The Great Events by Famous Historians [Volumes 1-14]

Men were slow to realize that the mighty hold which the papacy had once possessed on the deep heart of the world was being sapped at its foundation. Diplomatic pontiffs still managed for a time to play off one sovereign against another, and to have their battles fought by foreign armies on a business basis. As late as the year 1300 the first great jubilee of the Church was celebrated and brought hundreds of thousands of pilgrims flocking to Rome.[16] The papacy, though sorely pressed by many enemies, still proudly asserted its political supremacy. But in truth it had lost its power, not only over the minds of kings to hold them in subjection, not only over the interests of nobles to stir them to revolt, but alas, even over the love of the lower classes to rally them for its defence. Within ten years from the great jubilee the papacy met complete defeat and subjugation at the hands of a far lesser man and feebler monarch than Frederick II.

To the empire the long contest was as disastrous as to the papacy. When Frederick II, at one time the most splendid monarch of Europe, died in 1250, a crushed and defeated man, Germany sank into such anarchy as it had not known since the days of the Hunnish invasion. "When the Emperor was condemned by the Church," says an ancient chronicle, "robbers made merry over their booty. Ploughshares were beaten into swords, reaping hooks into lances. Men went everywhere with flint and steel, setting in a blaze whatsoever they found." The period from 1254 to 1273 is known as the "Great Interregnum" in German history. There was no emperor, no authority, and every little lord fought and robbed as he pleased. The cities, driven to desperation, raised armed forces of their own and united in leagues, which later developed into the great Hanseatic League, more powerful than neighboring kings.[17] The anarchy spread to Italy. Bands of "Free Companies" roamed from place to place, plundering, fighting battles, storming walled cities, and at last the Pope sent thoroughly frightened word to Germany that the lords must elect an emperor to keep order or he would appoint one himself.

The Church had learned its lesson, that without a strong civil government it could not exist. And perhaps the government had at least partly seen what later ages learned more fully, that without religion it could not exist. Church and state were gentler to each other after that. They realized that, whatever their quarrels, they must stand or fall together.

So, in 1273, it was the Pope's insistence that led to the selection of another emperor, Rudolph of Hapsburg. He was one of the lesser nobles, elected by the great dukes so that he should be too feeble to interfere with them. But he did interfere, and overthrew Ottocar of Bohemia, the strongest of them all, and restored some measure of law and tranquillity to distracted Germany. His son he managed to establish as Duke of Austria, and eventually the empire became hereditary in the family; so that the Hapsburgs remained rulers of Germany until Napoleon, that upsetter of so many comfortable sinecures, drove them out. Of Austria they are emperors even to this day.[18]