The New International Encyclopædia/Holy Roman Empire

​HOLY ROMAN EMPIRE. The name now given to the Empire erected by Charles the Great (q.v.), King of the Franks, in Western Europe, usually dated from his coronation, at Rome, by Pope Leo III. in 800; or, more technically, to this Empire as revived in 962 by Otho the Great (q.v.). In theory the Holy Roman Empire was a continuation of the Western Empire, which was ​overthrown by the barbarians in 476. When Charles the Great was crowned Emperor by Leo III. he thought of himself as the successor of Augustus, Trajan, and Marcus Aurelius, and styled himself Augustus. This theory prevailed throughout the Middle Ages. Louis the Pious, Lothaire I., Louis II., Charles the Bald, and Charles the Fat were crowned as Roman emperors. After the deposition of the latter (887), which was followed by the disruption of the great Frankish Empire, the Imperial title was still held by a few princes, as Arnulf, King of Germany, and Berenger I., King of Italy. In 962 Otho the Great, after wresting the royal crown of Italy from a descendant of Charles the Great, had himself crowned Emperor of the Romans by Pope John XII., and inaugurated the Roman Empire of the German nation. From that time the King of Germany was usually Emperor. The Empire consisted of Italy and the lands whose rulers recognized the overlordship of the German monarch; but theoretically the Emperor was the ruler of all Christians in Western Europe, and some emperors, as, for example, Henry VI., dreamed even of a world-wide empire. At different periods the rulers of Hungary, Poland, Denmark, Jerusalem, and Cyprus were to a greater or less extent vassals of the Roman Emperor. Until the reign of Frederick Barbarossa the name had been merely ‘Roman Empire;’ Frederick added the designation ‘Holy,’ either to vindicate its sacred character against the exclusive pretensions of the Church, or else to describe its chief function as the protection of that Church. By the close of the thirteenth century the authority of the German emperors in Italy was reduced to a mere shadow. At the close of the fifteenth century the Swiss cut loose completely from the Empire. In the Netherlands the Imperial authority had come to an end long before their connection with the Empire was declared to be severed in an article of the Peace of Westphalia (1648).

The early German kings were elected by the chief men of the nation with the assent of the other freemen. Gradually the chief nobles secured almost entire control of the elections, but there was no fixed mode of procedure. At the election of Lothair in 1125, for example, a committee consisting of ten from each duchy was chosen to select an Emperor. In the thirteenth century—by a process of evolution, which it is not possible to trace now—the number of electors had been fixed at seven, but there was a dispute as to who were included in the seven. This was settled in 1356 by the Golden Bull of Charles IV., which determined that the electoral college should be composed of the Archbishops of Mainz, Treves, and Cologne, the King of Bohemia, the Count Palatine of the Rhine, the Duke of Saxony, and the Margrave of Brandenburg. The Golden Bull also declared that the electoral votes were attached to the office, not to the persons, and descended in the case of the lay principalities by right of primogeniture. This continued to be the constitution of the electoral college until 1623, when Ferdinand II. arbitrarily transferred the vote belonging to the Count Palatine to Maximilian of Bavaria. At the Peace of Westphalia (1648) an eighth electorate was created for the Palatinate. In 1692 the ninth electorate, that of Hanover, was instituted. The Imperial elections were held at Frankfort-on-the-Main and the coronation city was Aix-la-Chapelle. The Emperor at some time during his reign went to Rome to receive the Imperial crown at the hands of the Pope. The last ceremony of this kind took place in 1530, when Charles V. was crowned at Bologna by Pope Clement VII. The successor-elect to the Emperor of the Romans was styled King of the Romans.

During the so-called Interregnum following on the death of the last Hohenstaufen Emperor there was a double election (1257), both Richard of Cornwall and Alfonso X. of Castile being made Emperor, one receiving four votes and the other three. Their election may be taken to illustrate the theory held by some at the time, that a man of any nationality might be chosen to the Empire; but their total failure to obtain anything but the mere Imperial title proved that as a matter of fact the sovereignty of the Holy Roman Empire could be held only by a Germanic prince. After 1438 all the emperors but two belonged to the House of Hapsburg.

Charles the Great and his immediate successors followed the old German custom of calling together, at frequent intervals, the nobles and freemen for consultation about the public welfare. As feudalism developed these assemblies ceased, and the Emperor called together only such of his vassals as he chose. Their meetings were called Imperial Diets (Reichstage). In the thirteenth century the cities became very influential, and consequently their representatives were summoned to the Diets. As the power of the emperors declined, the Diets took a more prominent part in the administration of the Empire. Their functions were judicial as well as administrative. In the fourteenth century it came to be fixed that the Diet consisted of the three classes: electors, princes, and representatives of the cities. The lesser nobility had no voice in the Diet. But the power of the Diet was slight, because it was concerned only with Imperial matters, and the Empire had ceased to be of real importance as a factor in European politics. This was clearly shown in 1496, when Maximilian I. attempted to unite the Imperial estates against the French invasion of Italy. The Diet which he summoned did nothing to check the French, but with the Emperor’s consent created the Imperial Chamber (q.v.) a supreme tribunal for the preservation of peace within the Empire. It consisted of a president and sixteen members, who could not be removed from office. It held its sessions at Frankfort, Speyer, and other cities until 1698, when it was established permanently at Wetzlar. Gradually the Imperial Chamber became an important factor in the maintenance of peace within the Empire. The Emperor was jealous of it, as he had no control over it. Consequently he attempted to transfer some of its authority to the Aulic Council (q.v.), a somewhat similar body for Austria, which was under his control. During the first half of the sixteenth century the Aulic Council interfered in the affairs of Italy, the Netherlands, and other portions of the Empire. After that time, however, it was again restricted to Austrian interests alone.

The Empire came to an end in 1806, when Francis II. resigned the Imperial crown after having assumed (1804) the title of Emperor of Austria. After the time of the Hohenstaufen, whose dynasty came to an end in 1254, the ​Empire rapidly sank in importance, and owed any real authority which it possessed to the strength of the ruler who was Emperor. Still the possession of the title gave some additional prestige. By the Peace of Westphalia (1648) the bonds which held the Empire together were greatly loosened, the right being accorded to the individual States to enter into foreign alliances. In the eighteenth century Voltaire said of the Holy Roman Empire that it was neither holy, nor Roman, nor an empire. During its earlier existence, however, it was a very important factor in the history of Europe. Consult: Bryce, The Holy Roman Empire (London, 1864); Fisher, The Mediaval Empire (2 vols., London, 1898). See Germany; Italy, and the articles on the individual emperors, with the books cited.