With the death of Frederick the Empire came to its end. The name of Holy Roman Empire continued till 1806, and from time to time for several hundred years German kings came down across the Alps to receive the Imperial crown, but on Frederick's death the old mediæval Empire practically ceased; and Italy, instead of being an Imperial province, became a series of independent states.
The end of the Hohenstaufens themselves reads like the last act of a bloody Elizabethan tragedy. Within a few years the only survivors among Frederick's descendants were his lawful heir, a baby, Conradin, and an illegitimate son, Manfred. Manfred, who had inherited the charm, the address, the energy and brilliance of his father, succeeded in establishing himself in the Two Sicilies, at first as regent for his nephew, and afterwards, for in those troubled times a regency was precarious, as king in his own right. But the Popes were resolved not to undergo a repetition of the danger they had experienced from Frederick, and laid their plans to destroy the last of the "viper's brood," as they called Frederick's family. They followed the old precedent, set in the days when the Papacy had been in danger from the Lombards, and invited a French prince, Charles of Anjou, brother to St. Louis, to come and depose Manfred, and offered him the crown of the Two Sicilies. The crafty, capable, deep-scheming Charles accepted, and came amid great rejoicing among the Guelfs. Rome made him Senator. Florence made him podestà; in fact, all Guelf Italy was at his feet. The Pope proclaimed a crusade against Manfred, collected tithes and taxes for the holy purpose, and provided Charles with an army. Manfred was defeated and killed (1266), and two years later, the valiant Conradin, a lad of sixteen, who came down in the mad hope of regaining his kingdom, was also defeated, taken prisoner, and, after a mock trial for treason, put to death. Thus the Papacy prevented the union of the Two Sicilies with the Empire, and thus the House of Anjou supplanted the last of the Hohenstaufens at Palermo and Naples.
CHAPTER XV
THE FALL OF THE MEDIÆVAL PAPACY (1303)
We are now coming out of the Middle Ages, and the dawn of a new era grows more and more apparent. The Empire, embodiment of an old outworn theory, has already fallen, and its victorious rival, the Papacy, in so far as it embodies the mediæval idea of a theocratic supremacy, is tottering, and it, too, will soon fall before the unsympathetic forces of a new age. So long as the Papacy stood untouched, it looked as potent and sovereign, and spoke with as lofty a tone, as in the days of Innocent; but a hundred years had wrought great changes, and at a push it tumbled and fell.
Hints had already been dropped that the dread thunderbolt, the curse of Rome, which had helped win the proud position of lordship over Europe, had become mere brutum fulmen. Excommunication had been so prodigally used for political purposes that educated men no longer believed that it was really the curse of heaven. Moreover, Europe had not been standing still. The vigorous, compact kingdom of France had come into being, and flushed with a sense of power and importance, determined to take that part in European politics which it regarded as its due. In angry self-confidence the young kingdom confronted the overweening Papacy, savagely tore off its giant's robe, and laid bare its real weakness.
Boniface VIII (1294-1303) was the pontiff under whom the papal empire came to its end. He was a vigorous, energetic, arrogant, eloquent, handsome man, with a wide knowledge of law, diplomacy, and politics. In the cathedral at Florence there is a large statue of him, calm and dignified, almost heroic. He sits with his rochet and tiara on, his right hand raised with two fingers extended as if blessing,—an unusual occupation,—and looks far more of this world than of the other. His contemporary, the Florentine historian, Villani, a Guelf, says: "He was great-minded and lordly, and coveted much honour, ... and was much respected and feared for his learning and power. He was very grasping for money in order to aggrandize the Church and his own relations, making no shame of gain, for he said that he might do anything with what belonged to the Church.... He was very learned in books, very wary and capable, and had great common sense; he had wide knowledge and a good memory, but was extremely cruel and haughty with his enemies and adversaries, ... more worldly than befitted his exalted station, and he did many things displeasing to God." Dante, passionately Ghibelline, calls Boniface "prince of the new Pharisees" and sends him to hell.
Boniface's chief enemies, as was usual in the case of a Pope who had enemies, were Romans. If the Papacy had been able to reduce Rome to real obedience, its history would have been different. The rebellious commune and the rebellious barons were constantly on the watch for favourable opportunities to revolt, or, as they regarded it, to assert their rights and liberties, and Boniface's first struggle came with the great House of Colonna. The Colonnas were haughty; he was imperious. They hinted that he was not legally Pope; he excommunicated them, proclaimed a crusade, captured and destroyed their fortresses in the Campagna, and made them deadly enemies. This victory was achieved at a price thereafter to be paid in full. But for the time Boniface was triumphant, and seemed, to himself at least, to sit as high as the great Innocent a hundred years before.