Red, and was but ^^ nineteen years old when his father died, though he had been already crowned and married. His wife was Theophano, daughter of the Eastern Emperor Nicephorus. Bishop Liutprand had been sent to ask her of her father, but was greatly dis- pleased with Constantinople, where the Emperor told him that the Germans would only fight when they were drunk, and that their weapons were too heavy to use. Also, he said that there were no real Romans save at Constantinople, and made a sign with his hand to shut Liutprand's mouth when he began to speak. The Eastern Caesars no doubt greatly despised the attempt of the barba- 93 94 Young Folks' History of Germany. rous Germans to call themselves Kaisars, wliile the German Bishop thought 400 stout Germans could have beaten their whole army, and called Constan- tinople a "perjured, lying, cheating, rapacious, greedy, avaricious, nasty town." Otto was so young that almost all the great dukes whom his father had forced to do homage hoped to shake off his yoke, but he reduced them all. Then Lothar, King of France, went to war with liim, and swore that he would di-ink up all the rivers in Germany ; to which Otto replied that he would cover all France with straw hats, for the Saxon troops used to go out to war in summer with straw hats over their hemlets. Charles, the brother of Lothar, marched through Lorraine and seized Aachen, where he turned the golden eagle on the roof of the palace of Charles the great with his beak towards France ; but Otto met him there, routed him, and hunted him back to Paris. There, while the Germans besieged the city, Lothar offered to settle the matter by a single combat with Otto, but the Germans answered, " We always heard that the Franks set little store by their King, and now we see it." They could not take the city, and concluded a peace, by which the right of the em- pire to Lorraine was established. Otto ILy the Red. 97 Otto was the son of the Empress Adelheid, and thus was half Italian, and he cared very much for the ajffairs of Italy. Rome was in a dreadful state, for the people had hated having Popes thrust on them by German Emperors, and broke out again and again. One Pope had just been murdered, and another set up in liis place, and Otto thought it was time to interfere with a high hand, and also a cruel one ; so he came to Rome, and inviting the chief citizens to a feast in the open space before St. Peter's Church, there seized and put to death all whom he thought dangerous to the authority of Rome. The southern provinces of Italy had been prom- ised him as the portion of his wife Theophano, but as they were not given up to him, he marched to take possession of them ; but the Greek Emperor had allied himself with a body of Saracens who had settled in part of Sicily, and Otto met with a terri- ble defeat at Basantello in Calabria. He had lost his horse in the battle, and made for the sea-shore on foot. A Je^vish rabbi, coming by offered him his horse, and on this horse, with the shouts of the pursuing Saracens still ringing in his ears, the Em- peror dashed into the sea towards a Greek ship, which took him on board. He spoke Greek so 98 Young Folks' History of Germany. well that no one found out he was a German ; and though one Slavonic merchant was there who knew him, he did not betray him, but contrived that the ship should put in at the city of Rossano, where Otto escaped unperceived, and swam ashore. There he found his wife Theophano, but she, as a Greek, was proud of the victory of her nation, and instead of comforting him, scornfully said, " How my countrymen have frightened you!" Otto took this bitterly to heart, and meant to assemble a fresh army and retrieve his cause, but his health had been hurt by his campaign, and he grew so ill that he called a Diet at Verona, and obtained of his nobles the assurance that they would choose his three-year-old son King of Germany and Kaisar, and that the two Empresses, Theophano and Adelheid, should govern in his name. He died in the year 983, when only twenty-nine years old. Otto IH. was carefully brought up by his mother, and Gerbert, Abbot of Magdeburg, and was so learned that he was called the Wonder of the World. He was brave and able, and was only sixteen when he went to Rome and was crowned Emperor. His design was to make Rome liis capital, reign there as Western Emperor, and render Germany only a province.: and he made his tutor, Gerbert, Pope- I OPfcNINC the: TOMV UK KAKL THE CKbAT. Otto III., the Wonder. 101 But his schemes were cut short by liis death in 1000, in the city of Paterno, having spent ver}'- little of liis short life in Germany, though he chose to be bui-ied at Aachen, where shortly before he had opened the tomb of Karl the Great, and found the robed, crowned, and sceptred corpse sitting undecaycd on its chair of state just as it had been placed 200 years before. Tliis year, 1000, was that when the end of the world was expected daily to happen, and it had a great effect upon the whole world. Heinrich, Duke of Bavaria, Otto's cousin through a daughter of Otto the Great, was elected in his place, and was so devout that he and his wife Kimigund * of Lux- emburg are both reckoned as saints. He endowed the Bishopric of Bamberg with lands of his own, and therefore ij generally drawn with the model of the cathedral in his arms. He was crowned Em- peror at Rome, and as he, like Otto, held that the Kings of the Germans had the right of reigning over Rome and Italy, he took the title of King of the Romans. Thenceforth the German Kings were so called until they were crov/ned as Emperors at Rome. An Emperor was usually crowned four times — at Aachen, as King of the Romans, which •Bold War. 102 Young Folks' Historj of Germany. really meant of Germany ; at Pavia, of Italy ; at Monza, of LomLardy, with an iron crown, said to be made jjartly of one of the nails of the cross ; and o' Rome, as Kaisar or Emperor. It was the choice ST. HENRY. of the nobles of Germany which gave him all these rights, though he was never Kaisar till his corona- tion by the Emperor. St. Heinrich did all he could St. Heinrieh II. 103 to promote tlie conversion of the Slavonic nations round him, and was a friend and helper of the good King Stephen of Hungary- The last event of Ids life was going to make a visit to Robert, King of France, a man as pious and saintly as himself. He died on liis way back, in 1024, the last of the Saxon Emperors. CHAPTER X. THE FKANCONIAN LINE. KONRAD II., THE SALIC, . . 1024-1039. IIEINRICH III., 1039-1054. HEINRICH IV., 1054-1106. HEINRICH v., 1106-1114. THE German dukes, archbishops, counts, bish- ops, and great abbots all met on a plain near Mainz, on the banks of the Rhine, to choose a new king. Two Konrads of Franconia, both cousins, and descended from a daughter of Otto the Great, stood foremost, and they agreed that whichever was elected should receive the ready submission of the other. The elder one, who was chosen, is known as Konrad the Salic, because he traced his descent from the old Meerwing kings ; but neither he nor his family resembled them in indolence. With the help of his son Heinrich, he did much to pull down 104 I Heinrich IH. 105 tte power of the dukes, and he favored the great free cities, wliich were fast grooving into strength. Konrad was crowned Emperor in 1027, and had two kings present at the ceremony — Rudolf, the last King of Burgundy, and our own Danish King Knut, whose daughter Kunhild married Heinrich, the son of the Kaisar. The Kaisar's o^\ti wife was Gisela, niece of Rudolf, who on liis death left the kingdom to him. Tliis did not mean the duchy of Burgundy, which belonged to France, but the old kingdom of Aries, or Provence, Dauphine, Savoy, and part of S^vitzerland, over which the Kmgs of Germany continued to have rights. Konrad had wars with the Bohemians and Hun- garians, but gained the advantage with both, and lie was also a great law-maker. In his time it was settled that lands should not be freshly granted on the death of the holder, but should always go on to the next heir ; and that no man should forfeit liis fief save by the judgment of his peers, thus prevent- ing the dukes and counts from takmg away the grants to their vassals at their own will. He died in 1039, and was buried at Speyer. His son Heinrich HI. was twenty-two when he began to reign, and was well able to carry out his father's policy, so far as spirit and resolution went. 106 Young Folks' History of Germany. The quarrels at Rome were worse than ever, there being no less than three Popes, and he marched to Rome, sent them all into monasteries, and set up one of his own choosing, namely, Clement 11. In- deed, though his was but a short reign, he was the maker of no less than four Popes, for each died almost as soon as he was appointed ; but there was a strong feeling growing up that this was not the right way for the head of the Western Church to be chosen, and it was most strongly felt by a 3'oung Roman deacon called Hildebrand, who resolved to make a reformation. Things grew worse when Heinrich III. died in the flower of his age, in 1054, leaving a little son, Heinrich IV., of five years old, under the charge of his mother, Agnes, a good woman, but not strong enough to keep the great dukes in order ; and she tried to bribe her enemies by giving them lands, which only made them more able to do her mis- chief. The Church lands, the great bishoprics and abbeys, were given either by favor, fear, or money, and some dioceses went from father to son, like duchies and counties, and the clergy were getting to be as bad as the laity. To check all this, Hilde- brand led Pope Stephen 11. to forbid all priests, even those who were not monks, to marry ; and Heinrich IV. 107 also a great council was collected at Rome, at the Lateral! Gate, where it was decreed that henceforth no clergyman should ever receive any benefice from the hands of a layman, but the bishops should be chosen by their clergy, and the Pope hunself by the seventy chief clergy of Rome, who were called cardinals, and wore scarlet robes and hats, in mem- ory of the old Roman purple. This was in the year 1059. Three years later the great nobles of Germany resolved to be rid of the rule of the Empress Agnes. Hanno, archbishop of Koln, invited her and her son to spend the Easter of 10G2 at the island of Kaiserswerth, on the Rhine, and while there the young Heinrich was invited on board a pleasure- boat, which instantly pushed off for the mainland. The boy, then thirteen years old, tried to leap out and swim back to his mother, but he was held back ; and though his mother stood weeping and begging for help, no one would do anything but yell at those who were rowing the boat rapidly to Koln, where Hanno proclaimed himself Regent, and declared that the affairs of the kingdom shuidd be managed by the bishop of whatever diocese the King was in. Hanno hoped thus to rule the kingdom, but his 108 Young Folks' History of Germany. plan turned against liim, for Adalbert, Bishop oi Bremen, got Heinrich into his power, and kept hiru amused with constant feasting and revelry, which did liis whole character much mischief; and he learnt besides to dislike and distrust all the great dukes and nobles. When he came of age he kept Adailbert as his chief adviser, and was very liarsh and fierce to his subjects, especially the Saxons. There was a ris- ing against him, and he was forced to send away Adalbert, and marry Beatha, the daughter of the Margrave of Susa ; but he hated and ill-used her, and his court was a place of grievous wickedness, while there was constant war with his people. In the meantime Hildebrand had been chosen Pope, in the year 1073, and he at once began to enforce the decrees of the Lateran Council, of which the Germans had taken no notice. The decree was read aloud at Efrurt by the Archbishop of Mainz to a synod of bishops, and such a roar of fury rose that his life Avas in danger, and Heinrich thought his subjects would all hold with him in resisting it. But Heinrich's violence and harshness had set his people against him, and the Saxons appealed to Rome against his injustice. Gregory VII. sum- Heinrich IV. Ill moned him to Rome to answer their charges, excom- municating at the same time all the bishops who had obtained their sees improperly. Upon this Heinrich called together the German bishops at Wurms, and made them depose the Pope. Gregory replied by pronouncing the King deposed, and re- leasing his subjects from their oath of allegiance. Germany and Italy were divided between the Pope and the King, and the Germans agreed that unless the King were abtolved witliin the year they must regard him as deposed, and choose another in his stead. Heinrich felt that he must give way, and he made a most dangerous winter journey across the Alps by !Mont Cenis, with Bertha and her child, blinded by snow or sliding along in frost. Tlie Queen and her child were wrapped in an ox-liide, and dragged along in a sledge. In Lonibardy the bishops and nobles were favor- able to IK-inrich, but he only sought to make his peace with the Pope, and hastened to Canossa, the castle of Countess Matilda of Tuscany, Gregory's greatest friend, where the Pope then was. He came barefooted and bareheaded, in the hair shirt of a penitent, and was kept for three days thus doing penance in the court of the castle before he was admitted to the chapel, where the Pope ab- 112 Young Folks' History of Germany. solved him, but only on condition that, till the affairs of Germany should be settled by the Pope, he should not assume his place as King. Nor had his humiliation liindered the Germans, who hated him, from electing a new king, Rudolf of Swabia, who was called the Priests' King. All Germany was thus at war, and Heinrich declared that Swabia was forfeited, and gave it to Friedrich of Hohen- staufen, who had married his daughter Agnes. Gregory, after a time, took the part of Rudolf, and Heinrich, on his side, appointed a Pope of his own ; so that there were two Popes and two Kings of the Romans, until the battle of Zcitz, where RudoLTs right hand was cut off by Gottfried of Bouillon, and he was afterwards killed. After this Heinrich prevailed, and pushed into Italy, where he beat Matilda's army, and besieged Rome for three years ; while Gregory retreated to Salerno, where he was protected by the Norman Duke of Calabria. Rome was taken, and Heinrich crowned Kaisar by the Antipope. Gregory VII. died wliile among the Normans, his last word being, " I have loved righteousness, and hated inicjuity ; therefore do I die in exile." His successor, Urban II., went on the same system of keeping the Cliurch above all temporal power. Heinrich V. 115 For a little while Heinrich triumphed, but his enemies stirred up his sons against him. Konrad, the elder, died at war with him ; Heinrich, the second, actually stripped his father of his robes, and, in spite of his tears and entreaties, forced him to sign his abdication. Then the old man wandered about half-starved, and came to the Bishop of Spe- yer to entreat for some small office about the cathedral, but this could not be, as he was excom- municated, and he had even to sell his boots to buy bread ! He died at Lidge, in 1106, and his body was put in a stone coffin in an island on the Maas, and watched day and night by a hermit till 1111, when Heinrich V. came to an agreement at Wurms with the Pope that, though bishops should do homage for the lands they held of him, the King should not deliver to them the ring and staff, which betokened spiritual power. After tliis Heinrich IV. was buried. Heinrich V. died three years later. He had married our Henry the First's daughter Matilda, whom we call the Empress Maude. CHAPTER XL LOTHAR n., 1125-1137- KONRAD III., 1137-1152. WHEN Heinrich V. died, without children, the Franconian line of Emperors came to an end, and ten great nobles from the four cliief dukedoms met at Mainz to choose a new king. Heinrich had left all his own lands to his sister's sons, Konrad and Friedrich of Hohenstaufen, and one of these hoped to be elected ; but the Germans feared that they would bring them as many troubles as had arisen under the last Franconians, and there- fore chose in their stead Lothar, Duke of Saxony. He thought he could never do enough to avoid the evils that Heinrich IV. had brought on the country, and so he asked Pope Innocent II. to ratify his election, and gave up the agreement at Wurms, with all rights to homage from bishops. Tliis dis- 116 Lothar U. 117 pleased the Hohenstaufen, and all who held for the power of the kings, and there was again a great war. The cliief supporter of the King was Ilein- rich the Proud, Duke of Bavaria, who married liis daughter Matilda, and was made Duke of Saxony. Heiurich's family was descended from a forefather named Welf, or Wolf, a Christian name often used, but of wliich a very odd story was told. It was said that the Countess of Altdorf laughed at a poor woman who had tliree children born at the same time, and that, as a punislmient, she gave birth to twelve sons in one day. She was so much shocked that she sent all of them but one to be drowned in the lake, but on the way the maid, who was carry- ing them in her apron, met the count. He asked what she had there. " Whelps," she said ; but he pulled aside her apron, and, seeing lus eleven little sons, had them safely brought up, and they were known by the name of Welfen. One of the Welfs married into the Italian house of Este, and both in Italy and Germany the party of the Pope came to be known as Welfs, or Guelfs ; wliile the party of the Kaisar were termed Waibiinger, from the castle of Waibling belonging to the Hohenstaufen. The luilians made tliis word into Gliibellini; and for many yeais there were fierce quarrels between tlr: 118 Young Folks' History of Grermany. Guelfs and Ghibellines, the first upholding the power of the Church, the second that of the State. These Idngs of Germany were much less power- ful than the great Emperors of the house of Saxony and Francouia had been ; and now that all fiefs had been made hereditary, the gieat dukes and mar- graves were more independent of them, wliile the counts and barons (Grafen and Freiherren, the Germans called them) were likewise more inde- pendent of their dukes. Every one was building castles and fortifying cities, whence the nobles made war on each other, and robbed those who passed on the roads. There is a story of a Bishop who gave a knight the charge of his castle, and when he was asked how those within it were to live, pointed down the four roads that met there, to indicate tliat the travelers were to be robbed for the supplies ! The larger cities governed themselves by a council, and called themselves free Imperial cities, and these were the most prosperous and peaceful places both in Germany and Italy, for even bishops and abbots did not always so keep out of the fray as to make themselves respected. The minne-singers, love- singers, or minstrels could, however, go about from town to town and castle to castle singing their ballads, and were always safe and welcome. LOTHAR II. LEADING THE POPES HORSE. Konrad III. 121 The great Countess Matildia had left all her do- minions to the Pope, and Lothar acknowledged this right of Innocent II., and crossed the Alps in order to be crowned Kaisar. There was an Antipope set up by the Ghibellines, who held the Church of St. Peter and the Castle of St. Angelo, and as Lothar could not drive him out, the coronation had to be in the Church of St. John Lateran. He came a second time to Italy to put down a great distui'bance in Lombardy, taking with him Konrad of Hohen- staufen, to whom he had restored the dukedom of Franconia, and had made standard-bearer to the Imperial army, Konrad was a good and noble man, brave, courteous, and devout, and respectful to the clergy, especially the Pope, wliich was the more re- marked as he was the head of the Ghibelline party. The head of the Guelfs, Heinrich the Proud, was as much hated as Konrad Avas loved, for his inso- lence to every one from the Pope downwards, and for his savage cruelties to the prisoners who feU into his hands ; but his father-in-law the Emperor favored him, and gave him the Marquisate of Tuscany. On the way home, Lothar II. was taken ill, and died in a peasant's hut in the Tyrol, in 1137. Heinrich the Proud fully expected to have been 122 Toung Folks' History of Germany^ chosen King of the Romans, but he had offended most of liis party, even the Pope liimself, and Konrad was elected. There was a battle between Konrad and Heinrich's brother Welf, at the foot of Weinsberg, a hill crowned with a castle, on the banks of the Neckar, and in tliis "Welf" and "Waibling" were first used as war-cries. The victory fell to Konrad, and he besieged the castle till those within offered to surrender. All the men were to be made prisoners, but the women were to go away in peace, with as much of her treasure as each could carry. All Konrad's army was drawn up to leave free passage for the ladies, the Emperor at their head, when behold a wonder- ful procession came down the lull. Each woman carried on her back her greatest treasure — husband, son, father, or brother ! Some were angry at this as a trick, but Konrad was touched, granted safety to all, and not only gave freedom to the men, but sent the wemon back to fetch the wealth they had left behind. The hill was called Weibertrue, or Woman's Truth ; and in 1820 Charlotte, Queen of Wurtemberg,* with the other ladies of Germany, built an asylum there for poor women who have been noted for self-sacrificing acts of love. Hein- * Daughter of George IIL THK WOMEN OF ■Wla^SBERG. Conrad III. 125 rich the Proud was reduced, and his two dukedoms taken away, Bavaria being given to Leopold, Mar- grave of Austria, and Saxony to Albrecht* the Bear, already Count of the Borders ; but when Heinrich died, Konrad gave back Saxony to his son Heinrich the Lion, and Albrecht the Bear be- came Margrave of a new border country beyond Saxony, called Brandenburg, wliich he conquered from the Wends. Germany had had Kttle to do "with the first cru- sade as a nation, though the noble and excellent Gorttfried of Bouillon, Duke of Lorraine, had been its leader, and first King of Jerusalem. But when St. Bernard preached the second crusade, Konrad took the cross, and went with an army of 70,000 men. They went by way of Constantinople, and in the wild hills of Asia Minor were led astray by their guides, starved and distressed, and when the Turks set upon them at Iconium, there was such a slaughter that only 7000 were left. Konrad went on and joined the host of King Louis V. of France at Nicea, almost alone, save for the knights from Provence, who had joined the French army, and whom Louis sent to form a tr.un for their own Em- peror. Together they landed at Antioch and be- * Nobly bright. 126 Young Folks' History of Germany. sieged Damascus, where Konrad showed great valor, and is said to have cut off the head and arm of a Turk with one blow of liis sword. But they could not take the city, and, disgusted with the falsehood and treachery of the dwellers in the Holy Land, Konrad returned home, and died three years after, in 1152. He was the first Kaisar who used the double eagle as his standard. CHAPTER XII. FRIEDRICII I., BARBAROSSA, . . . 1157-1178. KONRAD III. left a son, but as lie was very young the good king had recommended the nobles to choose his nephew Friedrich as their king, hoping that as his father was a Hohenstaufen, and his mother Jutta a Bavarian, the breach between Welfs and Waiblings might be healed. Friedrich was thirty-two years old, brave, keen, firm, and generous, but fiercely proud, violent, and self-"\villed. He was a grand-looking man, with fair hair and blue eyes, and a tinge of red in his beard, which made the Italians call him Barbarossa. He gave Heinrich the Lion, Bavaria as well as Saxony, formed Austria into a duchy instead of a mark county, and he also made Windislav of Bo- hemia a king instead of a duke. He married Bea- trice, the heiress of the county of Burgundy, which 127 128 Young Folks' History of Germany. meant Provence, with its capital Aries. Konrad had never been crowned Emperor, and thus had no power in Italy, so that the Lombard cities had grown very powerful, and were used to govern themselves ; the nobles were like little robber kings in their mountain castles, and at Rome, a priest named Arnold of Brescia had stirred up the people to turn out the Pope, Adrian IV., an Englishman, and set up a Republic in imitation of the old Com- monwealth. Friedrich felt himself called on to set all tliis right. He came over the Alps, marched into Rome, seized Arnold of Brescia, and had him executed, and then was crowned Emperor by Adrian IV. The people of Lodi came to ask his help against the citizens of Milan, who had conquered them, pulled down the walls of their city, and forced them to leave their homes and live in villages. Friedrich wrote orders that Lodi should be re- stored ; but the Milanese tore his letter to pieces, and threw it in the face of his messenger, and most of the Italian cities took their part. The Emperor blockaded them, and cut off the hands of any un- fortunate peasant who was caught trying to bring them provisions. They surrendered at last, and he made them swear fealty to him, and left them tRIEDRICH I. REFUSES THE iUI*ANESE SUBMISSION. Friedrich /., Barharossa. 131 under a judge. But in a short time they rebelled again, declaring they would give themselves to the Pope instead of the Emperor. Adrian IV. was dead, and some of the Cardinals elected Alexander III., but the others and the Roman people chose another Pope, who called himself Victor IV. Friedrich called on both to appear before a Council which was to decide between them, but Alexander, knowing himself to be riglitfully elected, replied by declaring that the Emperor had no right to summon the successor of St. Peter before a Council. So only the friends of Victor came to it, and de- clared him to be the true Pope. Alexander then excommunicated both Frietli-ich and Victor, and Friedrich came in great wrath over the Alps to overthrow the Pope and punish the Milanese, who liad insulted both him and his Empress in every way. He blockaded the city again, and forced it to yield. Before the day of surrender, he sent his gentle ^^ife Beatrice away, lest she shoidd move him from his purpose, and then all tlie cliief citi- zens were marched out with their thirty-seven ban- ners and the great standard of the city, which had a car all to itself when it went out to battle, and was embroidered with a Crucifix, beside wliich stood the figure of St. Ambrose giving his blessing. 132 Young Folks' History of Germany. The banners were tlurown in a heap, the trumpets over them, at the Kaisar's feet, the car v/as broken to pieces, and the unhappy people wept so bitterly that even Friedrich's stern warriors shed tears of pity. He told the citizens that they should have such mere}" as agreed with justice, and called a diet at Pavia to judge them. The diet decided that MUan ought to be broken up as Lodi had been, the wall thrown down, the ditch filled up, the people forced to live in villages, all two miles from the ruined city and from one another, and each A\ith a German governor. The people took some of their property with them, but much was forfeited and plundered, and a tenth was given to the churches and convents of Germany. Koln had for its share Avhat were thought to be the relics of the Wise Men from the East, whom the Germans thenceforth called the Three Kings of Koln. Friedrich then appeared at Pavia in his crown, which he had sworn never to wear again till Milan had been punished, and he showed much favor to all the Ghibelline cities of Lombardy. Then he marched to Rome, while Alexander fled to Benevento, but it was the height of summer, and a terrible pestilence broke out in liis army, cutting down many of Friedrich's near Friedrich /., Barharossa. 135 kindred and best advisers, and great numbers of the troops. He was forced to retreat into Lombar- dy, but he foimd the whole country in insurrection, guarding the passes of the Alps against him, and at Susa a party of armed men broke into his chamber at night, and he had only just time to escape by another door, while a faithful knight named Her- man of Sieveneichen threw himself into the bed to receive the death-blow while liis master escaped. However he was recognized, and though in their rage the Lombards were going to slay him, they respected his faithfulness, and he was spared. Germany was up in arms, and Friedrich had to subdue the rebellious princes. He was a great ruler, and founded Munich and several other great towns at home ; but in the meantime the cities of Italy had united with the Pope against him in what was called the Lombard League, and had founded the city of Alessandria in honor of it, calling it by the name of the Pope. Friedrich crossed the mountains to put down this rising, but the Lom- bards were stronger than he had expected, and in the midst of the struggle, at his greatest need, Heinrich the Lion, Duke of Saxony and Bavaria, refused his help, probably because he did not like fighting against the Chui'ch, but declaring that he 136 Young Folks' History of Germany, was too old for the campaign, though he was only forty-five, wliile the Emperor was fifty-four. Friedrich met liim at Cliiavenna, and actually knelt before him in entreaty not to ruin his cause by leaving him, but Heinrich, though distressed at the sight, held to his purpose, and rode off with his vassals. Without the Saxons, Friedrich had to figlit a battle at Lugnano, where the Milanese standard again appeared in its car, and the Welfs gained a complete victory. Friedrich's horse was killed under him, and he was thought to be slain, so that the Empress Beatrice had put on mourning as a widow, before he appeared again at Pavia, having escaped on foot by by-paths. He was forced to make peace, and went to meet the Pope at Venice, where the Doge, in full pro- cession conducted him to St. Mark's Church, at the door of which Alexander awaited liim with all the clergy. The Kaisar knelt to kiss the Pope's slip- per, and muttered in Latin (it is said), " Not to thee, but to Peter," which the Pope hearing an- swered with, " Both to me and to Peter." It is also said that Alexander then put Ids foot on Fried- rich's neck, quoting the promise — " Thou shalt go upon the lion and the adder;" but as another ac- Uill FRIEDRICH KNEELING TO Hi-lNRlCll THE LION. Friedrich I., Barharossa. 139 count says he shed tears of joy at the reconciliation, it is not likely that these insults passed between them. The question was then finally settled that Bishops might be named by the prince, but that the cathedi-al clergy should have the power of ac- cepting or rejecting them, and that though their land may be held of the prince, their spiritual power comes only through the Church, and is quite independent of him. The Milanese were re- stored to their city, and Friedi-ich went home, going on his way to Aries, where he and Beatrice were together crowned King and Queen of Burgundy — namely, what is now called Provence — in 1178. CHAPTER Xin. FRIEDRICH I., BARBAROSSA (contd.), 1174-1189. HEINRICH VI., 1189-1197. WHEN Friedrich I. came back to German}'-, he held a diet at Wurms, and summoned Heinrich the Lion, Duke of Saxony and Bavaria, to answer for his treason, rebellion, and many other crimes. One of these was that in the middle of the night, in time of peace and friendship, he had at- tacked the town of Veringen, where the bishop of Freising had great salt works, destroyed them and all the storehouses, and dragged away the makers to Munich. The Duke would not come, saying it was his right to be judged only in his own country, so an- other diet was held at Magdeburg, but he would not come to that, nor to a third at Goslau, where 140 Friedrich /.. Barbarossa. 141 he was put under the ban of- the empire — that is, made to forfeit his fiefs and honors, and declared an outlaw, for ban means a proclamation. He had friends, however, and held out for a long time, but he was so fierce and \iolent that he offended them all, and the Kaisar pushed him very hard, and be- sieged his city of BrunsAvick. There his "svife, who was Matilda, daughter to King Henry H. of Eng- land, was lying ill. She ventured to send to Fried- rich to ask that some Avine might be sent in for her use, and he answered that he had rather make her a present of Brunswick than disturb her. He was as good as his word, for he drew off his army, but he gained so much upon the Lion, that at last Heinrich came to the diet at Erfurt, fell on his knees before the Kaisar, and asked pardon Friedrich raised him kindly, but told him he had himself been the author of all his misfortunes. He was judged to have forfeited his great dukedoms, but the Kaisar allowed him to keep the Dukedoms of Brunswick and Luneburg, on condition that he should spend three years in exile at the court of his father-in-law. King Henry of England. Bruns- wick has ever smce continued to belong to his fam- ily, the house of Welf or Guelf. Part of Saxony was given to Bernhard of Anhalt, the son of Al- 1^^ Young Folks' History of Germany. brecht the Bear, in whos^ line it continued, and it is from these two houses jf Brunswick and Saxony that our English royal family have sprung. Bava- ria was given to Friedrich's friend. Otto of Wit- telsbach. Now that peace was made, Friedrich held a great festival at Mainz, where he knighted his sons and held a tournament, to which came knights of all nations, forty thousand in number. A camp with tents of silk and gold was set up by the river-side, full of noble ladies who came to look on, and of minne-singers, who were to sing of the deeds of the knights. The songs and ballads then sung became famous, and there was much more of the spirit of poetry from this time forward in Germany. The Kaisar, old as he was, took his full share in the tuts and tournaments, and jousted as well or better than his tliree sons. Heinrich. the eldest of these sons, had already been chosen to succeed his father, and was the first prince who was called King of the Romans, while the 'Kaisar was alive. Friedrich planned a grand' marriage for him. The Kings of Sicily, who were of Norman birth, had always been great friends of the Popes, and sheltered them when the Emperors drove them out of Rome, but the last of these, of Heinrich VI. 145 the right line, had no child, and had only an aunt named Constance, who had always lived in a con- vent, though it does not seem certain whether she was really a nun. Friedrich used to say that Italy was like an eel, whicli must be held both by the head and tail if you would keep it. He had the head, and hoped the son would get hold of the tail by marrying Constance. Her nephew, the King, agreed to the match, and Constance, who was thirty-four years old, was sent to meet her bride- groom at Milan with a hundred and twenty mules carrying her marriage portion. The Pope, Urban III., was very angry, and deposed all the Bishops who had been at the marriage, or at Constance's coronation, and fresh struggles were just beginning, when all Europe was shocked by the news that Jerusalem had been taken by the Saracens under Saladin. The Pope and the Kaisar both laid aside their quarrels to do all they could to rescue the Holy City, and, old as he was, Friedrich prepared to go on the crusade. He took his two younger sons with him, and a great army, in whicli were Leopold, Duke of Austria, and Konrad, Markgraf or Mar- quess of Monserrat. Passing tlirough Constanti- nople, they marched through Asia Minor, suffering 146 Young Folks' History of Germany mucli for want of food and water, but at Iconium, where with his uncle Konrad he had once suffered such a sore defeat, Friedi'ich, with his war-cry, "Christ reigns! Christ conquers!" so dashed on the enemy as to gain a glorious victory. But only a few days after, as he was bathing in the cold, swift river Kalykadmus, a chill struck him, and he sank into the rapid current. He was seventy years old when he was thus lost, in the year 1190. His body was found and buried at Antioch; but the Germans could not believe their mighty Kaisar was dead, and long thought that in the K^-ffhauser cave in Thiuingia he sat with all his knights round a stone table. Ids once red, but now white, beard growing through the stone, waiting till the ravens shall cease to fly round the mountain, and Ger- many's greatest need shall be come, when he will waken up, break forth, and deliver her. Friedrich's second son and namesake fought bravely, but soon caught the plague, and died when only twenty years of age. The Duke of Austria and Marquess of Monserrat joined the other body of crusaders, led by the Kings of France and Eng- land, at Acre, but Konrad was killed by an Eastern assassin, and Leopold was affronted by King Rich- ard wanting him to assist in building up the walls Konrad III. 149 of Ascalon, and left Palestine. In the meantime, the King of the Romans, Heinrich VI., had been fighting hard with Heinrich the Lion, who had come home from England resolved to win back what he had lost, but all in vain. His son Heinrich had been betrothed to Agnes, daughter to the Pfalz- graf Konrad, brother to Friedrich I., and when the house of Welf was ruined, she would not give up her love to marry the King of France. Her mother favored her, and sent a message to the young Hein- rich to come to her castle in her husband's absence. He came in the disgviise of a pilgrim, and the mother immediately caused them to be married. When her husband came home the next morning, she met him with — ''My lord, a noble falcon came yester- day to your tower, whom I have taken ! " The two presented themselves, the Pfalzgraf forgave them, and thus peace was made, and the old Lion soon after died. Young Heinrich was thus able to interfere on behalf of his English uncle, Richard the Lion Heart, when he had been shipwrecked in the Adriatic on his way from the Holy Land, and while trying to pass through the Tyrol as a pilgrim had been seized and imprisoned by Leopold, and afterwards made ever to the Kaisar. The Pope demanded the 150 Young Folks' History of Germany. release of a crusader, wliose person ouglit to have been sacred, and the Kaisar held a diet at Hagenau, at which Richard was called upon to defend him- self from the charge of having murdered Konrad of Monserrat, betrayed the cause, and other crimes. HEINRICH VI. Richard spoke with such grandeur and dignit^y that even Leopold turned aside weeping, and the Em- peror sprang from liis throne and embraced ,'7un. After this his ransom was accepted, and he did Heinrich VI. 151 homage to Heiiiricli VI. as Emperor of the West, receiving from him the promise of the kingdom of Aries to add to his duchy of Aquitaine. Heinrich took his wife into Sicily on the death of her cousin Tancred, and they were there crowned; but he showed himself a harsh and cruel ruler, and very avaricious. He went Ijack several times be- tween Sicily and Germany, and caused his little, son Friedi-ich to be elected King of the Romans, but he was everywhere hated. He was planning a ivar with the Eastern Emperor, when, after hunt- ing all day near Messina in the heat of August, he took a chill, and died at the age of tliirty-one, in the year 1194. The Sicilians rejoiced publicly at the death of their tyrant, and murdered all the Germans they could find in the country. CHAPTER XIV. PHILIP, 1198-1208. OTTO IV., 1209-1218. LITTLE Friedricli, the sou of Heinrich VI., was only three years old. He had been chosen King of the Romans as soon as he was born, but the Welfs declared that the election of an unbaptized infant could not be good for anything, and that there must be a fresh choice. On hearing tliis, Philip, Duke of Swabia, the only surviving son of Barbarossa, left his sister-in-law Constance to secure Sicily and Apulia to herself and her child, and hurried back to the diet. There the Waiblings declared that it was no use to try to elect an infant, and that if Philip wished to keep the empire in his family he muse be himself elected. He consented, and was chosen at Muhlhausen by the Waiblings, but the Welfs met at Koln and chose 152 J*hilip. 153 Otto, Duke of Brunswick, the son of Henry the Lion, and had him crowned at Aachen. Philip was crowned at Mainz, but only by the Savoyard Bishop of Tarentaise, and the same year the Empress Con- stance died when only forty-three years old, having had her little son Friedrich Roger crowned King of Sicily and Apulia, and placed him under the special protection of the Pope, whom she begged to become his guardian, and to watch over both his kingdoms and his education. The Pope at that time was Innocent III., a very great man, whose chief object was to make the power of the See of Rome felt by all princes ; and as the first Xorman conqueror had asked the Pope to grant the power over Sicily, he considered the kingdom a fief of the Roman See, and took charge of it and of the little king, whom the Normans called the Child of Apulia. Innocent at the same time thought it needful to pronounce between the three princes, who had all been chosen kings of the Romans — Friedrich, Philip, and Otto. He threw over the cliild's elec- tion at once, and likewise declared Philip's unlaw- ful, but he saw no objection to Otto's, and Otto promised his full support and faithfulness to Rome, 154 Young Folks' History of G-ermany. and to give up possession of Countess Matilda's in- heritance. Germany thus was divided between the tAvo kings till, in 1208, at the marriage festival of his niece Beatrice and Otto, Duke of Meran in the Tja-ol, Philip was stabbed in the throat — no one knows why, unless it Avas the deed of a madman or drunk- ard — by the Bavarian Pfalzgraf, Otto of Wittels- bach. Philip left only two little daughters, whose mother died of the shock a few days after. The bridegroom, Otto of Meran, promised Beatrice never to rest till he had revenged her uncle's death, and Otto of Wittelsbach was hunted down among some shepherds as he was playing with a ram, and his head cut off. Otto of Brunswick offered himself for a second election, and gained it, promising to marry Philip's orphan daughter Beatrice, who at eleven years old was led into the diet, while Otto said — " Behold your queen ! Pay her due honors I ' and then committed her to the care of her sister Agnes, the Pfalzgrafin of the Rhine, while he went to Italy to be crowned, and to try to bring Lombardy to be at peace. It is said that Innocent III. wept for joy at hav- ing to crown a Welf Emperor, but the German ../';'j(,|;|Liif,^„;«i(nnffl (!:■' r ■ •/, thf l',.!"'",: MURDER OF PHILIP. Otto IV. 157 troops were unruly, helped themselves to whatever pleased them in the Roman shops, and at last a fight took place in the streets, in wliich many were killed on both sides. Also, when Innocent claimed the lands which Countess Matilda of Tuscany had left to the Church, the Kaisar refused to give them up according to his promises, and the quarrel having begun, he most unjustly laid claim to the kingdom of Sicily as having been cut off from the empire, and actually marched into the Abruzzi. Young Friedrich, the Pope's ward, defended him- self bravely in Sicily, and Innocent, justly angered at the grasping and faithlessness of Otto, excom- municated liim, and called on all his subjects to re- nounce their allegiance. Otto was obliged to hurry back to Germany, where, to strengthen himself, he immediately married Beatrice of Hohenstaufen, but only a fortnight later the poor little bride was found dead, poisoned, it was supposed, by his enemies. Otto was always looked on as belonging to liis uncles, the Kings of England, and thus Philip Augustus of France hated him as one of that race. Once, when a boy, Otto had been at Philip's court with his uncle Richard, who pointed him out to the King, sa}'ing that one day that boy might be Em- peror. Philip laughed scornfully, and said — 158 Youiiy Folka' History of Germany. " When that comes to pass, I will give him Orleans, Chartres, and Paris." When Otto was really Kaisar, he sent to put Philip in mind of his promise. Pliilip replied that Orleans, Chartres, and Paris were the names of three little puppies, now three old hounds wliich he sent to the Emperor ! At this time Pliilip was the friend and champion of Innocent III., wliile King John of England, Otto's uncle, was NAith his kingdom under the interdict, and Otto was felt to be following him in liis mis- deeds, rather than acting as a Welf, faithful to the Pope. Therefore Friedrich was encouraged to make an attempt on Germany, and received the Pope's bless- ing and recommendation to the German nation, but only on condition that if he succeeded he should give up Apulia and Sicily, for the Popes did not choose to have the Emperors holding both ends of the eel of Italy. Though only eighteen, Friedrich was married to Constance of Aragon, and had a little son named Ileinrich, whom he carried to be crowned at Palermo before he set off for Germany. He was welcomed by the Waibhngers in Lom- bardy, but he took no army with him, and climbed the j)asses of the Alps alone with a guide, so as to descend into his own duchy of Swabia, where the Otto IV, 161 people were glad to see him. At Constance the gates were shut when Otto wanted to enter the city, and all the south of Germany soon owned the Apulian child, as Otto called him. He then went to France, and made a league with Philip Augus- tus, who gave him twenty thousand marks towards his expenses. He took the sum with him to Mainz, and when his chancellor, the Bishop of Speier, asked where he would have it kept, he answered — " Nowhere. It is to be given to our friends ; " and at Mainz all the Waiblinger chose him as King, and paid liim homage. Otto was, however, still strong in Brunswick and Saxony, the old homes of his line, but he had mixed himself up in a fierce quarrel of the Duke of Bra- bant, the Count of Flanders, and the other border vassals, with Philip Augustus, and joined them in a great attack upon France. All France united against them, and in 1214 there was fought the terrible battle of Bouvines, in which Philip gained a complete victory. Otto was in great danger, alone among the enemy, when a French knight tried to cut him down with a battle-axe, missed him, but so wounded his horse that, mad Avith pain, it tore back with him to his own troops, and there fell dead. He was remounted, but he could not bring his 162 Young Folks' History of Germany. troops back to the change, and was forced to ride off with them, Pliilip scornfully saying — " We shall see nothing more of him but liis back," though in truth Pliilip was a much less brave man. Otto's power was broken, and he fled to Koln, where liis second wife, Marie of Brabant, added to liis troubles by gambling away vast sums at dice. Being unable to pay them, he rode away from a hunting party to Bruns\vick, and she followed as a pilgrim, and Koln opened its gates to Friedrich. Otto lived four years longer in Brunswick, and on liis death-bed sent his crown by the hands of his brother Heinrich to Friedrich. He was then ab- solved from his long excommunication, and died in 1218. He had nc^ children, so that Brunswick and Luneburg went to his nephew Otto, the son of his brother Wilhelm, our Queen's ancestor. CHAPTER XV. FRIEDRICH II., 1218. TIj^RIEDRICH II., "the ApuHan child," was a -■- wonderfully able and briUiant man, brought up in all the old learning that was still kept up in the Italian cities by the greatest scholars of the world, and with all the fire and spirit of the House of Hohenstaufen, together with the keen wit of the Sicihan Normans. Bred in Palermo, he preferred Italy to Germany, and as soon as Otto was dead he set out to be crowned Kaisar at Rome, after having caused his young son Heinrich to be chosen as his successor. His wife Constance was dead, and the little cru- sadins: kinfjdom of JeriLsalein had again fallen to a little girl, Yolande de Briennc, whom Friedrich married, undertaking, as King of Jerusalem, to 164 Young Folks' History of Germany, lead a grand crusade to deliver the Holy City, which was still held by the Saracens. The Pope, Honorius II., was not pleased with the marriage, and taxed Friedrich with breaking his promise of preventing Sicily from being in the same hands with Germany, since he had caused his only son to be elected to both ; but Friedrich an- swered that he would take care to settle that, and went on into Sicily, where he had hard work in dealing with his fierce barons, and likewise with a colony of Saracens who had settled in the moun- tains and on the sea-shore, and gave much trouble to his people by land and sea. Friedrich con- quered these Saracens, and moved tliem into the Apulian cities of Lucera and Nocera, treating them so kindly that he won their hearts, and they served liim faithfully, but the Italians were angered by his bringing them among them. There was at this time much curious learning among the Saracens, especially in mathematics and chemistry. Fried- rich delighted in such studies, and this raised the report that he was half a Saracen liimself. More- over, he was not leading the life of a good Chiis- tian man, but was giving himself up to all sorts of vice and luxury at Falermo. The Pope urged him Friedrich II. 165 to begin his crusade, and he sent for his vassals from Germany to join him in it. Among them came the JMarkgraf Ludwig of Thuringia, a young man still, who had been mai- ried ever since he was a little child to Elizabeth, the daughter of the late King of Hungary. The two children had been brought up together at the castle of the Wartburg, and loved each other dearly, though Ludwig's mother, brother and sister hated and despised Elizabeth after her father was dead, and tried to set Ludwig against her pious and saintly ways, calling her the gipsy because she was dark complexioned, and the nun because of her prayers. Ludwig loved her through all, and up- held her in all her worlvs of charity, when she nursed the sick, and laid them in her own bed, and fed orphan children, and went to the houses to feed the bedridden and dress their sores. There was a story that once, when he met her coming out of the castle with a heavy basket fuU of broken meat, he asked her what was there. She smiled, and bade him look, and it was full of roses. Perhaps this was meant to show how sweet are deeds of love, for Elizabeth never deceived him, nor did he find fault with her charities. Both were still very young when he was called to go on the crusade 166 Young Folks' History of Ciermany, and great was his grief at parting with her and liis little cliildren. With him went the cliief German minne-singer of the time, Walter of Vogelwiede, and great numbers of noble knights, but the force could not be collected quickly, and those who came first had to wait, in the full heat of the summer, at Otranto and Brindisi to embark, till sickness began among them, and when at last they did embark it only became worse. Ludwig of Thuringia saw wliite doves flying round his mast — the sure sign of death in his family — and died before the fleet turned back, as it was forced to do, the Kaisar himself being very ill. The Pope, Gregory IX., who knew Friedrich's proud character and evil, self-indulgent life, could not believe he had been in earnest about the cru- sade, and was too angry and impatient to inquire whether his illness was real or only an excuse, would not hear his messengers, and excommuni- cated him. Friedrich was very angry at the injus- tice, and it drove him further towards unbelief, and love of all the Church condemned, but he still went on with his crusade, though, before he sailed, his wife, Yolande of Jerusalem, died at the birth of her first child, who s^as christened Conrad. The Pope did not approve of tliis expedition being led ^KK-"'''tu!H U. FUTiiMU UN XU£ CiiOWK OF Jluiil. 3AUUi. FrUdrich 11. 169 by one who was still excommunicate, and forbade the Knights Templars and Hospitallers to follow his standard ; but instead of fighting he made a treaty with Malek el Kameel, the Saracen Sultan, by which he made a ten years' truce, arranged that the pilgrimage to Jerusalem should be made safe, and that the Holy City should be put into his hands, with all its chiu"ches, the Moslems only keeping for themselves the Mosque of Omar, on the site of the old Temple. But the Pope's friends thought the treaty only a snare to get Christians into the hands of the Mahometans, and when Friedi'ich marched to Jerusalem, the Holy City was laid under an interdict while he should be there. No Holy Communion, no Church services took place when he visited the Church of the Holy Sepulchre, and he took the crown of Jerusalem off the altar, and crowned himself with it with his own hands. Then he came back to Italy, having learned in the East much of the old Greek learning which had passed to the Saracen Arabs, and, in especial, an Arabic translation of the Ethics of Aristotle, which was afterwards much studied in Europe. The Pope had in the meantime caused Jean de Brienne, the father of Friedrich's late wife, to raise 170 Young Folks' History of Germany. an army, and seize Apulia and Sicily in the name of liis infant grandson Konrad, to whom Friedrich was bound, the Pope said, to have delivered it up. His soldiers were called the Key-bearers, as being sent forth by the See of Rome, and bearing the Jveys of St. Peter made in cloth on their shoidders ; but they were really only savage, plundering men- at-arms, and the people of the country all joined their Emperor gladly in expelling them. The ]-*ope on tliis gave u^) his attempt, and peace was made between him and the Emperor, in which (jrregory declared that the treaty with the Sultan was the best that could have been made, and ab- solved Friedrich. The two had a conference at San Germano, but only one tiling is known, that was there settled. The Germans had formed an order of soldier monks like the Templars and Hospitallers for the defence of the Holy Sepulchre, but as there were jealousies between the three, Friedrich wished the Germans, who were called Teutonic Knights, to be removed from the Holy Land, and set to fight with the heathen Sclavonians in the lands near the Baltic called Borussia (near Russia) or Prussia. Their Grand Master, Herman von Salza, was made a Friedrich II. 171 prince of the empire, and they were to have all the lands they conquered. Friediich stayed on in Italy, attending to a uni- versity he had founded at Naples, to which he in- vited scholars from all parts, especially the famous Scotsman, Michael Scott, who translated into Latin his Arabic version of Aristotle, and was looked on by all the ignorant as a great magician. The greatest scholar who grew up at Naples was St. Thomas Aquinas, a most wonderful teacher, who turned Aristotle's arguments to teach Christian truth. Friedi'ich's court Avas full of learning, ele- jjance, and poetry, but chiefly of a self-indulgent Idnd. He so loved minstrelsy that he gave the city of Orange, in his kingdom of Aries, to a troubadoiu*. The minne-singer Walther of Vogelwiede died about this time, and left lands whose produce was to be given to feed his fellow-minstrels the birds at his tomb, that so there might always be their sweet music round him. It was a time of very great beauty in everything — j)oetry, dress, buildings, and all. One of the loveliest buildings in Germany is Marburg Cathe- dral, which was built by Konrad of Thuringia, brother of Ludwig, in memory of the " dear saint Elizabeth." When the news of Ludwig's death had 172 Young Folks' History of Germany. come home, Konrad and liis mother had driven her out wdth her five babies, homeless and wandering, and seized the goverment, but the barons and knights restored her little son. The Emperor wished to marry her, but instead of listening to his messages she went into a convent, where her con- fessor made her use hard discipline with herself, and she died when only twenty-four years old. Then her brother-in-law repented, and built this exquisite church in memory of her. This was the time too when the two orders of friars founded by St. Francis and St. Dominic were trying to teach people to love the world and its delights less, and to turn all their learning to holiness and the love of God. CHAPTER XVI. FRIEDRICH II., 1250.— Concluded. I TRIEDRICH II. had been 15 years absent from -■- Germany since he set out after his election at Mainz. His eldest son, Heinrich, who had been chosen King of the Romans in his infancy, was sent to reign in Germany, even as a mere child, under the care of Ludwig, Duke of Bavaria, but there was so much crime and misrule that in the Dukedom of ^^estphalia Bishop Engelbert revived a strange secret tribunal called the Vehmegericht of Vehm, which is said to have dated from ancient rites around the Irmansul. Members were sworn in secretly, and met at night. Judges were chosen from among them, and before them persons were tried for their crimes, and if found guilty were sure to be found hanging on trees, a dagger stuck be- neath, and the letters carved, S. S. G. G. (stock, stone, grass, green), the meaning of which no one 173 174 Young Folks' Hietory of Germany. knew. This Velime was much dreaded, and did much good in keeping down evil-doers, when the regular courts of law were weak. As Heinrich grew up he became discontented, and thought his father ought to resign the empire to liim, and only keep Sicily and Apulia. The Duke Ludwig of Bavaria Avas miu'dered while tak- ing an evening walk on the bridge of Kelheim, it is said, by an idiot, whom he had teased, but the 3^oung king declared that it was by one of the Eastern assassins sent by liis father, and Friedricli aud his people suspected Heiniich liimself. So many complaints were sent to the Emperor that he summoned Ids son and the German princes to a diet at Ravenna, and there tried to set mattersi straight between them, intending to come back to Germany as soon as he had arranged the affairs of Lombardy, but before he could do so Heinrich broke out into open rebellion, assisted by liis brother-in-law, Friedrich, Duke of Austria, and laid siege to Wm-ms. The Kaisar again crossed the Alps, aud being joined by all the loyal Germans, soon crushed the rebellion, and forced Heinrich to come and ask pardon. This was at once granted, but the wretched young man was found to be tr} ing to poison liis father, and was therefore sent Friedrich 11. 177 as a prisoner to Apiilia, and was moved about from castle to castle there until his death, Friediich remained in Germany, and took as his third wife, Isabel, the sister of Henry III. of Eng- land, sending a splendid embassy to betroth her, and going to receive her himself at Wiu-nis, where they were married in presence of four kings and eleven dukes, all sovereign princes. Tlie festivities are said to have been even more splendid than those at his grandfather's diet at Mainz, and her English attendants were infinitely amazed by the elephants and camels which Fiiediich had brought from the East. Friedrich was called back to Italy by another disturbance in Lombardy, where the cities, with Milan at their head, had formed a leagrue against him. He caused liis son Konrad to be elected King of the Romans, and crossed the Alps with liis army, and, being joined by all the Ghibellines in Northern Italy, he beat the Milanese at Corunuova. They hoped at least to have saved then' beloved standard, but there had been heavy rain, the car stuck fast in a bog, and though they tried to carry off its gilt cross an