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Holy Roman Empire

2007 Schools Wikipedia Selection. Related subjects: General history

   The double-headed eagle
   Enlarge
   The double-headed eagle

   The Holy Roman Empire was a mainly Germanic conglomeration of lands in
   Central Europe during the Middle Ages and the early modern period. It
   was also known as the Holy Roman Empire of the German Nation. It
   originated with the partition of the Frankish Empire following the
   Treaty of Verdun in 843, and lasted until its dissolution in 1806
   during the Napoleonic Wars.

   At its peak the Holy Roman Empire encompassed the territories of
   present-day Germany, Switzerland, Liechtenstein, Luxembourg, Czech
   Republic, Slovenia, Austria, Croatia, Belgium, and the Netherlands as
   well as large parts of modern Poland, France and Italy. At the time of
   its dissolution it consisted of its core German territories and smaller
   parts of France, Italy, Poland, Croatia, Belgium, and the Netherlands.

Government

   The Reich (empire) was an elective monarchy whose Emperor was crowned
   by the Pope until 1508. For most of its existence the Empire lacked the
   central authority of a modern state and was more akin to a loose
   religious confederation, divided into numerous territories ruled by
   hereditary nobles, prince-bishops, knightly orders, and free cities.
   These rulers (later only a select few of them known as Electors would
   elect the Emperor from among their number, although there was a strong
   tendency for the office of Emperor to become hereditary. The House of
   Habsburg, for example, furnished an almost continuous line of Emperors
   from 1452.

   The concept of the Reich not only included the government of a specific
   territory, but had strong Christian religious connotations (hence the
   holy prefix). The Emperors thought of themselves as continuing the
   function of the Roman Emperors in defending, governing and supporting
   the Church. This viewpoint led to much strife between the Empire and
   the papacy .

Composition

   Most of the Holy Roman Empire's rulers and subjects were Germans. All
   of the Holy Roman Emperors were Catholic. However, many of its most
   important noble families and appointed officials came from outside the
   German-speaking communities. Languages spoken in the Empire included
   the High and Low varieties of German, many Slavic languages and the
   precursors to modern French, Dutch, and Italian. Significant numbers of
   religious minorities, especially Jews, lived within the Empire's
   borders at various times, and the Empire was also the birthplace of the
   Protestant Reformation.

Nomenclature

   Middle Ages
   by region
   Medieval Britain
   Byzantine Empire
   Kievan Rus'
   Medieval Czech lands
   Medieval France
   Holy Roman Empire
   Medieval Ireland
   Medieval Italy
   Medieval Poland
   Medieval Romania
   Medieval Scotland
   Medieval Spain
   by topic
   Art
   Literature
   Poetry
   Music
   Architecture
   Philosophy
   Universities
   Science
   Technology
   Warfare

   The Holy Roman Empire was a conscious attempt to resurrect the Western
   Roman Empire, considered to have ended with the abdication of Romulus
   Augustulus in 476. Although Pope Leo III crowned Charlemagne as
   Imperator Augustus on 25 December 800, and his son, Louis the Pious was
   also crowned as Emperor by the Pope, the Empire and the imperial office
   did not become formalized for some decades, due largely to the Frankish
   tendency to divide realms between heirs after a ruler's death. It is
   notable that Louis first crowned himself in 814, upon his father's
   death, but in 816, Pope Stephen V , who had succeeded Leo III, visited
   Rheims and again crowned Louis. By that act, the Emperor strengthened
   the papacy by recognising the importance of the pope in imperial
   coronations.

   The name of the Empire, in various languages that historically were
   spoken within its confines are:
     * Czech: Svatá říše římská, later: Svatá říše římská národa německého
     * Dutch: Heilige Roomse Rijk, later Heilige Roomse Rijk der Duitse
       Natie/Volkeren
     * French: Saint Empire Romain Germanique
     * German: Heiliges Römisches Reich [ˈhaɪlɪgəs ˈrøːmɪʃəs raɪç] listen
       , later Heiliges Römisches Reich deutscher Nation [ˈhaɪlɪgəs
       ˈrøːmɪʃəs raɪç ˈdɔɪtʃɐ nɑˈʦjoːn]
     * Italian: Sacro Romano Impero
     * Latin: Sacrum Romanum Imperium, later Sacrum Romanum Imperium
       Nationis Germanicæ [ˈsakrʊm rːoˈmaːnʊm ɪmˈpɛːrɪʊm naʦɪˈoːnɪs
       ʤɛrˈmaːnɪʧe]
     * Slovene: Sveto rimsko cesarstvo, later Sveto rimsko cesarstvo
       nemške narodnosti
     * Croatian: Sveto Rimsko Carstvo

   Contemporary terminology for the Empire varied greatly over the
   centuries. The term Roman Empire was used in 1034 to denote the lands
   under Conrad II, and Holy Empire in 1157. The use of the term Roman
   Emperor to refer to Northern European rulers started earlier with Otto
   II (Emperor 973–983). Emperors from Charlemagne (c. 742 or 747 – 814)
   to Otto I the Great (Emperor 962–973) had simply used the phrase
   Imperator Augustus ("August Emperor"). The precise term Holy Roman
   Empire dates from 1254; the final version Holy Roman Empire of the
   German Nation (German Heiliges Römisches Reich Deutscher Nation)
   appears in 1512, after several variations in the late 15th century.

   Contemporaries did not quite know how to describe this entity either.
   In his famous 1667 description De statu imperii Germanici, published
   under the alias Severinus de Monzambano, Samuel Pufendorf wrote: "Nihil
   ergo aliud restat, quam ut dicamus Germaniam esse irregulare aliquod
   corpus et monstro simile ..." ("We are therefore left with calling
   Germany a body that conforms to no rule and resembles a monster").

   In Faust I, in a scene written in 1775, the German author Goethe has
   one of the drinkers in Auerbach's Cellar in Leipzig ask "Our Holy Roman
   Empire, lads, what still holds it together?" Goethe also has a longer,
   not very favourable essay about his personal experiences as a trainee
   at the Reichskammergericht in his autobiographical work Dichtung und
   Wahrheit.

Institutions

   From the High Middle Ages onwards, the Reich was stamped by a
   coexistence of the Empire with the struggle of the dukes of the local
   territories to take power away from it. As opposed to the rulers of the
   West Frankish lands, which later became France, the Emperors never
   managed to gain much control over the lands that they formally owned.
   Instead, Emperors were forced to grant more and more powers to the
   individual dukes in their respective territories. This process began in
   the 12th century and was more or less concluded with the 1648 Peace of
   Westphalia. Several attempts were made to reverse this degradation of
   the Reich's former glory, but failed.

   Formally, the Reich comprised the King, to be crowned Emperor by the
   pope (until 1508), on one side, and the Reichsstände (imperial estates)
   on the other.

King of the Romans

   The crown of the Holy Roman Empire (2nd half of the 10th century), now
   held in the Vienna Schatzkammer.
   Enlarge
   The crown of the Holy Roman Empire (2nd half of the 10th century), now
   held in the Vienna Schatzkammer.

   Becoming Emperor required becoming King of the Romans (Rex
   romanorum/römischer König) first. Kings had been elected since time
   immemorial: in the 9th century by the leaders of the five most
   important tribes: the Salian Franks of Lorraine, the Riparian Franks of
   Franconia, and the Saxons, Bavarians, and Swabians, later by the main
   lay and clerical dukes of the kingdom, finally only by the so-called
   Kurfürsten (electing dukes, electors). This college was formally
   established by a 1356 decree known as the Golden Bull. Initially, there
   were seven electors: the Count Palatine of the Rhine, the King of
   Bohemia, the Duke of Saxony, the Margrave of Brandenburg, and the
   Archbishops of Köln, Mainz, and Trier. During the Thirty Years' War,
   the Duke of Bavaria was given the right to vote as the eighth elector.
   In order to be elected king, a candidate had to first win over the
   electors, usually with bribes or promises of land.

   Until 1508, the newly-elected king then travelled to Rome to be crowned
   Emperor by the Pope. In many cases, this took several years while the
   King was held up by other tasks: frequently he first had to resolve
   conflicts in rebellious northern Italy or was in quarrel with the Pope
   himself.

   At no time could the Emperor simply issue decrees and govern
   autonomously over the Empire. His power was severely restricted by the
   various local leaders: after the late 15th century, the Reichstag
   established itself as the legislative body of the Empire, a complicated
   assembly that convened irregularly at the request of the Emperor at
   varying locations. Only after 1663 would the Reichstag become a
   permanent assembly.

Imperial estates

   An entity was considered Reichsstand (imperial estate) if, according to
   feudal law, it had no authority above it except the Holy Roman Emperor
   himself. They included:
     * Territories governed by a prince or duke, and in some cases kings.
       (Rulers of the Holy Roman Empire, with the exception of the King of
       Bohemia (an elector), were not allowed to become King within the
       Empire, but some had kingdoms outside the Empire, as was, for
       instance, the case in the Kingdom of Great Britain, where the ruler
       was also the Prince-elector of Hanover.)
     * Feudal territories led by a clerical dignitary, who was then
       considered a prince of the church. In the common case of a
       Prince-Bishop, this temporal territory (called prince-bishopric)
       frequently overlapped his -often larger- ecclesiastical diocese (
       bishopric), giving the Bishop both worldly and clerical powers. An
       example, among many others, was the Bishopric of Osnabrück. The
       most prominent Prince-Bishop (Fürstbischof) within the Holy Roman
       Empire were the three Archbishops who were generally styled after
       the worldy rank of Prince-elector, and their prince-archbishoprics
       rather electorates: Cologne (his large temporal estates did not
       include his cathedral city, so Bonn became his princely residence),
       Trier and the Archbishop of Mainz with his Holy See at Mainz
       Cathedral.
     * Imperial Free Cities

   The number of territories was amazingly large, rising to several
   hundred at the time of the Peace of Westphalia. Many of these comprised
   no more than a few square miles, so the Empire is aptly described as a
   "patchwork carpet" (Flickenteppich) by many- see Kleinstaaterei. For a
   list as in 1792, see List of Reichstag participants (1792).

Reichstag

   The Reichstag was the legislative body of the Holy Roman Empire. It was
   divided into three distinct classes:
     * The Council of Electors, which included the Electors of the Holy
       Roman Empire.
     * The Council of Princes, which included both laypersons and clerics.
          + The Secular Bench: Princes (those with the title of Prince,
            Grand Duke, Duke, Count Palatine, Margrave, or Landgrave) held
            individual votes; some held more than one vote on the basis of
            ruling several territories. Also, the Council included Counts
            or Grafs, who were grouped into four Colleges: Wetterau,
            Swabia, Franconia, and Westphalia. Each College could cast one
            vote as a whole.
          + The Ecclesiastical Bench: Bishops, certain Abbots, and the two
            Grand Masters of the Teutonic Order and the Order of St John
            had individual votes. Certain other Abbots were grouped into
            two Colleges: Swabia and the Rhine. Each College held one
            collective vote.
     * The Council of Imperial Cities, which included representatives from
       Imperial Cities grouped into two Colleges: Swabia and the Rhine.
       Each College had one collective vote. The Council of Imperial
       Cities was not fully equal to the others; it could not vote on
       several matters such as the admission of new territories. The
       representation of the Free Cities at the Reichstag had become
       common since the late Middle Ages. Nevertheless, their
       participation was formally acknowledged only as late as in 1648
       with the peace of Westphalia ending the Thirty Years' War.

Imperial courts

   The Reich also had two courts: the Reichshofrat (also known in English
   as the Aulic Council) at the court of the King/Emperor (that is, later
   in Vienna), and the Reichskammergericht (Imperial Chamber Court),
   established with the Imperial Reform of 1495.

Imperial circles

   As part of the Reichsreform, six Imperial Circles were established in
   1500 and extended to ten in 1512. These were regional groupings of most
   (though not all) of the various states of the Empire for the purposes
   of defence, imperial taxation, supervising of coining, peace keeping
   functions and public security. Each circle had its own Kreistag
   ("Circle Diet").

History

From the East Franks to the Investiture Controversy

   The Western Empire, 843 division at Verdun
   Enlarge
   The Western Empire, 843 division at Verdun

   The Holy Roman Empire is usually considered to have been founded at the
   latest in 962 by Otto I the Great.

   Although some date the beginning of the Holy Roman Empire from the
   coronation of Charlemagne as Emperor of the Romans in 800, Charlemagne
   himself more typically used the title king of the Franks. This title
   also makes clearer that the Frankish Kingdom covered an area that
   included modern-day France and Germany and was thus the kernel of both
   countries.

   Most historians therefore consider the establishment of the Empire to
   be a process that started with the split of the Frankish realm in the
   Treaty of Verdun in 843, continuing the Carolingian dynasty
   independently in all three sections. The eastern part fell to Louis the
   German, who was followed by several leaders until the death of Louis
   the Child, the last Carolingian in the eastern part.

   The leaders of Alamannia, Bavaria, Frankia and Saxonia elected Conrad I
   of the Franks, not a Carolingian, as their leader in 911. His
   successor, Henry (Heinrich) I the Fowler (r. 919–936), a Saxon elected
   at the Reichstag of Fritzlar in 919, achieved the acceptance of a
   separate Eastern Empire by the West Frankish (still ruled by the
   Carolingians) in 921, calling himself rex Francorum orientalum (King of
   the East Franks). He founded the Ottonian dynasty.

   Heinrich designated his son Otto to be his successor, who was elected
   King in Aachen in 936. A marriage alliance with the widowed queen of
   Italy gave Otto control over that nation as well. His later crowning as
   Emperor Otto I (later called "the Great") in 962 would mark an
   important step, since from then on the Empire – and not the
   West-Frankish kingdom that was the other remainder of the Frankish
   kingdoms – would have the blessing of the Pope. Otto had gained much of
   his power earlier, when, in 955, the Magyars were defeated in the
   Battle of Lechfeld.
   The Empire in 1000
   Enlarge
   The Empire in 1000

   In contemporary and later writings, the crowning would be referred to
   as translatio imperii, the transfer of the Empire from the Romans to a
   new Empire. The German Emperors thus thought of themselves as being in
   direct succession of those of the Roman Empire; this is why they
   initially called themselves Augustus. Still, they did not call
   themselves "Roman" Emperors at first, probably in order not to provoke
   conflict with the Roman Emperor who still existed in Constantinople.
   The term imperator Romanorum only became common under Conrad II later.

   At this time, the eastern kingdom was not "German" but a
   "confederation" of the old Germanic tribes of the Bavarians, Alamanns,
   Franks and Saxons. The Empire as a political union probably only
   survived because of the strong personal influence of King Henry the
   Saxon and his son, Otto. Although formally elected by the leaders of
   the Germanic tribes, they were actually able to designate their
   successors.

   This changed after Henry II died in 1024 without any children. Conrad
   II, first of the Salian Dynasty, was then elected king in 1024 only
   after some debate. How exactly the king was chosen thus seems to be a
   complicated conglomeration of personal influence, tribal quarrels,
   inheritance, and acclamation by those leaders that would eventually
   become the collegiate of Electors.

   Already at this time the dualism between the "territories", then those
   of the old tribes rooted in the Frankish lands, and the King/Emperor,
   became apparent. Each king preferred to spend most time in his own
   homelands; the Saxons, for example, spent much time in palatinates
   around the Harz mountains, among them Goslar. This practice had only
   changed under Otto III (king 983, Emperor 996–1002), who began to
   utilize bishopries all over the Empire as temporary seats of
   government. Also, his successors, Henry II, Conrad II, and Henry III,
   apparently managed to appoint the dukes of the territories. It is thus
   no coincidence that at this time, the terminology changes and the first
   occurrences of a regnum Teutonicum are found.

   The glory of the Empire almost collapsed in the Investiture
   Controversy, in which Pope Gregory VII declared a ban on King Henry IV
   (king 1056, Emperor 1084–1106). Although this was taken back after the
   1077 Walk to Canossa, the ban had wide-reaching consequences.
   Meanwhile, the German dukes had elected a second king, Rudolf of
   Swabia, whom Henry IV could only defeat after a three-year war in 1080.
   The mythical roots of the Empire were permanently damaged; the German
   king was humiliated. Most importantly though, the church became an
   independent player in the political system of the Empire.

Under the Hohenstaufen

   Conrad III came to the throne in 1138, being the first of the
   Hohenstaufen dynasty, which was about to restore the glory of the
   Empire even under the new conditions of the 1122 Concordat of Worms. It
   was Frederick I "Barbarossa" (king 1152, Emperor 1155–1190) who first
   called the Empire "holy", with which he intended to address mainly law
   and legislation.
   Adhemar de Monetel carries the Holy Lance
   Enlarge
   Adhemar de Monetel carries the Holy Lance

   Also, under Barbarossa, the idea of the "Romanness" of the Empire
   culminated again, which seemed to be an attempt to justify the
   Emperor's power independently of the (now strengthened) Pope. An
   imperial assembly at the fields of Roncaglia in 1158 explicitly
   reclaimed imperial rights at the advice of quattuor doctores of the
   emerging judicial facility of the University of Bologna, citing phrases
   such as princeps legibus solutus ("the emperor [princeps] is not bound
   by law") from the Digestae of the Corpus Juris Civilis. That the Roman
   laws were created for an entirely different system and didn't fit the
   structure of the Empire was obviously secondary; the point here was
   that the court of the Emperor made an attempt to establish a legal
   constitution.

   Imperial rights had been referred to as regalia since the Investiture
   Controversy, but were enumerated for the first time at Roncaglia as
   well. This comprehensive list included public roads, tariffs, coining,
   collecting punitive fees, and the investiture, the seating and
   unseating of office holders. These rights were now explicitly rooted in
   Roman Law, a far-reaching constitutional act; north of the Alps, the
   system was also now connected to feudal law, a change most visible in
   the withdrawal of the feuds of Henry the Lion in 1180 which led to his
   public banning. Barbarossa thus managed for a time to more closely bind
   the stubborn Germanic dukes to the Empire as a whole.

   Another important constitutional move at Roncaglia was the
   establishment of a new peace (Landfrieden) for all of the Empire, an
   attempt to (on the one hand) abolish private vendettas not only between
   the many local dukes, but on the other hand a means to tie the
   Emperor's subordinates to a legal system of jurisdiction and public
   prosecution of criminal acts – a predecessor concept of " rule of law",
   in modern terms, that was, at this time, not yet universally accepted.

   In order to solve the problem that the emperor was (after the
   Investiture Controversy) no longer as able to use the church as a
   mechanism to maintain power, the Staufer increasingly lent land to
   ministerialia, formerly unfree service men, which Frederick hoped would
   be more reliable than local dukes. Initially used mainly for war
   services, this new class of people would form the basis for the later
   knights, another basis of imperial power.

   Another new concept of the time was the systematic foundation of new
   cities, both by the emperor and the local dukes. These were partly due
   to the explosion in population, but also to concentrate economic power
   at strategic locations, while formerly cities only existed in the shape
   of either old Roman foundations or older bishoprics. Cities that were
   founded in the 12th century include Freiburg, possibly the economic
   model for many later cities, and Munich.

   The later reign of the last Staufer Emperor, Frederick II, was in many
   ways different from that of earlier Emperors. Still a child, he first
   reigned in Sicily, while in Germany, Barbarossa's second son Philip of
   Swabia and Henry the Lion's son Otto IV competed with him for the title
   of King of the Germans. After finally having been crowned emperor in
   1220, he risked conflict with the pope when he claimed power over Rome;
   astonishingly to many, he managed to claim Jerusalem in a Crusade in
   1228 while still under the pope's ban.

   While Frederick brought the mythical idea of the Empire to a last
   highpoint, he was also the one to initiate the major steps that led to
   its disintegration. On the one hand, he concentrated on establishing an
   – for the times – extraordinarily modern state in Sicily, with public
   services, finances, and jurisdiction. On the other hand, Frederick was
   the emperor who granted major powers to the German dukes in two
   far-reaching privileges that would never be reclaimed by the central
   power. In the 1220 Confoederatio cum principibus ecclesiasticis,
   Frederick basically gave up a number of regalia in favour of the
   bishops, among them tariffs, coining, jurisdiction and fortification.
   The 1232 Statutum in favorem principum mostly extended these privileges
   to the other (non-clerical) territories (Frederick II was forced to
   give those privileges by a rebellion of his son, Henry). Although many
   of these privileges had existed earlier, they were now granted
   globally, and once and for all, to allow the German dukes to maintain
   order north of the Alps while Frederick wanted to concentrate on his
   homelands in Italy. The 1232 document marked the first time that the
   German dukes were called domini terrae, owners of their lands, a
   remarkable change in terminology as well.

   The Teutonic Knights were invited to Poland by the duke of Masovia
   Konrad of Masovia to Christianize the Prussians in 1226.

   During the long stays of the Hohenstaufen emperors (1138-1254) in
   Italy, the German princes became stronger and began a successful,
   mostly peaceful colonisation of West Slavic lands, so that the empire's
   influence increased to eventually include Pomerania and Silesia

Rise of the territories after the Staufen

   After the death of Frederick II in 1250, none of the dynasties worthy
   of producing the king proved able to do so, and the leading dukes
   elected several competing kings. The time from 1246 (beginning with the
   election of Heinrich Raspe and William of Holland) to 1273, when
   Rudolph I of Habsburg was elected king, is commonly referred to as the
   Interregnum. During the Interregnum, much of what was left of imperial
   authority was lost, as the princes were given time to consolidate their
   holdings and become even more independent rulers.
   The Prince-electors
   Enlarge
   The Prince-electors

   In 1257, there occurred a double election which produced a situation
   that guaranteed a long interregnum. William of Holland had fallen the
   previous year, and Conrad of Swabia had died three years earlier.
   First, three electors ( Palatinate, Cologne and Mainz) (being mostly of
   the Guelph persuasion) cast their votes for Richard of Cornwall who
   became the successor of William of Holland as king. After a delay, a
   fourth elector, Bohemia, joined this choice. However, a couple of
   months later, Bohemia and the three other electors Trier, Brandenburg
   and Saxony voted for Alfonso X of Castile, this being based on
   Ghibelline party. The realm now had two kings. Was the King of Bohemia
   entitled to change his vote, or was the election complete when four
   electors had chosen a king? Were the four electors together entitled to
   depose Richard a couple of months later, if his election had been
   valid?

   The difficulties in electing the king eventually led to the emergence
   of a fixed college of electors, the Kurfürsten, whose composition and
   procedures were set forth in the Golden Bull of 1356. This development
   probably best symbolizes the emerging duality between Kaiser und Reich,
   emperor and realm, which were no longer considered identical. This is
   also revealed in the way the post-Staufen kings attempted to sustain
   their power. Earlier, the Empire's strength (and finances) greatly
   relied on the Empire's own lands, the so-called Reichsgut, which always
   belonged to the respective king (and included many Imperial Cities).
   After the 13th century, its relevance faded (even though some parts of
   it did remain until the Empire's end in 1806). Instead, the Reichsgut
   was increasingly pawned to local dukes, sometimes to raise money for
   the Empire but, more frequently, to reward faithful duty or as an
   attempt to civilize stubborn dukes. The direct governance of the
   Reichsgut no longer matched the needs of either the king or the dukes.

   Instead, the kings, beginning with Rudolph I of Habsburg, increasingly
   relied on the lands of their respective dynasties to support their
   power. In contrast with the Reichsgut, which was mostly scattered and
   difficult to administer, these territories were comparably compact and
   thus easier to control. In 1282, Rudolph I thus lent Austria and Styria
   to his own sons.

   With Henry VII, the House of Luxembourg entered the stage. In 1312, he
   was crowned as the first Holy Roman Emperor since Frederick II. After
   him all kings and emperors relied on the lands of their own family
   (Hausmacht): Louis IV of Wittelsbach (king 1314, emperor 1328–1347)
   relied on his lands in Bavaria; Charles IV of Luxembourg, the grandson
   of Henry VII, drew strength from his own lands in Bohemia.
   Interestingly, it was thus increasingly in the king's own interest to
   strengthen the power of the territories, since the king profited from
   such a benefit in his own lands as well.

   The 13th century also saw a general structural change in how land was
   administered. Instead of personal duties, money increasingly became the
   common means to represent economic value in agriculture. Peasants were
   increasingly required to pay tribute for their lands. The concept of
   "property" more and more replaced more ancient forms of jurisdiction,
   although they were still very much tied together. In the territories
   (not at the level of the Empire), power became increasingly bundled:
   Whoever owned the land had jurisdiction, from which other powers
   derived. It is important to note, however, that jurisdiction at this
   time did not include legislation, which virtually did not exist until
   well into the 15th century. Court practice heavily relied on
   traditional customs or rules described as customary.

   It is during this time that the territories began to transform
   themselves into predecessors of modern states. The process varied
   greatly among the various lands and was most advanced in those
   territories that were most identical to the lands of the old Germanic
   tribes, e.g. Bavaria. It was slower in those scattered territories that
   were founded through imperial privileges.

Imperial Reform

   Map of the Empire showing division into Circles in 1512
   Enlarge
   Map of the Empire showing division into Circles in 1512

   The "constitution" of the Empire was still largely unsettled at the
   beginning of the 15th century. Although some procedures and
   institutions had been fixed, for example by the Golden Bull of 1356,
   the rules of how the king, the electors, and the other dukes should
   cooperate in the Empire much depended on the personality of the
   respective king. It therefore proved somewhat fatal that Sigismund of
   Luxemburg (king 1410, emperor 1433–1437) and Frederick III of Habsburg
   (king 1440, emperor 1452–1493) neglected the old core lands of the
   empire and mostly resided in their own lands. Without the presence of
   the king, the old institution of the Hoftag, the assembly of the
   realm's leading men, deteriorated. The Reichstag as a legislative organ
   of the Empire did not exist yet. Even worse, dukes often went into
   feuds against each other that, more often than not, escalated into
   local wars.

   At the same time, the church was in crisis too. The conflict between
   several competing popes was only resolved at the Council of Constance (
   1414– 1418); after 1419, much energy was spent on fighting the heresy
   of the Hussites. The medieval idea of a unified Corpus christianum, of
   which the papacy and the Empire were the leading institutions, began to
   decline.

   With these drastic changes, much discussion emerged in the 15th century
   about the Empire itself. Rules from the past no longer adequately
   described the structure of the time, and a reinforcement of earlier
   Landfrieden was urgently called for. During this time, the concept of
   "reform" emerges, in the original sense of the Latin verb re-formare,
   to regain an earlier shape that had been lost.

   When Frederick III needed the dukes to finance war against Hungary in
   1486 and at the same time had his son, later Maximilian I elected king,
   he was presented with the dukes' united demand to participate in an
   Imperial Court. For the first time, the assembly of the electors and
   other dukes was now called Reichstag (to be joined by the Imperial Free
   Cities later). While Frederick refused, his more conciliant son finally
   convoked the Reichstag at Worms in 1495, after his father's death in
   1493. Here, the king and the dukes agreed on four bills, commonly
   referred to as the Reichsreform (Imperial Reform): a set of legal acts
   to give the disintegrating Empire back some structure. Among others,
   this act produced the Imperial Circle Estates and the
   Reichskammergericht, (Imperial Chamber Court); structures that would –
   to a degree – persist until the end of the Empire in 1806.

   However, it should take a few more decades until the new regulation was
   universally accepted and the new court began to actually function; only
   in 1512 would the Imperial Circles be finalized. The King also made
   sure that his own court, the Reichshofrat, continued to function in
   parallel to the Reichskammergericht. It is interesting to note that in
   this year, the Empire also receives its new title, the Heiliges
   Römisches Reich Deutscher Nation ("Holy Roman Empire of the German
   Nation").

Crisis after Reformation

   In 1517, Martin Luther initiated what would later be known as the
   Reformation. At this time, many local dukes saw a chance to oppose the
   hegemony of Emperor Charles V. The empire became then fatally divided
   along religious lines, with the North, the East, and many of the major
   cities— Strassburg, Frankfurt and Nuremberg—became Protestant while the
   southern and western regions largely remained Catholic. Religious
   conflicts were waged in various parts of Europe for a century, though
   in German regions there was relative quiet from the Peace of Augsburg
   in 1555 until the Defenestration of Prague in 1618. When Bohemians
   rebelled against the emperor, the immediate result was the series of
   conflicts known as the Thirty Years' War (1618–1648), which devastated
   the Empire. Foreign powers, including France and Sweden intervened in
   the conflict and strengthened those fighting Imperial power, but they
   also seized considerable chunks of territory for themselves. The long
   conflict bled the Empire to such a degree that it would never recover
   its former strength.

The long decline

   Areas being part of the Holy Roman Empire of the German Nation around
   1630. Showing modern European state borders.
   Enlarge
   Areas being part of the Holy Roman Empire of the German Nation around
   1630. Showing modern European state borders.

   The actual end of the empire came in several steps. After the Peace of
   Westphalia in 1648, which gave the territories almost complete
   sovereignty, even allowing them to form independent alliances with
   other states, the Empire was only a mere conglomeration of largely
   independent states. By the rise of Louis XIV of France, the Holy Roman
   Empire as such had lost all power and clout in major European politics.
   The Habsburg emperors relied more on their role as Austrian archdukes
   than as emperors when challenged by Prussia, portions of which were
   part of the Empire. Throughout the 18th century, the Habsburgs were
   embroiled in various European conflicts. From 1792 onwards,
   revolutionary France was at war with various parts of the Empire
   intermittently. The Empire was formally dissolved on August 6, 1806
   when the last Holy Roman Emperor Francis II (from 1804, Emperor Francis
   I of Austria) abdicated, following a military defeat by the French Army
   under Napoleon (see Treaty of Pressburg). Napoleon reorganized much of
   the empire into the Confederation of the Rhine. This ended the
   so-called First Reich. Francis II's family continued to be called
   Austrian emperors until 1918. In fact, the Habsburg Emperors of
   Austria, however nostalgically and sentimentally, considered
   themselves, as the lawful heirs of the Holy Roman monarchs, to be
   themselves the final continuation of the Holy Roman Imperial line,
   their dynasty dying out with the ousting of Karl I in 1918 (reigned
   1916-1918). Germany itself would not become one unified state until
   1871 after the Franco-Prussian War. In addition, at the time of the
   dissolution of the Austro-Hungarian Empire following the First World
   War, it was argued that Liechtenstein as a fief of the Holy Roman
   Empire (supposedly still incarnated in Liechtensteiner eyes at an
   abstract level in the person of the then-destitutued Austro-Hungarian
   Emperor, despite its formal dissolution in 1806) was no longer bound to
   Austria, then emerging as an independent monarchy which did not
   consider itself as the legal successor to the Empire. Liechtenstein is
   thus the last independent state in Europe which can claim an element of
   continuity from the Holy Roman Empire.

Analysis

   It has been said that modern history of Germany was primarily
   predetermined by three factors: the Reich, the Reformation, and the
   later dualism between Austria and Prussia. Many attempts have been made
   to explain why the Reich never managed to gain a strong centralized
   power over the territories, as opposed to neighbouring France. Some
   reasons include:
     * The Reich had been a very federal body from the beginning: again,
       as opposed to France, which had mostly been part of the Roman
       Empire, in the eastern parts of the Frankish kingdom, the Germanic
       tribes later comprising the German nation ( Saxons, Thuringians,
       Franks, Bavarians, Alamanni or Swabians) were much more independent
       and reluctant to cede power to a central authority. All attempts to
       make the kingdom hereditary failed; instead, the king was always
       elected. Later, every candidate for the king had to make promises
       to his electorate, the so-called Wahlkapitulationen (election
       capitulations), thus granting the territories more and more power
       over the centuries.

     * Due to its religious connotations, the Reich as an institution was
       severely damaged by the contest between the Pope and the German
       Kings over their respective coronations as Emperor. It was never
       entirely clear under which conditions the pope would crown the
       emperor and especially whether the worldly power of the emperor was
       dependent on the clerical power of the pope. Much debate occurred
       over this, especially during the 11th century, eventually leading
       to the Investiture Controversy and the Concordat of Worms in 1122.

     * Whether the feudal system of the Reich, where the King formally was
       the top of the so-called "feudal pyramid", was a cause of or a
       symptom of the Empire's weakness is unclear. In any case, military
       obedience, which – according to Germanic tradition – was closely
       tied to the giving of land to tributaries, was always a problem:
       when the Reich had to go to war, decisions were slow and brittle.

     * Until the sixteenth century, the economic interests of the south
       and west diverged from those of the north where the Hanseatic
       League operated. The Hanseatic League was far more closely allied
       to Scandinavia and the Baltic than the rest of Germany.

     * German historiography nowadays often views the Holy Roman Empire as
       a well balanced system of organizing a multitude of (effectively
       independent) states under a complex system of legal regulations.
       Smaller estates like the Lordships or the Imperial Free cities
       survived for centuries as independent entities, although they had
       no effective military strength. The supreme courts, the
       Reichshofrat and the Reichskammergericht helped to settle
       conflicts, or at least keep them as wars of words rather than
       shooting wars.

     * The multitude of different territories with different religious
       denominations and different forms of government led to a great
       variety of cultural diversification, which can be felt even in
       present day Germany with regional cultures, patterns of behaviour
       and dialects changing sometimes within the range of kilometres.

Successive German Empires

   After the unification of Germany as a nation state in 1871 (see German
   Empire), the Holy Roman Empire of the German Nation was also known as
   the Old Empire (First Reich) while the new empire was known as the New
   Empire, second Empire, or Second Reich.

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