Having somewhat accustomed the people to this new form of military service, and constantly exercised the n.o.bles and their men-at-arms in sham fights and tournaments (which he is said to have first inst.i.tuted), Henry now tested them in actual war. The Slavonic tribes east of the Elbe had become the natural and hereditary enemies of the Germans, and an attack upon them hardly required a pretext. The present province of Brandenburg, the basis of the Prussian kingdom, was conquered by Henry in 928; and then, after a successful invasion of Bohemia, he gradually extended his annexation to the Oder. The most of the Slavonic population were slaughtered without mercy, and the Saxons and Thuringians, spreading eastward, took possession of their vacant lands. Finally, in 932, Henry conquered Lusatia (now Eastern Saxony); Bohemia was already tributary, and his whole eastern frontier was thereby advanced from the Baltic at Stettin to the Danube at Vienna.
[Sidenote: 933. VICTORY OVER THE HUNGARIANS.]
By this time the nine years of truce with the Hungarians were at an end, and when the amba.s.sadors of the latter came to the German Court to receive their tribute, they were sent back with empty hands. A tradition states that Henry ordered an old, mangy dog to be given to them, instead of the usual gold and silver. A declaration of war followed, as he had antic.i.p.ated; but the Hungarians seem to have surprised him by the rapidity of their movements. Contrary to their previous custom, they undertook a winter campaign, overrunning Thuringia and Saxony in such immense numbers that the king did not immediately venture to oppose them. He waited until their forces were divided in the search for plunder, then fell upon a part and defeated them. Shortly afterwards he moved against their main army, and on the 15th of March, 933, after a b.l.o.o.d.y battle (which is believed to have been fought in the vicinity of Merseburg), was again conqueror. The Hungarians fled, leaving their camp, treasures and acc.u.mulated plunder in Henry"s hands. They were never again dangerous to Northern Germany.
After this came a war with the Danish king, Gorm, who had crossed the Eider and taken Holstein. Henry brought it to an end, and added Schleswig to his dominion rather by diplomacy than by arms. After his long and indefatigable exertions, the Empire enjoyed peace; its boundaries were extended and secured; all the minor rulers submitted to his sway, and his influence over the people was unbounded. But he was not destined to enjoy the fruits of his achievements. A stroke of apoplexy warned him to set his house in order; so, in the spring of 936, he called together a Diet at Erfurt, which accepted his second son, Otto, as his successor. Although he left two other sons, no proposition was made to divide Germany among them. The civil wars of the Merovingian and Carolingian dynasties, during nearly 400 years, compelled the adoption of a different system of succession; and the reigning Dukes and Counts were now so strong that they bowed reluctantly even to the authority of a single monarch.
Henry died on the 20th of July, 936, not sixty years old. His son and successor, Otto, was twenty-four,--a stern, proud man, but brave, firm, generous and intelligent. He was married to Editha, the daughter of Athelstan, the Saxon king of England. A few weeks after his father"s death, he was crowned with great splendor in the cathedral of Charlemagne, at Aix-la-Chapelle. All the Dukes and Bishops of the realm were present, and the new Emperor was received with universal acclamation. At the banquet which followed, the Dukes of Lorraine, Franconia, Suabia, and Bavaria, served as Chamberlain, Steward, Cupbearer and Marshal. It was the first national event of a spontaneous character, which took place in Germany, and now, for the first time, a German Empire seemed to be a reality.
The history of Otto"s reign fulfilled, at least to the people of his day, the promise of his coronation. Like his father, his inheritance was to include wars with internal and external foes; he met and carried them to an end, with an energy equal to that of Henry I., but without the same prudence and patience. He made Germany the first power of the civilized world, yet he failed to unite the discordant elements of which it was composed, and therefore was not able to lay the foundation of a distinct _nation_, such as was even then slowly growing up in France.
[Sidenote: 937.]
He was first called upon to repel invasions of the Bohemians and the Wends, in Prussia. He entrusted the subjection of the latter to a Saxon Count, Hermann Billung, and marched himself against the former. Both wars lasted for some time, but they were finally successful. The Hungarians, also, whose new inroad reached even to the banks of the Loire, were twice defeated, and so discouraged that they never afterwards attempted to invade either Thuringia or Saxony.
Worse troubles, however, were brewing within the realm. Eberhard, Duke of the Franks (the same who had carried his brother Konrad"s crown to Otto"s father), had taken into his own hands the punishment of a Saxon n.o.ble, instead of referring the case to the king. The latter compelled Eberhard to pay a fine of a hundred pounds of silver, and ordered that the Frank freemen who a.s.sisted him should carry dogs in their arms to the royal castle,--a form of punishment which was then considered very disgraceful. After the order had been carried into effect, Otto received the culprits kindly and gave them rich presents; but they went home brooding revenge.
Eberhard allied himself with Thankmar, Otto"s own half-brother by a mother from whom Henry I. had been divorced before marrying Mathilde.
Giselbert, Duke of Lorraine, Otto"s brother-in-law, joined the conspiracy, and even many of the Saxon n.o.bles, who were offended because the command of the army sent against the Wends had been given to Count Hermann, followed his example. Otto"s position was very critical, and if there had been more harmony of action among the conspirators, he might have lost his throne. In the struggle which ensued, Thankmar was slain and Duke Eberhard forced to surrender. But the latter was not yet subdued. During the rebellion he had taken Otto"s younger brother, Henry, prisoner; he secured the latter"s confidence, tempted him with the prospect of being chosen king in case Otto was overthrown, and then sent him as his intercessor to the conqueror.
[Sidenote: 939. REVOLT OF OTTO"S BROTHER, HENRY.]
Thus, while Otto supposed the movement had been crushed, Eberhard, Giselbert of Lorraine and Henry, who had meantime joined the latter, were secretly preparing a new rebellion. As soon as Otto discovered the fact, he collected an army and hastened to the Rhine. He had crossed the river with only a small part of his troops, the remainder being still encamped upon the eastern bank, when Giselbert and Henry suddenly appeared with a great force. Otto at first gave himself up for lost, but determined at least to fall gallantly, he and his followers fought with such desperation that they won a signal victory. Giselbert retreated to Lorraine, whither Otto was prevented from following him by new troubles among the Saxons and the subject Wends between the Elbe and Oder.
The rebellious princes now sought the help of the king of France, Louis IV. (called _d"Outre-mer_, or "from beyond sea," because he had been an exile in England). He marched into Alsatia with a French army, while Duke Eberhard and the Archbishop of Mayence added their forces to those of Giselbert and Henry. All the territory west of the Rhine fell into their hands, and the danger seemed so great that many of the smaller German princes began to waver in their fidelity to Otto. He, however, hastened to Alsatia, defeated the French, and laid siege to the fortress of Breisach (half-way between Strasburg and Basel), although Giselbert was then advancing into Westphalia. A small band who remained true to him met the latter and forced him back upon the Rhine; and there, in a battle fought near Andernach, Eberhard was slain and Giselbert drowned in attempting to fly.
This was the turning-point in Otto"s fortunes. The French retreated, all the supports of the rebellion fell away from it, and in a short time the king"s authority was restored throughout the whole of Germany. These events occurred during the year 939. The following year Otto marched to Paris, which, however, was too strongly fortified to be taken. An irregular war between the two kingdoms lasted for some time longer, and was finally terminated by a personal interview between Otto and Louis IV., at which the ancient boundaries were reaffirmed, Lorraine remaining German.
[Sidenote: 940.]
Henry, pardoned for the second time, was unable to maintain himself as Duke of Lorraine, to which position Otto had appointed him. Enraged at being set aside, he united with the Archbishop of Mayence in a conspiracy against his brother"s life. It was arranged that the murder should be committed during the Easter services, in Quedlinburg. The plot was discovered, the accomplices tried and executed, and Henry thrown into prison. During the celebration of the Christmas ma.s.s, in the cathedral at Frankfort, the same year, he suddenly appeared before Otto, and, throwing himself upon his knees before him, prayed for pardon. Otto was magnanimous enough to grant it, and afterwards to forget as well as forgive. He bestowed new favors upon Henry, who never again became unfaithful.
During this time the Saxon Counts, Gero and Hermann, had held the Wends and other Slavonic tribes at bay, and gradually filled the conquered territory beyond the Elbe with fortified posts, around which German colonists rapidly cl.u.s.tered. Following the example of Charlemagne, the people were forcibly converted to Christianity, and new churches and monasteries were founded. The Bohemians were made tributary, the Hungarians repelled, and in driving back an invasion of the king of Denmark, Harold Blue-tooth, Otto marched to the extremity of the peninsula of Jutland, and there hurled his spear into the sea, as a sign that he had taken possession of the land.
He now ruled a wider, and apparently a more united realm, than his father. The power of the independent Dukes was so weakened, that they felt themselves subjected to his favor; he was everywhere respected and feared, although he never became popular with the ma.s.ses of the people.
He lacked the easy, familiar ways with them which distinguished his father and Charlemagne; his manner was cold and haughty, and he surrounded himself with pomp and ceremony. He married his eldest son, Ludolf, to the daughter of the Duke of Suabia, whom the former soon succeeded in his rule; he gave Lorraine to his son-in-law, Konrad, and Bavaria to his brother Henry, while he retained the Franks, Thuringians and Saxons under his own personal rule. Germany might have grown into a united nation, if the good qualities of his line could have been transmitted without its inordinate ambition.
While thus laying, as he supposed, the permanent basis of his power, Otto was called upon by the king of France, who, having married the widow of Giselbert of Lorraine, was now his brother-in-law, for help against Duke Hugo, a powerful pretender to the French throne. In 946 he marched at the head of an army of 32,000 men, to a.s.sist king Louis; but, although he reached Normandy, he did not succeed in his object, and several years elapsed before Hugo was brought to submission.
[Sidenote: 951. OTTO"S VISIT TO ITALY.]
In the year 951, Otto"s attention was directed to Italy, which, since the fall of the Carolingian Empire, had been ravaged in turn by Saracens, Greeks, Normans and even Hungarians. The Papal power had become almost a shadow, and the t.i.tle of Roman Emperor was practically extinct. Berengar of Friuli, a rough, brutal prince, called himself king of Italy, and demanded for his son the hand of Adelheid, the widow of his predecessor. On her refusal to accept Berengar"s offer, she was imprisoned and treated with great indignity, but finally she succeeded in sending a messenger to Germany, imploring Otto"s intervention. His wife, Editha of England, was dead: he saw, in Adelheid"s appeal, an opportunity to acquire an ascendency in Italy, and resolved to claim her hand for himself.
Accompanied by his brother Henry of Bavaria, his son Ludolf of Suabia, and his son-in-law Konrad of Lorraine, with their troops, Otto crossed the Alps, defeated Berengar, took possession of Verona, Pavia, Milan and other cities of Northern Italy, and a.s.sumed the t.i.tle of king of Lombardy. He then applied for Adelheid"s hand, which was not refused, and the two were married with great pomp at Pavia. Ludolf, incensed at his father for having taken a second wife, returned immediately to Germany, and there stirred up such disorder that Otto relinquished his intention of visiting Rome, and followed him. After much negotiation, Berengar was allowed to remain king of Lombardy, on condition of giving up all the Adriatic sh.o.r.e, from near Venice to Istria, which was then annexed to Bavaria.
[Sidenote: 954.]
Duke Henry, therefore, profited most by the Italian campaign, and this excited the jealousy of Ludolf and Konrad, who began to conspire both against him, and against Otto"s authority. The trouble increased until it became an open rebellion, which convulsed Germany for nearly four years. If Otto had been personally popular, it might have been soon suppressed; but the petty princes and the people inclined to one side or the other, according to the prospects of success, and the Empire, finally, seemed on the point of falling to pieces. In this crisis, there came what appeared to be a new misfortune, but which, most unexpectedly, put an end to the wasting strife. The Hungarians again broke into Germany, and Ludolf and Konrad granted them permission to pa.s.s through their territory to reach and ravage their father"s lands. This alliance with an hereditary and barbarous enemy turned the whole people to Otto"s side; the long rebellion came rapidly to an end, and all troubles were settled by a Diet held at the close of 954.
The next year the Hungarians came again in greater numbers than ever, and, crossing Bavaria, laid siege to Augsburg. But Otto now marched against them with all the military strength of Germany, and on the 10th of August, 955, met them in battle. Konrad of Lorraine led the attack and decided the fate of the day, but, in the moment of victory, having lifted his visor to breathe more freely, a Hungarian arrow pierced his neck and he fell dead. Nearly all the enemy were slaughtered or drowned in the river Lech. Only a few scattered fugitives returned to Hungary to tell the tale, and from that day no new invasion was ever undertaken against Germany. On the contrary, the Bavarians pressed eastward and spread themselves along the Danube and among the Styrian Alps, while the Bohemians took possession of Moravia, so that the boundary lines between the three races then became very nearly what they are at the present day.
Soon afterwards, Otto lost his brother Henry of Bavaria, and, two years later, his son Ludolf, who died in Italy, while endeavoring to make himself king of the Lombards. A new disturbance in Saxony was suppressed, and with it there was an end of civil war in Germany, during Otto"s reign. We have already stated that he was proud and ambitious: the crown of a "Roman Emperor," which still seemed the highest t.i.tle on earth, had probably always hovered before his mind, and now the opportunity of attaining it came. The Pope, John XII., a boy of seventeen, who found himself in danger of being driven from Rome by Berengar, the Lombard, sent a pressing call for help to Otto, who entered upon his second journey to Italy in 961.
[Sidenote: 962. OTTO"S CORONATION IN ROME.]
He first called a Diet together at Worms, and procured the acceptance of his son Otto, then only 6 years old, as his successor. The child was solemnly crowned at Aix-la-Chapelle; the Archbishop Bruno of Cologne was appointed his guardian and vicegerent of the realm during Otto"s absence, and the latter was left free to carry out his designs beyond the Alps. He was received with rejoicing by the Lombards, and the iron crown of the kingdom was placed on his head by the Archbishop of Milan.
He then advanced to Rome and was crowned Emperor in St. Peter"s by the boy-pope, on the 2d of February, 962. Nearly a generation had elapsed since the t.i.tle had been held or claimed by any one, and its renewal at this time was the source of centuries of loss and suffering to Germany.
It was a sham and a delusion,--a will-o"-the wisp which led rulers and people aside from the true path of civilization, and left them floundering in quagmires of war.
Otto had hardly returned to Lombardy before the Pope, who began to see that he had crowned his own master, conspired against him. The Pope called on the Byzantine Emperor for aid, incited the Hungarians, and even entered into correspondence with the Saracens in Corsica. All Italy became so turbulent that three years elapsed before the Emperor Otto succeeded in restoring order. He took Rome by force of arms, deposed the Pope and set up another of his own appointment, banished Berengar, and compelled the universal recognition of his own sovereignty. Then, with the remnants of an army which had almost been destroyed by war and pestilence, he returned to Germany in 965.
A grand festival was held at Cologne, to celebrate his new honors and victories. His mother, the aged queen Mathilde, Lothar, reigning king of France, and all the Dukes and Princes of Germany, were present, and the people came in mult.i.tudes from far and wide. The internal peace of the Empire had not been disturbed during Otto"s absence, and his journey of inspection was a series of peaceful and splendid pageants. An insurrection having broken out among the Lombards the following year, he sent Duke Burkhard of Suabia to suppress it in his name; but it soon became evident that his own presence was necessary. He thereupon took a last farewell of his old mother, and returned to Italy in the autumn of 966.
Lombardy was soon brought to order, and the rebellious n.o.bles banished to Germany. As Otto approached Rome, the people restored the Pope he had appointed, whom they had in the meantime deposed: they were also compelled to give up the leaders of the revolt, who were tried and executed. Otto claimed the right of appointing the Civil Governor of Rome, who should rule in his name. He gave back to the Pope the territory which the latter had received from Pippin the Short, two hundred years before, but nearly all of which had been taken from the Church by the Lombards. In return, the Pope agreed to govern this territory as a part, or province, of the Empire, and to crown Otto"s son as Emperor, in advance of his accession to the throne.
[Sidenote: 966.]
These new successes seem to have quite turned Otto"s mind from the duty he owed to the German people; henceforth he only strove to increase the power and splendor of his house. His next step was to demand the hand of the Princess Theophania, a daughter of one of the Byzantine Emperors, for his son Otto. The Eastern Court neither consented nor refused; amba.s.sadors were sent back and forth until the Emperor became weary of the delay. Following the suggestion of his offended pride, he undertook a campaign against Southern Italy, parts of which still acknowledged the Byzantine rule. The war lasted for several years, without any positive result; but the hand of Theophania was finally promised to young Otto, and she reached Rome in the beginning of the year 972. Her beauty, grace and intelligence at once won the hearts of Otto"s followers, who had been up to that time opposed to the marriage. Although her betrothed husband was only seventeen, and she was a year younger, the nuptials were celebrated in April, and the Emperor then immediately returned to Germany with his Court and army.
[Sidenote: 973. DEATH OF OTTO THE GREAT.]
All that Otto could show, to balance his six years" neglect of his own land and people, was the t.i.tle of "the Great," which the Italians bestowed upon him, and a Princess of Constantinople, who spoke Greek and looked upon the Germans as barbarians, for his daughter-in-law. His return was celebrated by a grand festival held at Quedlinburg, at Easter, 973. All the Dukes and reigning Counts of the Empire were present, the kings of Bohemia and Poland, amba.s.sadors from Constantinople, from the Caliph of Cordova, in Spain, from Bulgaria, Russia, Denmark and Hungary. Even Charlemagne never enjoyed such a triumph; but in the midst of the festivities, Otto"s first friend and supporter, Hermann Billung, whom he had made Duke of Saxony, suddenly died. The Emperor became impressed with the idea that his own end was near: he retired to Memleben in Thuringia, where his father died, and on the 6th of May was stricken with apoplexy, at the age of sixty-one. He died, seated in his chair and surrounded by his princely guests, and was buried in Magdeburg, by the side of his first wife, Editha of England.
Otto completed the work which Henry commenced, and left Germany the first power in Europe. Had his mind been as clear and impartial, his plans as broad and intelligent, as Charlemagne"s, he might have laid the basis of a permanent Empire; but, in an evil hour, he called the phantom of the sceptre of the world from the grave of Roman power, and, believing that he held it, turned the ages that were to follow him into the path of war, disunion and misery.
CHAPTER XIV.
THE DECLINE OF THE SAXON DYNASTY.
(973--1024.)
Otto II., "The Red." --Conquest of Bavaria. --Invasion of Lothar of France. --Otto"s March to Paris. --His Journey to Italy. --His Defeat by the Saracens, and Escape. --Diet at Verona. --Otto"s Death. --Theophania as Regent. --Alienation of France. --Otto III.
--His Dealings with the Popes. --Negotiations with the Poles. --His Fantastic Actions. --His Death in Rome. --Youthful Popes. --Henry of Bavaria chosen by the Germans. --His character. --War with Poland. --March to Italy, and Coronation. --Other Wars. --Henry repels the Byzantines. --His Death. --The Character of his Reign.
--His Piety.
[Sidenote: 973.]
Otto II., already crowned as king and Emperor, began his reign as one authorized "by the grace of G.o.d." Although only eighteen years old, and both physically and intellectually immature, his succession was immediately acknowledged by the rulers of the smaller German States. He was short and slender, and of such a ruddy complexion that the people gave him the name of "Otto the Red." He had been carefully educated, and possessed excellent qualities of heart and mind, but he had not been tried by adversity, like his father and grandfather, and failed to inherit either the patience or the energy of either. At first his mother, the widowed Empress Adelheid, conducted the government of the Empire, and with such prudence that all were satisfied. Soon, however, the Empress Theophania became jealous of her mother-in-law"s influence, and the latter was compelled to retire to her former home in Burgundy.
The first internal trouble came from Henry II., Duke of Bavaria, the son of Otto the Great"s rebellious brother, and cousin of Otto II. He was ambitious to convert Bavaria into an independent kingdom: in fact he had himself crowned king at Ratisbon, but in 976 he was defeated, taken prisoner and banished to Holland by the Emperor. Bavaria was united to Suabia, and the Eastern provinces on the Danube were erected into a separate princ.i.p.ality, which was the beginning of Austria as a new German power.
[Sidenote: 978. BATTLE WITH THE SARACENS.]
At the same time Otto II. was forced to carry on new wars with Bohemia and Denmark, in both of which he maintained the frontiers established by his father. But Lothar, king of France, used the opportunity to get possession of Lorraine and even to take Aix-la-Chapelle, Charlemagne"s capital, in the summer of 978. The German people were so enraged at this treacherous invasion that Otto II. had no difficulty in raising an army of 60,000 men, with which he marched to Paris in the autumn of the same year. The city was so well fortified and defended that he found it prudent to raise the siege as winter approached; but first, on the heights of Montmartre, his army chanted a _Te Deum_ as a warning to the enemy within the walls. The strife was prolonged until 980, when it was settled by a personal interview of the Emperor and the king of France, at which Lorraine was restored to Germany.