Chapter 6

The authorities for the life and reign of Henry are Lambert of Hersfeld,Annales; Bernold of Reichenau, Chronicon; Ekkehard of Aura,Chronicon; and Bruno,De bello Saxonico, which gives several of the more important letters that passed between Henry and Gregory VII. These are all found in theMonumenta Germaniae historica. Scriptores, Bände v. and vi. (Hanover and Berlin, 1826-1892). There is an anonymousVita Heinrici IV., edited by W. Wattenbach (Hanover, 1876). The best modern authorities are: G. Meyer von Knonau,Jahrbücher des deutschen Reiches unter Heinrich IV.(Leipzig, 1890); H. Floto,Kaiser Heinrich IV. und sein Zeitalter(Stuttgart, 1855); E. Kilian,Itinerar Kaiser Heinrichs IV.(Karlsruhe, 1886); K. W. Nitzsch, “Das deutsche Reich und Heinrich IV.,” in theHistorische Zeitschrift, Band xlv. (Munich, 1859); H. Ulmann,Zum Verständniss der sächsischen Erhebung gegen Heinrich IV.(Hanover, 1886), W. von Giesebrecht,Geschichteder deutschen Kaiserzeit(Leipzig, 1881-1890); B. Gebhardt,Handbuch der deutschen Geschichte(Berlin, 1901). For a list of other works, especially those on the relations between Henry and Gregory, see Dahlmann-Waitz,Quellenkunde der deutschen Geschichte(Göttingen, 1894).

(A. W. H.*)

HENRY V.(1081-1125), Roman emperor, son of the emperor Henry IV., was born on the 8th of January 1081, and after the revolt and deposition of his elder brother, the German king Conrad (d. 1101), was chosen as his successor in 1098. He promised to take no part in the business of the Empire during his father’s lifetime, and was crowned at Aix-la-Chapelle on the 6th of January 1099. In spite of his oath Henry was induced by his father’s enemies to revolt in 1104, and some of the princes did homage to him at Mainz in January 1106. In August of the same year the elder Henry died, when his son became sole ruler of the Empire. Order was soon restored in Germany, the citizens of Cologne were punished by a fine, and an expedition against Robert II., count of Flanders, brought this rebel to his knees. In 1107 a campaign, which was only partially successful, was undertaken to restore Bořiwoj II. to the dukedom of Bohemia, and in the year following the king led his forces into Hungary, where he failed to take Pressburg. In 1109 he was unable to compel the Poles to renew their accustomed tribute, but in 1110 he succeeded in securing the dukedom of Bohemia for Ladislaus I.

The main interest of Henry’s reign centres in the controversy over lay investiture, which had caused a serious dispute during the previous reign. The papal party who had supported Henry in his resistance to his father hoped he would assent to the decrees of the pope, which had been renewed by Paschal II. at the synod of Guastalla in 1106. The king, however, continued to invest the bishops, but wished the pope to hold a council in Germany to settle the question. Paschal after some hesitation preferred France to Germany, and, after holding a council at Troyes, renewed his prohibition of lay investiture. The matter slumbered until 1110, when, negotiations between king and pope having failed, Paschal renewed his decrees and Henry went to Italy with a large army. The strength of his forces helped him to secure general recognition in Lombardy, and at Sutri he concluded an arrangement with Paschal by which he renounced the right of investiture in return for a promise of coronation, and the restoration to the Empire of all lands given by kings, or emperors, to the German church since the time of Charlemagne. It was a treaty impossible to execute, and Henry, whose consent to it is said to have been conditional on its acceptance by the princes and bishops of Germany, probably foresaw that it would occasion a breach between the German clergy and the pope. Having entered Rome and sworn the usual oaths, the king presented himself at St Peter’s on the 12th of February 1111 for his coronation and the ratification of the treaty. The words commanding the clergy to restore the fiefs of the crown to Henry were read amid a tumult of indignation, whereupon the pope refused to crown the king, who in return declined to hand over his renunciation of the right of investiture. Paschal was seized by Henry’s soldiers and, in the general disorder into which the city was thrown, an attempt to liberate the pontiff was thwarted in a struggle during which the king himself was wounded. Henry then left the city carrying the pope with him; and Paschal’s failure to obtain assistance drew from him a confirmation of the king’s right of investiture and a promise to crown him emperor. The coronation ceremony accordingly took place on the 13th of April 1111, after which the emperor returned to Germany, where he sought to strengthen his power by granting privileges to the inhabitants of the region of the upper Rhine.

In 1112 Lothair, duke of Saxony, rose in arms against Henry, but was easily quelled. In 1113, however, a quarrel over the succession to the counties of Weimar and Orlamünde gave occasion for a fresh outbreak on the part of Lothair, whose troops were defeated at Warnstädt, after which the duke was pardoned. Having been married at Mainz on the 7th of January 1114 to Matilda, or Maud, daughter of Henry I., king of England, the emperor was confronted with a further rising, initiated by the citizens of Cologne, who were soon joined by the Saxons and others. Henry failed to take Cologne, his forces were defeated at Welfesholz on the 11th of February 1115, and complications in Italy compelled him to leave Germany to the care of Frederick II. of Hohenstaufen, duke of Swabia, and his brother Conrad, afterwards the German king Conrad III. After the departure of Henry from Rome in 1111 a council had declared the privilege of lay investiture, which had been extorted from Paschal, to be invalid, and Guido, archbishop of Vienne, excommunicated the emperor and called upon the pope to ratify this sentence. Paschal, however, refused to take so extreme a step; and the quarrel entered upon a new stage in 1115 when Matilda, daughter and heiress of Boniface, margrave of Tuscany, died leaving her vast estates to the papacy. Crossing the Alps in 1116 Henry won the support of town and noble by privileges to the one and presents to the other, took possession of Matilda’s lands, and was gladly received in Rome. By this time Paschal had withdrawn his consent to lay investiture and the excommunication had been published in Rome; but the pope was compelled to fly from the city. Some of the cardinals withstood the emperor, but by means of bribes he broke down the opposition, and was crowned a second time by Burdinas, archbishop of Braga. Meanwhile the defeat at Welfesholz had given heart to Henry’s enemies; many of his supporters, especially among the bishops, fell away; the excommunication was published at Cologne, and the pope, with the assistance of the Normans, began to make war. In January 1118 Paschal died and was succeeded by Gelasius II. The emperor immediately returned from northern Italy to Rome. But as the new pope escaped from the city, Henry, despairing of making a treaty, secured the election of an antipope who took the name of Gregory VIII., and who was left in possession of Rome when the emperor returned across the Alps in 1118. The opposition in Germany was gradually crushed and a general peace declared at Tribur, while the desire for a settlement of the investiture dispute was growing. Negotiations, begun at Würzburg, were continued at Worms, where the new pope, Calixtus II., was represented by Cardinal Lambert, bishop of Ostia. In the concordat of Worms, signed in September 1122, Henry renounced the right of investiture with ring and crozier, recognized the freedom of election of the clergy and promised to restore all church property. The pope agreed to allow elections to take place in presence of the imperial envoys, and the investiture with the sceptre to be granted by the emperor as a symbol that the estates of the church were held under the crown. Henry, who had been solemnly excommunicated at Reims by Calixtus in October 1119, was received again into the communion of the church, after he had abandoned his nominee, Gregory, to defeat and banishment. The emperor’s concluding years were occupied with a campaign in Holland, and with a quarrel over the succession to the margraviate of Meissen, two disputes in which his enemies were aided by Lothair of Saxony. In 1124 he led an expedition against King Louis VI. of France, turned his arms against the citizens of Worms, and on the 23rd of May 1125 died at Utrecht and was buried at Spires. Having no children, he left his possessions to his nephew, Frederick II. of Hohenstaufen, duke of Swabia, and on his death the line of Franconian, or Salian, emperors became extinct.

The character of Henry is unattractive. His love of power was inordinate; he was wanting in generosity, and he did not shrink from treachery in pursuing his ends.

The chief authority for the life and reign of Henry V. is Ekkehard of Aura,Chronicon, edited by G. Waitz in theMonumenta Germaniae historica. Scriptores, Band vi. (Hanover and Berlin, 1826-1892), See also W. von Giesebrecht,Geschichte der deutschen Kaiserzeit, Band iii. (Leipzig, 1881-1890); L. von Ranke,Weltgeschichte, pt. vii. (Leipzig, 1886); M. Manitius,Deutsche Geschichte(Stuttgart, 1889); G. Meyer von Knonau,Jahrbücher des deutschen Reiches unter Heinrich IV. und Heinrich V.(Leipzig, 1890); E. Gervais,Politische Geschichte Deutschlands unter der Regierung der Kaiser Heinrich V. und Lothar III.(Leipzig, 1841-1842); G. Peiser,Der deutsche Investiturstreit unter Kaiser Heinrich V.(Berlin, 1883); C. Stutzer, “Zur Kritik der Investiturverhandlungen im Jahre 1119,” in theForschungen zur deutschen Geschichte, Band xviii. (Göttingen, 1862-1886); T. von Sickel and H. Bresslau, “Diekaiserliche Ausfertigung des Wormser Konkordats,” in theMittheilungen des Instituts für österreichische Geschichtsforschung(Innsbruck, 1880); B. Gebhardt,Handbuch der deutschen Geschichte, Band i. (Berlin, 1901), and E. Bernheim,Zur Geschichte des Wormser Konkordats(Göttingen, 1878).

HENRY VI.(1165-1197), Roman emperor, son of the emperor Frederick I. and Beatrix, daughter of Renaud III., count of upper Burgundy, was born at Nijmwegen, and educated under the care of Conrad of Querfurt, afterwards bishop of Hildesheim and Würzburg. Chosen German king, or king of the Romans, at Bamberg in June 1169, he was crowned at Aix-la-Chapelle on the 15th of August 1169, invested with lands in Germany in 1179, and at Whitsuntide 1184 his knighthood was celebrated in the most magnificent manner at Mainz. Frederick was anxious to associate his son with himself in the government of the empire, and when he left Germany in 1184 Henry remained behind as regent, while his father sought to procure his coronation from Pope Lucius III. The pope was hesitating when he heard that the emperor had arranged a marriage between Henry and Constance, daughter of the late king of Sicily, Roger I., and aunt and heiress of the reigning king, William II.; and this step, which threatened to unite Sicily with Germany, decided him to refuse the proposal. This marriage took place at Milan on the 27th of January 1186, and soon afterwards Henry was crowned king of Italy. The claim of Henry and his wife on Sicily was recognized by the barons of that kingdom; and having been recognized by the pope as Roman emperor elect, Henry returned to Germany, and was again appointed regent when Frederick set out on crusade in May 1189. His attempts to bring peace to Germany were interrupted by the return of Henry the Lion, duke of Saxony, in October 1189, and a campaign against him was followed by a peace made at Fulda in July 1190.

Henry’s desire to make this peace was due to the death of William of Sicily, which was soon followed by that of the emperor Frederick. Germany and Italy alike seemed to need the king’s presence, but for him, like all the Hohenstaufen, Italy had the greater charm, and having obtained a promise of his coronation from Pope Clement III. he crossed the Alps in the winter of 1190. He purchased the support of the cities of northern Italy, but on reaching Rome he found Clement was dead and his successor, Celestine III., disinclined to carry out the engagement of his predecessor. The strength of the German army and a treaty made between the king and the Romans induced him, however, to crown Henry as emperor on the 14th of April 1191. The aid of the Romans had been purchased by the king’s promise to place in their possession the city of Tusculum, which they had attacked in vain for three years. After the ceremony the emperor fulfilled this contract, when the city was destroyed and many of the inhabitants massacred. Meanwhile a party in Sicily had chosen Tancred, an illegitimate son of Roger, son of King Roger II., as their king, and he had already won considerable authority and was favoured by the pope. Leaving Rome Henry met with no resistance until he reached Naples, which he was unable to take, as the ravages of fever and threatening news from Germany, where his death was reported, compelled him to raise the siege. In December 1191 he returned to Germany. Disorder was general and a variety of reasons induced both the Welfs and their earlier opponents to join in a general league against the emperor. Vacancies in various bishoprics added to the confusion, and Henry’s enemies gained in numbers and strength when it was suspected that he was implicated in the murder of Albert, bishop of Liége. Henry acted energetically in fighting this formidable combination, but his salvation came from the captivity of Richard I., king of England, and the skill with which he used this event to make peace with his foes; and, when Henry the Lion came to terms in March 1194, order was restored to Germany.

In the following May, Henry made his second expedition to Italy, where Pope Celestine had definitely espoused the cause of Tancred. The ransom received from Richard enabled him to equip a large army, and aided by a fleet fitted out by Genoa and Pisa he soon secured a complete mastery over the Italian mainland. When he reached Sicily he found Tancred dead, and, meeting with very little resistance, he entered Palermo, where he was crowned king on Christmas day 1194. A stay of a few months’ duration enabled Henry to settle the affairs of the kingdom; and leaving his wife, Constance, as regent, and appointing many Germans to positions of influence, he returned to Germany in June 1195.

Having established his position in Germany and Italy, Henry began to cherish ideas of universal empire. Richard of England had already owned his supremacy, and declaring he would compel the king of France to do the same Henry sought to stir up strife between France and England. Nor did the Spanish kingdoms escape his notice. Tunis and Tripoli were claimed, and when the eastern emperor, Isaac Angelus, asked his help, he demanded in return the cession of the Balkan peninsula. The kings of Cyprus and Armenia asked for investiture at his hands; and in general Henry, in the words of a Byzantine chronicler, put forward his demands as “the lord of all lords, the king of all kings.” To complete this scheme two steps were necessary, a reconciliation with the pope and the recognition of his young son, Frederick, as his successor in the Empire. The first was easily accomplished; the second was more difficult. After attempting to suppress the renewed disorder in Germany, Henry met the princes at Worms in December 1195 and put his proposal before them. In spite of promises they disliked the suggestion as tending to draw them into Sicilian troubles, and avoided the emperor’s displeasure by postponing their answer. By threats or negotiations, however, Henry won the consent of about fifty princes; but though the diet which met at Würzburg in April 1196 agreed to the scheme, the vigorous opposition of Adolph, archbishop of Cologne, and others rendered it inoperative. In June 1196 Henry went again to Italy, sought vainly to restore order in the north, and tried to persuade the pope to crown his son who had been chosen king of the Romans at Frankfort. Celestine, who had many causes of complaint against the emperor and his vassals, refused. The emperor then went to the south, where the oppression of his German officials had caused an insurrection, which was put down with terrible cruelty. At Messina on the 28th of September 1197 Henry died from a cold caught whilst hunting, and was buried at Palermo. He was a man of small frame and delicate constitution, but possessed considerable mental gifts and was skilled in knightly exercises. His ambition was immense, and to attain his ends he often resorted deliberately to cruelty and treachery. His chief recreation was hunting, and he also found pleasure in the society of the Minnesingers and in writing poems, which appear in F. H. von der Hagen’sMinnesinger(Leipzig, 1838). He left an only son Frederick, afterwards the emperor Frederick II.

The chief authorities for the life and reign of Henry VI. are Otto of Freising,Chronicon, continued by Otto of St Blasius; Godfrey of Viterbo,Gesta Friderici I.andGesta Heinrici VI.; Giselbert of Mons,Chronicon Hanoniense, all of which appear in theMonumenta Germaniae historica. Scriptores, Bände xx., xxi., xxii. (Hanover and Berlin, 1826-1892), and the various annals of the time.The best modern authorities are: W. von Giesebrecht,Geschichte der deutschen Kaiserzeit, Band iv. (Brunswick, 1877); T. Toeche,Kaiser Heinrich VI.(Leipzig, 1867); H. Bloch,Forschungen zur Politik Kaiser Heinrichs VI.(Berlin, 1892), and K. A. Kneller,Des Richard Löwenherz deutsche Gefangenschaft(Freiburg, 1893).

The best modern authorities are: W. von Giesebrecht,Geschichte der deutschen Kaiserzeit, Band iv. (Brunswick, 1877); T. Toeche,Kaiser Heinrich VI.(Leipzig, 1867); H. Bloch,Forschungen zur Politik Kaiser Heinrichs VI.(Berlin, 1892), and K. A. Kneller,Des Richard Löwenherz deutsche Gefangenschaft(Freiburg, 1893).

HENRY VII.(c.1269-1313), Roman emperor, son of Henry III., count of Luxemburg, was knighted by Philip IV., king of France, and passed his early days under French influences, while the French language was his mother-tongue. His father was killed in battle in 1288, and Henry ruled his tiny inheritance with justice and prudence, but came into collision with the citizens of Trier over a question of tolls. In 1292 he married Margaret (d. 1311), daughter of John I., duke of Brabant, and after the death of the German king, Albert I., he was elected to the vacant throne on the 27th of November 1308. Recognized at once by the German princes and by Pope Clement V., the aspirations of the new king turned to Italy, where he hoped by restoring the imperial authority to prepare the way for the conquest ofthe Holy Land. Meanwhile he strove to secure his position in Germany. The Rhenish archbishops were pacified by the restoration of the Rhine tolls, negotiations were begun with Philip IV., king of France, and with Robert, king of Naples, and the Habsburgs were confirmed in their possessions. At this time Bohemia was ruled by Henry V., duke of Carinthia, but the terrible disorder which prevailed induced some of the Bohemians to offer the crown, together with the hand of Elizabeth, daughter of the late king Wenceslas II., to John, the son of the German king. Henry accepted the offer, and in August 1310 John was invested with Bohemia and his marriage was celebrated. Before John’s coronation at Prague, however, in February 1311, Henry had crossed the Alps. His hopes of reuniting Germany and Italy and of restoring the empire of the Hohenstaufen were flattered by an appeal from the Ghibellines to come to their assistance, and by the fact that many Italians, sharing the sentiments expressed by Dante in hisDe Monarchia, looked eagerly for a restoration of the imperial authority. In October 1310 he reached Turin where, on receiving the homage of the Lombard cities, he declared that he favoured neither Guelphs nor Ghibellines, but only sought to impose peace. Having entered Milan he placed the Lombard crown upon his head on the 6th of January 1311. But trouble soon showed itself. His poverty compelled him to exact money from the citizens; the peaceful professions of the Guelphs were insincere, and Robert, king of Naples, watched his progress with suspicion. Florence was fortified against him, and the mutual hatred of Guelph and Ghibelline was easily renewed. Risings took place in various places and, after the capture of Brescia, Henry marched to Rome only to find the city in the hands of the Guelphs and the troops of King Robert. Some street fighting ensued, and the king, unable to obtain possession of St Peter’s, was crowned emperor on the 29th of June 1312 in the church of St John Lateran by some cardinals who declared they only acted under compulsion. Failing to subdue Florence, the emperor from his headquarters at Pisa prepared to attack Robert of Naples, for which purpose he had allied himself with Frederick III., king of Sicily. But Clement, anxious to protect Robert, threatened Henry with excommunication. Undeterred by the threat the emperor collected fresh forces, made an alliance with the Venetians, and set out for Naples. On the march he was, however, taken ill, and died at Buonconvento near Siena on the 24th of August 1313, and was buried at Pisa. His death was attributed, probably without reason, to poison given him by a Dominican friar in the sacramental wine. Henry is described by his contemporary Albertino Mussato, in theHistoria Augusta, as a handsome man, of well-proportioned figure, with reddish hair and arched eyebrows, but disfigured by a squint. He adds, among other details, that he was slow and laconic in his speech, magnanimous and devout, but impatient of any compacts with his subjects, loathing the mention of the Guelph and Ghibelline factions, and insisting on the absolute authority of the Empire over all (cuncta absoluto complectens Imperio). He was, however, a lover of justice, and as a knight both bold and skilful. He was hailed by Dante as the deliverer of Italy, and in theParadisothe poet reserved for him a place marked by a crown.

The contemporary documents for the life and reign of Henry VII. are very numerous. Many of them are found in theRerum Italicarum scriptores, edited by L. A. Muratori (Milan, 1723-1751), others inFontes rerum Germanicarum, edited by J. F. Böhmer (Stuttgart, 1843-1868), and inDie Geschichtsschreiber der deutschen Vorzeit, Bände 79 and 80 (Leipzig, 1884). The following modern works may also be consulted:Acta Henrici VII. imperatoris Romanorum, edited by G. Dönniges (Berlin, 1839); F. Bonaini,Acta Henrici VII. Romanorum imperatoris(Florence, 1877); T. Lindner,Deutsche Geschichte unter den Habsburgern und Luxemburgern(Stuttgart, 1888-1893); J. Heidemann, “Die Königswahl Heinrichs von Luxemburg,” in theForschungen zur deutschen Geschichte, Band xi. (Göttingen, 1862-1886); B. Thomas,Zur Königswahl des Grafen Heinrich von Luxemburg(Strassburg, 1875); D. König,Kritische Erörterungen zu einigen italienischen Quellen für die Geschichte des Römerzuges Königs Heinrich VII.(Göttingen, 1874); K. Wenck,Clemens V. und Heinrich VII.(Halle, 1882); F. W. Barthold,Der Römerzug König Heinrichs von Lützelburg(Königsberg, 1830-1831); R. Pöhlmann,Der Römerzug König Heinrichs VII. und die Politik der Curie(Nuremberg, 1875); W. Dönniges,Kritik der Quellen für die Geschichte Heinrichs VII. des Luxemburgers(Berlin, 1841), and G. Sommerfeldt,Die Romfahrt Kaiser Heinrichs VII.(Königsberg, 1888).

HENRY VII.(1211-1242), German king, son of the emperor Frederick II. and his first wife Constance, daughter of Alphonso II., king of Aragon, was crowned king of Sicily in 1212 and made duke of Swabia in 1216. Pope Innocent III. had favoured his coronation as king of Sicily in the hope that the union of this island with the Empire would be dissolved, and had obtained a promise from Frederick to this effect. In spite of this, however, Henry was chosen king of the Romans, or German king, at Frankfort in April 1220, and crowned at Aix-la-Chapelle on the 8th of May 1222 by his guardian Engelbert, archbishop of Cologne. He appears to have spent most of his youth in Germany, and on the 18th of November 1225 was married at Nuremberg to Margaret (d. 1267), daughter of Leopold VI., duke of Austria. Henry’s marriage was the occasion of some difference of opinion, as Engelbert wished him to marry an English princess, and the name of a Bohemian princess was also mentioned in this connexion, but Frederick insisted upon the union with Margaret. The murder of Engelbert in 1225 was followed by an increase of disorder in Germany in which Henry soon began to participate, and in 1227 he took part in a quarrel which had arisen on the death of Henry V., the childless count palatine of the Rhine. About this time the relations between Frederick and his son began to be somewhat strained. The emperor had favoured the Austrian marriage because Margaret’s brother, Duke Frederick II., was childless; but Henry took up a hostile attitude towards his brother-in-law and wished to put away his wife and marry Agnes, daughter of Wenceslaus I., king of Bohemia. Other causes of trouble probably existed, for in 1231 Henry not only refused to appear at the diet at Ravenna, but opposed the privileges granted by Frederick to the princes at Worms. In 1232, however, he submitted to his father, promising to adopt the emperor’s policy and to obey his commands. He did not long keep his word and was soon engaged in thwarting Frederick’s wishes in several directions, until in 1233 he took the decisive step of issuing a manifesto to the princes, and the following year raised the standard of revolt at Boppard. He obtained very little support in Germany, however, while the suspicion that he favoured heresy deprived him of encouragement from the pope. On the other hand, he succeeded in forming an alliance with the Lombards in December 1234, but his few supporters fell away when the emperor reached Germany in 1235, and, after a vain attack on Worms, Henry submitted and was kept for some time as a prisoner in Germany, though his formal deposition as German king was not considered necessary, as he had broken the oath taken in 1232. He was soon removed to San Felice in Apulia, and afterwards to Martirano in Calabria, where he died, probably by his own hand, on the 12th of February 1242, and was buried at Cosenza. He left two sons, Frederick and Henry, both of whom died in Italy about 1251.

See J. Rohden,Der Sturz Heinrichs VII.(Göttingen, 1883); F. W. Schirrmacher,Die letzten Hohenstaufen(Göttingen, 1871), and E. Winkelmann,Kaiser Friedrich II.(Leipzig, 1889).

HENRY RASPE(c.1202-1247), German king and landgrave of Thuringia, was the second surviving son of Hermann I., landgrave of Thuringia, and Sophia, daughter of Otto I., duke of Bavaria. When his brother the landgrave Louis IV. died in Italy in September 1227, Henry seized the government of Thuringia and expelled his brother’s widow, St Elizabeth of Hungary, and her son Hermann. With some trouble Henry made good his position, although his nephew Hermann II. was nominally the landgrave, and was declared of age in 1237. Henry, who governed with a zealous regard for his own interests, remained loyal to the emperor Frederick II. during his quarrel with the Lombards and the revolt of his son Henry. In 1236 he accompanied the emperor on a campaign against Frederick II., duke of Austria, and took part in the election of his son Conrad as German king at Vienna in 1237. He appears, however, to have become somewhat estranged from Frederick after thisexpedition, for he did not appear at the diet of Verona in 1238; and it is not improbable that he disliked the betrothal of his nephew Hermann to the emperor’s daughter Margaret. At all events, when the projected marriage had been broken off the landgrave publicly showed his loyalty to the emperor in 1239 in opposition to a plan formed by various princes to elect an anti-king. Henry, whose attitude at this time was very important to Frederick, was probably kept loyal by the influence which his brother Conrad, grand-master of the Teutonic Order, exercised over him, for after the death of this brother in 1241 Henry’s loyalty again wavered, and he was himself mentioned as a possible anti-king. Frederick’s visit to Germany in 1242 was successful in preventing this step for a time, and in May of that year the landgrave was appointed administrator of Germany for King Conrad; and by the death of his nephew in this year he became the nominal, as well as the actual, ruler of Thuringia. Again he contemplated deserting the cause of Frederick, and in April 1246 Pope Innocent IV. wrote to the German princes advising them to choose Henry as their king in place of Frederick who had just been declared deposed. Acting on these instructions, Henry was elected at Veitshöchheim on the 22nd of May 1246, and owing to the part played by the spiritual princes in this election was called thePfaffenkönig, or parsons’ king. Collecting an army, he defeated King Conrad near Frankfort on the 5th of August 1246, and then, after holding a diet at Nuremberg, undertook the siege of Ulm. But he was soon compelled to give up this enterprise, and returning to Thuringia died at the Wartburg on the 17th of February 1247. Henry married Gertrude, sister of Frederick II., duke of Austria, but left no children, and on his death the male line of his family became extinct.

See F. Reuss,Die Wahl Heinrich Raspes(Lüdenscheid, 1878); A. Rübesamen,Landgraf Heinrich Raspe von Thüringen(Halle, 1885); F. W. Schirrmacher,Die letzten Hohenstaufen(Göttingen, 1871); E. Winkelmann,Kaiser Friedrich II.(Leipzig, 1889), and T. Knochenhauer,Geschichte Thüringens zur Zeit des ersten Landgrafenhauses(Gotha, 1871).

HENRY(c.1174-1216), emperor of Romania, or Constantinople, was a younger son of Baldwin, count of Flanders and Hainaut (d. 1195). Having joined the Fourth Crusade about 1201, he distinguished himself at the siege of Constantinople in 1204 and elsewhere, and soon became prominent among the princes of the new Latin empire of Constantinople. When his brother, the emperor Baldwin I., was captured at the battle of Adrianople in April 1205, Henry was chosen regent of the empire, succeeding to the throne when the news of Baldwin’s death arrived. He was crowned on the 20th of August 1205. Henry was a wise ruler, whose reign was largely passed in successful struggles with the Bulgarians and with his rival, Theodore Lascaris I., emperor of Nicaea. Henry appears to have been brave but not cruel, and tolerant but not weak; possessing “the superior courage to oppose, in a superstitious age, the pride and avarice of the clergy.” The emperor died, poisoned, it is said, by his Greek wife, on the 11th of June 1216.

See Gibbon’sDecline and Fall of the Roman Empire, vol. vi. (ed. J. B. Bury, 1898).

HENRY I.(1068-1135), king of England, nicknamed Beauclerk, the fourth and youngest son of William I. by his queen Matilda of Flanders, was born in 1068 on English soil. Of his life before 1086, when he was solemnly knighted by his father at Westminster, we know little. He was his mother’s favourite, and she bequeathed to him her English estates, which, however, he was not permitted to hold in his father’s lifetime. Henry received a good education, of which in later life he was proud; he is credited with the saying that an unlettered king is only a crowned ass. His attainments included Latin, which he could both read and write; he knew something of the English laws and language, and it may have been from an interest in natural history that he collected, during his reign, the Woodstock menagerie which was the admiration of his subjects. But from 1087 his life was one of action and vicissitudes which left him little leisure. Receiving, under the Conqueror’s last dispositions, a legacy of five thousand pounds of silver, but no land, he traded upon the pecuniary needs of Duke Robert of Normandy, from whom he purchased, for the small sum of £3000, the district of the Cotentin. He negotiated with Rufus to obtain the possession of their mother’s inheritance, but only incurred thereby the suspicions of the duke, who threw him into prison. In 1090 the prince vindicated his loyalty by suppressing, on Robert’s behalf, a revolt of the citizens of Rouen which Rufus had fomented. But when his elder brothers were reconciled in the next year they combined to evict Henry from the Cotentin. He dissembled his resentment for a time, and lived for nearly two years in the French Vexin in great poverty. He then accepted from the citizens of Domfront an invitation to defend them against Robert of Bellême; and subsequently, coming to an agreement with Rufus, assisted the king in making war on their elder brother Robert. When Robert’s departure for the First Crusade left Normandy in the hands of Rufus (1096) Henry took service under the latter, and he was in the royal hunting train on the day of Rufus’s death (August 2nd, 1100). Had Robert been in Normandy the claim of Henry to the English crown might have been effectually opposed. But Robert only returned to the duchy a month after Henry’s coronation. In the meantime the new king, by issuing his famous charter, by recalling Anselm, and by choosing the Anglo-Scottish princess Edith-Matilda, daughter of Malcolm III., king of the Scots, as his future queen, had cemented that alliance with the church and with the native English which was the foundation of his greatness. Anselm preached in his favour, English levies marched under the royal banner both to repel Robert’s invasion (1101) and to crush the revolt of the Montgomeries headed by Robert of Bellême (1102). The alliance of crown and church was subsequently imperilled by the question of Investitures (1103-1106). Henry was sharply criticized for his ingratitude to Anselm (q.v.), in spite of the marked respect which he showed to the archbishop. At this juncture a sentence of excommunication would have been a dangerous blow to Henry’s power in England. But the king’s diplomatic skill enabled him to satisfy the church without surrendering any rights of consequence (1106); and he skilfully threw the blame of his previous conduct upon his counsellor, Robert of Meulan. Although the Peterborough Chronicle accuses Henry of oppression in his early years, the nation soon learned to regard him with respect. William of Malmesbury, about 1125, already treats Tinchebrai (1106) as an English victory and the revenge for Hastings. Henry was disliked but feared by the baronage, towards whom he showed gross bad faith in his disregard of his coronation promises. In 1110 he banished the more conspicuous malcontents, and from that date was safe against the plots of his English feudatories.

With Normandy he had more trouble, and the military skill which he had displayed at Tinchebrai was more than once put to the test against Norman rebels. His Norman, like his English administration, was popular with the non-feudal classes, but doubtless oppressive towards the barons. The latter had abandoned the cause of Duke Robert, who remained a prisoner in England till his death (1134); but they embraced that of Robert’s son William the Clito, whom Henry in a fit of generosity had allowed to go free after Tinchebrai. The Norman conspiracies of 1112, 1118, and 1123-24 were all formed in the Clito’s interest. Both France and Anjou supported this pretender’s cause from time to time; he was always a thorn in Henry’s side till his untimely death at Alost (1128), but more especially after the catastrophe of the White Ship (1120) deprived the king of his only lawful son. But Henry emerged from these complications with enhanced prestige. His campaigns had been uneventful, his chief victory (Brémule, 1119) was little more than a skirmish. But he had held his own as a general, and as a diplomatist he had shown surpassing skill. The chief triumphs of his foreign policy were the marriage of his daughter Matilda to the emperor Henry V. (1114) which saved Normandy in 1124; the detachment of the pope, Calixtus II., from the side of France and the Clito (1119), and the Angevin marriages which he arranged for his son William Aetheling (1119) and forthe widowed empress Matilda (1129) after her brother’s death. This latter match, though unpopular in England and Normandy, was a fatal blow to the designs of Louis VI., and prepared the way for the expansion of English power beyond the Loire. After 1124 the disaffection of Normandy was crushed. The severity with which Henry treated the last rebels was regarded as a blot upon his fame; but the only case of merely vindictive punishment was that of the poet Luke de la Barre, who was sentenced to lose his eyes for a lampoon upon the king, and only escaped the sentence by committing suicide.

Henry’s English government was severe and grasping; but he “kept good peace” and honourably distinguished himself among contemporary statesmen in an age when administrative reform was in the air. He spent more time in Normandy than in England. But he showed admirable judgment in his choice of subordinates; Robert of Meulan, who died in 1118, and Roger of Salisbury, who survived his master, were statesmen of no common order; and Henry was free from the mania of attending in person to every detail, which was the besetting sin of medieval sovereigns. As a legislator Henry was conservative. He issued few ordinances; the unofficial compilation known as theLeges Henricishows that, like the Conqueror, he made it his ideal to maintain the “law of Edward.” His itinerant justices were not altogether a novelty in England or Normandy. It is characteristic of the man that the exchequer should be the chief institution created in his reign. The eulogies of the lastPeterborough Chronicleon his government were written after the anarchy of Stephen’s reign had invested his predecessor’s “good peace” with the glamour of a golden age. Henry was respected and not tyrannous. He showed a lofty indifference to criticism such as that of Eadmer in theHistoria novorum, which was published early in the reign. He showed, on some occasions, great deference to the opinions of the magnates. But dark stories, some certainly unfounded, were told of his prison-houses. Men thought him more cruel and more despotic than he actually was.

Henry was twice married. After the death of his first wife, Matilda (1080-1118), he took to wife Adelaide, daughter of Godfrey, count of Louvain (1121), in the hope of male issue. But the marriage proved childless, and the empress Matilda was designated as her father’s successor, the English baronage being compelled to do her homage both in 1126, and again, after the Angevin marriage, in 1131. He had many illegitimate sons and daughters by various mistresses. Of these bastards the most important is Robert, earl of Gloucester, upon whom fell the main burden of defending Matilda’s title against Stephen.

Henry died near Gisors on the 1st of December, 1135, in the thirty-sixth year of his reign, and was buried in the abbey of Reading which he himself had founded.

Original Authorities.—The Peterborough Chronicle(ed. Plummer, Oxford, 1882-1889);Florence of Worcesterand his first continuator (ed. B. Thorpe, 1848-1849); Eadmer,Historia novorum(ed. Rule, Rolls Series, 1884); William of Malmesbury,Gesta regumandHistoria novella(ed. Stubbs, Rolls Series, 1887-1889); Henry of Huntingdon,Historia Anglorum(ed. Arnold, Rolls Series, 1879); Simeon of Durham (ed. Arnold, Rolls Series, 1882-1885); Orderic Vitalis,Historia ecclesiastica(ed. le Prévost, Paris, 1838-1855); Robert of Torigni,Chronica(ed. Howlett, Rolls Series, 1889), andContinuatio Willelmi Gemmeticensis(ed. Duchesne,Hist. Normannorum scriptores, pp. 215-317, Paris, 1619). See also the Pipe Roll of 31 H. I. (ed. Hunter,Record Commission, 1833); the documents in W. Stubbs’sSelect Chapters(Oxford, 1895); theLeges Henriciin Liebermann’sGesetze der Angel-Sachsen(Halle, 1898, &c.); and the same author’s monograph,Leges Henrici(Halle, 1901); the treaties, &c., in the Record Commission edition of Thomas Rymer’sFoedera, vol. i. (1816).Modern authorities.—E. A. Freeman,History of the Norman Conquest, vol. v.; J. M. Lappenberg,History of England under the Norman Kings(tr. Thorpe, Oxford, 1857); Kate Norgate,England under the Angevin Kings, vol. i. (1887); Sir James Ramsay,Foundations of England, vol. ii.; W. Stubbs,Constitutional History, vol. i.; H. W. C. Davis,England under the Normans and Angevins; Hunt and Poole,Political History of England, vol. ii.

Modern authorities.—E. A. Freeman,History of the Norman Conquest, vol. v.; J. M. Lappenberg,History of England under the Norman Kings(tr. Thorpe, Oxford, 1857); Kate Norgate,England under the Angevin Kings, vol. i. (1887); Sir James Ramsay,Foundations of England, vol. ii.; W. Stubbs,Constitutional History, vol. i.; H. W. C. Davis,England under the Normans and Angevins; Hunt and Poole,Political History of England, vol. ii.

(H. W. C. D.)

HENRY II.(1133-1189), king of England, son of Geoffrey Plantagenet, count of Anjou, by Matilda, daughter of Henry I., was born at Le Mans on the 25th of March 1133. He was brought to England during his mother’s conflict with Stephen (1142), and was placed under the charge of a tutor at Bristol. He returned to Normandy in 1146. He next appeared on English soil in 11491when he came to court the help of Scotland and the English baronage against King Stephen. The second visit was of short duration. In 1150 he was invested with Normandy by his father, whose death in the next year made him also count of Anjou. In 1152 by a marriage with Eleanor of Aquitaine, the divorced wife of the French king Louis VII., he acquired Poitou, Guienne and Gascony; but in doing so incurred the ill-will of his suzerain from which he suffered not a little in the future. Lastly in 1153 he was able, through the aid of the Church and his mother’s partisans, to extort from Stephen the recognition of his claim to the English succession; and this claim was asserted without opposition immediately after Stephen’s death (25th of October 1154). Matilda retired into seclusion, although she possessed, until her death (1167), great influence with her son.

The first years of the reign were largely spent in restoring the public peace and recovering for the crown the lands and prerogatives which Stephen had bartered away. Amongst the older partisans of the Angevin house the most influential were Archbishop Theobald, whose good will guaranteed to Henry the support of the Church, and Nigel, bishop of Ely, who presided at the exchequer. But Thomas Becket, archdeacon of Canterbury, a younger statesman whom Theobald had discovered and promoted, soon became all-powerful. Becket lent himself entirely to his master’s ambitions, which at this time centred round schemes of territorial aggrandizement. In 1155 Henry asked and obtained from Adrian IV. a licence to invade Ireland, which the king contemplated bestowing upon his brother, William of Anjou. This plan was dropped; but Malcolm of Scotland was forced to restore the northern counties which had been ceded to David; North Wales was invaded in 1157; and in 1159 Henry made an attempt, which was foiled by the intervention of Louis VII., to assert his wife’s claims upon Toulouse. After vainly invoking the aid of the emperor Frederick I., the young king came to terms with Louis (1160), whose daughter was betrothed to Henry’s namesake and heir. The peace proved unstable, and there was desultory skirmishing in 1161. The following year was chiefly spent in reforming the government of the continental provinces. In 1163 Henry returned to England, and almost immediately embarked on that quarrel with the Church which is the keynote to the middle period of the reign.

Henry had good cause to complain of the ecclesiastical courts, and had only awaited a convenient season to correct abuses which were admitted by all reasonable men. But he allowed the question to be complicated by personal issues. He was bitterly disappointed that Becket, on whom he bestowed the primacy, left vacant by the death of Theobald (1162), at once became the champion of clerical privilege; he and the archbishop were no longer on speaking terms when the Constitutions of Clarendon came up for debate. The king’s demands were not intrinsically irreconcilable with the canon law, and the papacy would probably have allowed them to take effectsub silentio, if Becket (q.v.) had not been goaded to extremity by persecution in the forms of law. After Becket’s flight (1164), the king put himself still further in the wrong by impounding the revenues of Canterbury and banishing at one stroke a number of the archbishop’s friends and connexions. He showed, however, considerable dexterity in playing off the emperor against Alexander III. and Louis VII., and contrived for five years, partly by these means, partly by insincere negotiations with Becket, to stave off a papal interdict upon his dominions. When, in July 1170, he was forced by Alexander’s threats to make terms with Becket, the king contrived that not a word should be said of the Constitutions. He undoubtedly hoped that in this matter he would have his way when Becket should be more in England and within his grasp. For the murder of Becket (Dec. 29, 1170) the king cannot be held responsible, though thedeed was suggested by his impatient words. It was a misfortune to the royal cause; and Henry was compelled to purchase the papal absolution by a complete surrender on the question of criminous clerks (1172). When he heard of the murder he was panic-stricken; and his expedition to Ireland (1171), although so momentous for the future, was originally a mere pretext for placing himself beyond the reach of Alexander’s censures.

Becket’s fate, though it supplied an excuse, was certainly not the real cause of the troubles with his sons which disturbed the king’s later years (1173-1189). But Henry’s misfortunes were largely of his own making. Queen Eleanor, whom he alienated by his faithlessness, stirred up her sons to rebellion; and they had grievances enough to be easily persuaded. Henry was an affectionate but a suspicious and close-handed father. The titles which he bestowed on them carried little power, and served chiefly to denote the shares of the paternal inheritance which were to be theirs after his death. The excessive favour which he showed to John, his youngest-born, was another cause of heart-burning; and Louis, the old enemy, did his utmost to foment all discords. It must, however, be remembered in Henry’s favour, that the supporters of the princes, both in England and in the foreign provinces, were animated by resentment against the soundest features of the king’s administration; and that, in the rebellion of 1173, he received from the English commons such hearty support that any further attempt to raise a rebellion in England was considered hopeless. Henry, like his grandfather, gained in popularity with every year of his reign. In 1183 the death of Prince Henry, the heir-apparent, while engaged in a war against his brother Richard and their father, secured a short interval of peace. But in 1184 Geoffrey of Brittany and John combined with their father’s leave to make war upon Richard, now the heir-apparent. After Geoffrey’s death (1186) the feud between John and Richard drove the latter into an alliance with Philip Augustus of France. The ill-success of the old king in this war aggravated the disease from which he was suffering; and his heart was broken by the discovery that John, for whose sake he had alienated Richard, was in secret league with the victorious allies. Henry died at Chinon on the 6th of July 1189, and was buried at Fontevraud. By Eleanor of Aquitaine the king had five sons and three daughters. His eldest son, William, died young; his other sons, Henry, Richard, Geoffrey and John, are all mentioned above. His daughters were: Matilda (1156-1189), who became the wife of Henry the Lion, duke of Saxony; Eleanor (1162-1214), who married Alphonso III., king of Castile; and Joanna, who, after the death of William of Sicily in 1189, became the wife of Raymund VI., count of Toulouse, having previously accompanied her brother, Richard, to Palestine. He had also three illegitimate sons: Geoffrey, archbishop of York; Morgan; and William Longsword, earl of Salisbury.

Henry’s power impressed the imagination of his contemporaries, who credited him with aiming at the conquest of France and the acquisition of the imperial title. But his ambitions of conquest were comparatively moderate in his later years. He attempted to secure Maurienne and Savoy for John by a marriage-alliance, for which a treaty was signed in 1173. But the project failed through the death of the intended bride; nor did the marriage of his third daughter, the princess Joanna (1165-1199), with William II., king of Sicily (1177) lead to English intervention in Italian politics. Henry once declined an offer of the Empire, made by the opponents of Frederick Barbarossa; and he steadily supported the young Philip Augustus against the intrigues of French feudatories. The conquest of Ireland was carried out independently of his assistance, and perhaps against his wishes. He asserted his suzerainty over Scotland by the treaty of Falaise (1175), but not so stringently as to provoke Scottish hostility. This moderation was partly due to the embarrassments produced by the ecclesiastical question and the rebellions of the princes. But Henry, despite a violent and capricious temper, had a strong taste for the work of a legislator and administrator. He devoted infinite pains and thought to the reform of government both in England and Normandy. The legislation of his reign was probably in great part of his own contriving. His supervision of the law courts was close and jealous; he transacted a great amount of judicial business in his own person, even after he had formed a high court of justice which might sit without his personal presence. To these activities he devoted his scanty intervals of leisure. His government was stern; he over-rode the privileges of the baronage without regard to precedent; he persisted in keeping large districts under the arbitrary and vexatious jurisdiction of the forest-courts. But it is the general opinion of historians that he had a high sense of his responsibilities and a strong love of justice; despite the looseness of his personal morals, he commanded the affection and respect of Gilbert Foliot and Hugh of Lincoln, the most upright of the English bishops.

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