Part 1
# Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, "Germany" to "Gibson, William": Volume 11, Slice 8 ### By Various
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Produced by Marius Masi, Don Kretz and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net
Transcriber's notes:
(1) Numbers following letters (without space) like C2 were originally printed in subscript. Letter subscripts are preceded by an underscore, like C_n.
(2) Characters following a carat (^) were printed in superscript.
(3) Side-notes were relocated to function as titles of their respective paragraphs.
(4) Macrons and breves above letters and dots below letters were not inserted.
(5) [root] stands for the root symbol; [alpha], [beta], etc. for greek letters.
(6) The following typographical errors have been corrected:
ARTICLE GERMANY: "After Rupert's death two cousins, Jobst, margrave of Moravia, and Sigismund, king of Hungary, were in the autumn of 1410 both chosen to fill the vacant throne by opposing parties ..." 'After' amended from "After's".
ARTICLE GERMANY: "... others--like the landgraves of Hesse and the cities of Magdeburg and Strassburg--refused to sign it, and thus it served only to emphasize the divisions among the Protestants. Moreover ..." 'Magdeburg' amended from 'Madgeburg'.
ARTICLE GERMANY: "These Articles, embodying the more important terms, were included with slight verbal alterations in the treaty of peace signed at Prague on the 23rd of August." 'embodying' amended from 'enbodying'.
ARTICLE GERMANY: "... Die Entwicklung des gelehrten Richtertums in deutschen Territorien (Stuttgart, 1872) ..." 'Entwicklung' amended from 'Entwickelung'.
ARTICLE GETTYSBURG: "That no decisive success had been obtained by Lee was clear to all, but Ewell's men on Culp's Hill, and Longstreet's corps below Round Top, threatened to turn both flanks of the Federal position, which was no longer a compact horseshoe but had been considerably prolonged to the left ..." 'horseshoe' amended from 'horsehoe'.
ARTICLE GHAZNI: "In 997 Mahmud, son of Sabuktagin, succeeded to the government, and with his name Ghazni and the Ghaznevid dynasty have become perpetually associated. Issuing forth year after year from that capital ..." 'become' amended from 'beome'.
ARTICLE GHOST: "... on the other hand, the phrase 925 "ghostly man" for a clergyman (cf. the Ger. Geistlicher) is an archaism the use of which could only be justified by poetic licence, as in Tennyson's Elaine (1842)." '1842' amended from '1094'.
ENCYCLOPAEDIA BRITANNICA
A DICTIONARY OF ARTS, SCIENCES, LITERATURE AND GENERAL INFORMATION
ELEVENTH EDITION
VOLUME XI, SLICE VIII
Germany to Gibson, William
ARTICLES IN THIS SLICE:
GERMANY (part) GHADAMES GERMERSHEIM GHAT GERMISTON GHATS GERMONIUS, ANASTASIUS GHAZALI GERO GHAZI GEROLSTEIN GHAZIABAD GEROME, JEAN LEON GHAZIPUR GERONA (province of Spain) GHAZNI GERONA (town of Spain) GHEE GEROUSIA GHEEL GERRESHEIM GHENT GERRHA GHETTO GERRUS GHIBERTI, LORENZO GERRY, ELBRIDGE GHICA GERRYMANDER GHILZAI GERS GHIRLANDAJO, DOMENICO GERSON, JOHN GHIRLANDAJO, RIDOLFO GERSONIDES GHOR GERSOPPA, FALLS OF GHOST GERSTACKER, FRIEDRICH GHOST DANCE GERSTENBERG, WILHELM VON GIACOMETTI, PAOLO GERUZEZ, NICOLAS EUGENE GIAMBELLI, FEDERIGO GERVAIS, PAUL GIANNONE, PIETRO GERVASE OF CANTERBURY GIANNUTRI GERVASE OF TILBURY GIANT GERVEX, HENRI GIANT'S CAUSEWAY GERVINUS, GEORG GOTTFRIED GIANT'S KETTLE GERYON GIAOUR GESENIUS, FRIEDRICH WILHELM GIB, ADAM GESNER, ABRAHAM GIBARA GESNER, JOHANN MATTHIAS GIBBON, EDWARD GESNER, KONRAD VON GIBBON GESSNER, SOLOMON GIBBONS, GRINLING GESSO GIBBONS, JAMES GESTA ROMANORUM GIBBONS, ORLANDO GETA, PUBLIUS SEPTIMIUS GIBBS, JOSIAH WILLARD GETAE GIBBS, OLIVER WOLCOTT GETHSEMANE GIBEON GETTYSBURG GIBEONITES GEULINCX, ARNOLD GIBRALTAR GEUM GIBSON, CHARLES DANA GEVELSBERG GIBSON, EDMUND GEX GIBSON, JOHN GEYSER GIBSON, THOMAS MILNER GEZER GIBSON, WILLIAM HAMILTON GFRORER, AUGUST FRIEDRICH
GERMANY (Continued from volume 11 slice 7).
Decay of the royal power.
Nothing could indicate more clearly than this fact how much of their old power the German kings had lost. It was not past hope that even yet some of their former splendour might be restored, and for a brief period monarchy did again stand high. Still, its foundations were sapped. Incessant war, both at home and in Italy, had deprived it of its force; it had lost moral influence by humiliations, of which the scene at Canossa was an extreme type. Steadily, with unwearied energy, letting no opportunity escape, the princes had advanced towards independence, and they might well look forward to such a bearing in regard to the kings as the kings had formerly adopted in regard to them.
Conrad III.
Henry the Proud was confident that he would succeed Lothair, who had died on his return from Italy in December 1137; but, by a hasty and irregular election, Conrad of Hohenstaufen, duke of Franconia, was chosen king in March 1138. Henry the Proud rebelled and was declared to have forfeited his two duchies, Saxony and Bavaria, the former being given to Albert the Bear, margrave of Brandenburg, and the latter to Leopold IV., margrave of Austria. Henry defended his rights with vigour and once again Germany was ravaged by war, for although he was unpopular in Bavaria he was strongly supported by the Saxons, who, since the time of Henry IV., had always been ready to join in an attack on the monarchy, and he had little difficulty in driving Albert the Bear from the land. However, in October 1139 Henry died suddenly, but his young son, Henry the Lion, was recognized at once as duke of Saxony, while his brother, Welf, upheld the fortunes of his house in Bavaria. The struggle went on until May 1142, when peace was made at Frankfort. Saxony, with the assent of Albert the Bear, was granted by Conrad to Henry the Lion, and Bavaria was given to Henry Jasomirgott, who had just succeeded his brother Leopold as margrave of Austria. But this was only a lull in the civil strife, which was renewed after the king had made a successful expedition into Bohemia. The princes clerical and lay were fighting against each other, and the Bavarians were at war with the Hungarians, who gained a great victory in 1146. Notwithstanding the many sources of confusion Conrad was persuaded by the passionate eloquence of Bernard of Clairvaux to take part in the second crusade; he left for the East in 1147 and returned to Germany in 1149, to find Welf again in arms and Henry the Lion claiming Bavaria. The king had done nothing to stem the rising tide of disorder when he died at Bamberg in February 1152. During this reign the work of conquering and Germanizing the Slavonic tribes east of the Elbe was seriously taken in hand under the lead of Albert the Bear and Henry the Lion, and the foundation of the margraviate of Brandenburg by Albert tended to make life and property more secure in the north-east of Germany.
Frederick I. becomes king.
After Conrad's death Germany passed under the rule of one of the greatest of her sovereigns, Frederick I., called Barbarossa, nephew of the late king and son of Frederick, that duke of Swabia who had fought along with Conrad against Henry the Proud. Frederick himself had also been closely associated with Conrad, who advised the princes to choose his nephew as his successor. This was done, and the new king was crowned at Aix-la-Chapelle in March 1152. Allied through his mother to the Welfs of Bavaria, and anxious to put an end to the unrest which dominated Germany, especially to the strife between the families of Welf and Hohenstaufen, Frederick began his reign by promising to secure for Henry the Lion the duchy of Bavaria, and by appeasing Henry's uncle, Count Welf, by making him duke of Spoleto and margrave of Tuscany. But the new king had another, and perhaps a more potent, reason for wishing to see peace restored in Germany. For his adventurous and imaginative spirit Italy and the imperial title had an irresistible charm, and in 1154, two years after he had ascended the throne, he crossed the Alps, being crowned emperor at Rome in June 1155. After this event the best years of his life were spent in Italy, where, in his long and obstinate struggle with the Lombard cities and with Pope Alexander III., he chiefly acquired his fame. Although on the emperor's side this struggle was conducted mainly with German troops it falls properly under the history of Italy. In that country the record of this reign is a blood-stained page, while in the history of Germany, on the contrary, Frederick's name is associated with a peaceful and prosperous period.
Bavaria and Saxony.
The promise that Bavaria should be granted to Henry the Lion was not easily fulfilled, as Henry Jasomirgott refused to give up the duchy. At last, however, in 1156, after his return from his first expedition to Italy, Frederick reconciled the latter prince by making Austria into a duchy with certain special privileges, an important step in the process by which that country became the centre of a powerful state. Henry Jasomirgott then renounced Bavaria, and Henry the Lion became its duke. It was, however, in his other duchy of Saxony that the latter duke's most important work was done. Although he often gave offence by his haughty and aggressive disposition, few German princes have earned so thoroughly the goodwill of posterity. Since the death of Otto the Great the Slavonic lands to the east of the Elbe had been very imperfectly held in subjection by the Germans. Devoting himself to the conquest of the lands lying along the shore of the Baltic, Henry succeeded as no one before him had ever done. But he was not only a conqueror. He built towns and encouraged those which already existed; he founded and restored bishoprics in his new territories; and between the Elbe and the Oder he planted bodies of industrious colonists. While he was thus at work a similar task was being performed to the south-east of Saxony by Albert the Bear, the first margrave of Brandenburg, who, by his energetic rule was preparing this country for its great destinies.
Frederick in Poland and Germany.
Early in his reign, by settling a dispute over the crown of Denmark, Frederick brought the king of that country once more into the position of a German vassal. Having spent the year 1156 in settling the Bavarian question and in enforcing order in the Rhineland and elsewhere, the emperor marched into Poland in 1157, compelled its ruler, Boleslaus IV., to do the homage which he had previously refused to perform, and in return for services rendered during the campaign and for promises of future aid, raised the duke of Bohemia to the rank of a king, a change which in no way affected his duties to the German crown, but which gave him a certain precedence over other vassal princes. The king of Hungary, too, although no attempt was made to subdue him, became a useful ally. Thus the fame of Germany in the neighbouring countries, which had been nearly destroyed during the confusion of Henry IV.'s reign, was to a large extent restored. Frederick asserted his authority in Burgundy or, as it was sometimes called, Franche Comte. In Germany itself internal order was established by a strict appliance of the existing laws against those who broke the peace, fresh orders for its observance were issued, and in Frederick the robber nobles found a most implacable enemy. The cities, too, flourished during this reign. The emperor attached them to himself by granting to many of them the very liberties which, by a strained interpretation of his imperial rights, he withheld from the cities of Lombardy. Yet, notwithstanding his policy, in these directions the German nobles appear to have been enthusiastically devoted to Frederick. Time after time they followed him to Italy, enduring serious losses and hardships in order that he might enforce claims which were of no advantage to them, and which, previously, had been a curse to their nation. Their loyalty is well illustrated by the famous scene at Besancon in October 1157. During a meeting of the diet a papal legate read a letter from Pope Adrian IV., which seemed to imply that the Empire was a papal fief. Indignant murmurs rose from the assembled nobles, and the life of the legate was only saved from their fury by the intervention of the emperor himself. The secret of Frederick's great popularity was partly the national pride excited by his foreign achievements, partly the ascendance over other minds which his genius gave him, and partly the conviction that while he would forego none of his rights he would demand from his vassals nothing more than was sanctioned by the laws of the Empire.
Frederick and Alexander III.
Having suppressed a rising at Mainz Frederick set out in the autumn of 1163 for Italy, which country was now distracted by a papal schism. This incident was bound to affect German politics. After the death of Adrian IV. in 1159 the imperial party put forward an anti-pope, Victor IV., against Alexander III., who had been canonically elected. The emperor made stupendous efforts to secure for Victor and then for his successor, Paschal III., recognition by the sovereigns of Europe, but in vain; and almost the only support which the anti-pope received came from the German clergy. In May 1165 Frederick held a diet at Wurzburg, where the princes lay and clerical swore to be faithful to Paschal and never to recognize Alexander. But Alexander soon found partisans among the German clergy, hitherto the most loyal of the emperor's friends; and Frederick retaliated by driving the offending prelates from their sees, a proceeding which tended to disturb the peace of the land. Then in August 1167, in the midst of the struggle in Italy, came the pestilence which destroyed the imperial army in Rome, and drove the emperor as a fugitive across the Alps. After this humiliation Frederick remained for six years in Germany. He was fully occupied in restoring order in Saxony, in the diocese of Salzburg and elsewhere; in adding to his hereditary lands; in negotiating for a better understanding with France and England; and in reminding the vassal states, Hungary, Poland and Bohemia, of their duties towards the Empire. The success with which he carried out this work shows clearly that, in Germany at least, the disaster at Rome had not seriously affected his prestige. Again in Italy in 1174 the contest with the Papacy was abruptly ended by Frederick's overwhelming defeat at Legnano in May 1176, and by the treaty of Venice made about a year later with Alexander III.
Frederick and Henry the Lion.
In the later years of his reign the emperor's chief enemy was Henry the Lion. Rendered arrogant by success and confident that his interests were in northern, and not in southern Europe, the Saxon duke refused to assist Frederick in the campaign which ended so disastrously at Legnano. Ascribing his defeat to Henry's defection, Frederick returned to Germany full of anger against the Saxon duke and firmly resolved to punish him. The immediate cause of Henry's downfall, however, was not his failure to appear in Italy, but his refusal to restore some lands to the bishop of Halberstadt, and it was on this charge that he was summoned before the diet. Three times he refused to appear, and early in 1180 sentence was pronounced against him; he was condemned to lose all his lands and to go into banishment. For some time he resisted, but at length the emperor in person marched against him and he was forced to submit; the only favour he could secure when peace was made at Erfurt in November 1181 was permission to retain Brunswick and Luneburg, which have remained in the possession of his descendants until our own day. Bavaria was granted to Otto of Wittelsbach, but it lost some of its importance because Styria was taken from it and made into a separate duchy. The extensive duchy of Saxony was completely dismembered. The name was taken by the small portion of the former duchy which was given to Bernard, son of Albert the Bear, the founder of a new Saxon line, and the extensive western part was added to the archbishopric of Cologne. The chief prelates of Saxony and many of the late duke's most important feudatories were made virtually independent of all control save that of the crown. Frederick's object in thus breaking up the two greatest duchies in his kingdom was doubtless to strengthen the imperial authority. But in reality he made it certain that the princes would one day shake off the imperial power altogether; for it was perhaps more difficult for the sovereign to contend with scores of petty nobles than with two or three great princes.
Frederick and Philip of Heinsberg.
Less serious than the struggle with Henry the Lion was Frederick's struggle with Philip of Heinsberg, archbishop of Cologne (d. 1191), on whom he had just conferred a great part of Saxony. When the emperor went to Italy in 1184 he left the government of Germany to his son Henry, afterwards the emperor Henry VI., who had been crowned German king in 1169. On all sides, but especially in the north-west, Henry was faced with incipient revolution, and while he was combating this the quarrel between Frederick and the Papacy broke out again in Italy. At this juncture Philip of Cologne united the German and the Italian oppositions. Several princes rallied to his standard and foreign powers promised aid, but although very formidable in appearance the combination had no vestige of popular support. The greater part of the German clergy again proved their loyalty to Frederick, who hurried to Germany only to see the opposition vanish before him. In March 1188 Philip of Cologne submitted at Mainz.
Frederick's death.
Germany was now at peace. With the accession of Gregory VIII. pope and emperor were reconciled, and by the marriage of his son Henry with Constance, daughter of Roger I., king of Sicily, the emperor had reason to hope that the Empire would soon include Naples and Sicily. Resolving that the sunset of his life should be even more splendid than its dawn he decided to go on crusade, and in 1189 he started with a great army for the Holy Land. When the news reached Germany that he had been drowned, an event which took place in Cilicia in June 1190, men felt that evil days were coming upon the country, for the elements of discord would no longer be controlled by the strong hand of the great emperor.
Henry VI.
Evil days did not, however, come in the time of Henry VI., who, although without his father's greatness, had some of his determination and energy, and was at least his equal in ambition. Having in 1190 reduced Henry the Lion once more to submission, the new king set out to take possession of his Sicilian kingdom, being on the way crowned emperor at Rome. At the end of 1191 he returned to Germany, where he was soon faced by two serious risings. The first of these centred round the restless and unruly Welfs; after a time these insurgents were joined by their former enemies, the rulers of Saxony, of Thuringia and of Meissen, who were angered by Henry's conduct. The Welfs also gained the assistance of Canute VI., king of Denmark. Equally dangerous was a rebellion in the Lower Rhineland, where the emperor made many foes by appointing, regardless of their fitness, his own candidates to vacant bishoprics. At Liege this led to serious complications; and when Bishop Albert, who had been chosen against Henry's wish, was murdered at Reims in November 1192, the emperor was openly accused of having instigated the crime. At once the rulers of Brabant, of Limburg and of Flanders, with the archbishops of Cologne and Trier, were in arms. In the east of Germany Ottakar I. of Bohemia joined the circle of Henry's enemies, and the southern duchies, Bavaria, Swabia and Austria, were too much occupied with internal quarrels to send help to the harassed emperor. But formidable as were these risings they were crushed, although not entirely by force of arms. In 1193 Richard I. of England passed as a prisoner into Henry's keeping, and with rare skill the emperor used him as a means of compelling his enemies to come to terms. Henry the Lion was the last to submit. He made his peace in 1194, when his son Henry was promised the succession to the Rhenish Palatinate. Returning from another visit to Sicily, the emperor was now so powerful that, in pursuance of his plan for making himself the head of a great world monarchy, he put forward the suggestion that the imperial crown should be declared hereditary in his family. This proposal aroused much opposition, but Henry persisted with it; he promised important concessions to the princes, many of whom were induced to consent, and but for his sudden death, which occurred in Sicily in September 1197, it is probable that he would have attained his end.
Philip of Swabia and Otto of Brunswick.