realisation of Hildebrand's ideals by Innocent III. The Papacy was well established. Its dogmas were expressed in canon law, its machinery was completed, and its right to exist as a state resting upon a territorial basis was recognised. In the Empire Henry VI. had died in 1197, Naples was ruled by a child, the Guelphs and Ghibellines were at war in the Lombard cities and the whole Empire was distracted and almost reduced to anarchy by the rival claimants to the imperial throne. In France Philip Augustus, a tyrannical ruler, ambitious to overthrow the English king, greedy to swallow up the larger fiefs, was on the throne. He had divorced his Danish wife and had remarried. At this time he was violently opposed by both the nobles and the people. In Spain the lack of a strong central power led to quarrelling among the rival kings and compelled the Pope to interfere. In England the brutal, boisterous, immoral Richard I. died in 1199 and was succeeded by the tyrannical and feeble King John who was at war with his own nobles. In the East the Slavic nations were ready to accept Roman rule while the Eastern Empire was tottering and ready to fall. In general parties in all countries were crying out to the Pope for assistance. All Europe was ripe for just such a man as Innocent III. with just such a policy.
The first step in Innocent's plan was to make himself the political head of Europe. In Italy he first made himself absolute sovereign of Rome by removing all vestiges of imperial rule. The senators and the prefect, who held their commissions from the Emperor, were required to take oaths to him as their sovereign.[549:1]
The imperial judges were also replaced by his own appointees. By persuasion or tactful diplomacy he gained a mastery over the warring Roman nobles. From Rome he gradually extended his sway over the rest of Italy. He was made regent of Frederick II., the youthful son of Henry VI.,[550:1] now King of Sicily. He forced the Tuscan cities to recognise his suzerainty[550:2] instead of that of the German Emperor, and subdued the March of Ancona and the Duchy of Spoleto.[550:3] He posed as the champion of Italian independence and liberty against foreign rule. His leadership was generally recognised and he was called "The Father of His Country." "Innocent III. was the first Pope who claimed and exercised the rights of an Italian Prince."[550:4] When Emperor Otto IV. ceded all the lands claimed by the Papacy under grants from former rulers, an indisputable title to the papal states was established.
In Germany, before the imperial throne was made vacant by the death of Henry VI. (1197), the princes had been persuaded to choose his infant son, Frederick, King of the Romans. But the election had been set aside, and now the imperial crown was claimed by two rival claimants: Otto of Brunswick and Philip of Hohenstaufen, a brother of Henry VI. The civil war which ensued in Germany between these rival claimants gave Innocent III. his opportunity. Both claimants appealed to the Pope, but Otto was the more submissive. The Pope assumed the function of arbiter and issued a famous bull favouring Otto.[550:5]
Otto promised on oath protection of the possessions and rights of the Roman Church, and obedience and homage such as pious Emperors had formerly shown towards the Chair of Peter (1201). Still victory did not come to Otto and the Pope, until after ten years of civil strife followed by the assassination of Philip. In 1208 Otto was coronated by Innocent in St. Peter's, Rome, but was soon caught in deeds of treachery to the Pope and excommunicated and deposed (1210), and died forgotten seven years later.
Frederick of Sicily was anxious to become King of Germany and also Emperor. The Hohenstaufen party in Germany invited him to visit them and in this Frederick was encouraged by Innocent III. Frederick made some important concessions to the Holy See[551:1] (1213), was victorious in Germany, and was crowned Emperor at Aachen after the Lateran Council in 1215. After a most remarkable career he died, however, a rebel against the Church (1250). When death smote down Innocent III., he had created two Emperors, he was recognised as lord paramount over the Empire, and he ruled personally over a larger domain in the Empire than any preceding Pope.
In France Philip Augustus had been excommunicated by Pope Celestine III. (1196) for having divorced his wife, a Danish Princess in order to marry, with the sanction of the French clergy, Mary, the daughter of the Duke of Bohemia. Immediately after his election and before his coronation, Innocent III. took up this case. He ordered Philip to put away his concubine and to take back his lawful wife under the threat of pronouncing his children bastards and of putting his
land under an interdict. Since the king turned a deaf ear to these demands, the Pope excommunicated him, declared France under an interdict,[552:1] and punished the French bishops. As a result Philip was compelled to submit, and agreed to take back his wife and to restore confiscated Church lands. This was a great and significant victory for the Pope.
In Spain the King of Leon had married a cousin contrary to canon law. The Pope immediately annulled the marriage. The king refused at first to give up his wife, but was forced to submission by excommunication.[552:2] The Kings of Navarre and Castile were compelled to make peace and to unite against the Saracens. Portugal was declared a fief of the Holy See and the king was commanded to hurry up the payment of tribute.[552:3] The King of Aragon was crowned by the Pope at Rome as a feudal vassal.[552:4]
In England King John, who had succeeded Richard I. in 1199, had embittered against him nobles, clergy, and common people by extortions and tyrannical acts of all sorts. He aroused the wrath of Innocent III. by making a treaty of peace with Philip Augustus of France, while that ruler was still under the ban for repudiating his first wife and marrying another. John had likewise boldly ousted the Bishop of Limoges, confiscated his lands, and revived the Constitutions of Clarendon.[552:5] Innocent III. immediately called John to account for these misdemeanours[552:6] and forced the stubborn king to promise to make a crusade to atone