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BRIEF HISTORY OF THE HOLY ROMAN EMPIRE OF THE
GERMAN NATION
The Holy Roman Empire of the German Nation
(Latin: Imperium Romanum Sacrum Nationis
Germanicæ; German: Heiliges Römisches Reich
Deutscher Nation) was traditionally founded on
Christmas Day of the year 800 A.D., when Pope Leo
III placed the crown on the head of Charlemagne in
St. Peter's, and the assembled multitudes shouted
"Carolo Augusto, a Deo coronato magno et pacifico
imperatori, vita et victoria!" — "To Charles the
Magnificent, crowned the great and peace-giving
emperor by God, life and victory!" Strictly speaking,
however, Charles's empire was neither Roman nor
German, but Frankish — or as we might say, a sort of French-German mix (for that
matter, there was a perfectly valid Roman Emperor at the time in any case*). The
Empire was not officially described as "Holy" until the twelfth century, nor
officially "German" before the sixteenth. Charlemagne's empire quickly fell to
pieces among his squabbling successors, and the Holy Roman Emperors
themselves tended to ignore any discontinuity between pagan and Christian Rome
— Frederick I Barbarossa (1123-1190) going so far as to assert that one of his
reasons for going on Crusade was to avenge the defeat of Crassus by the Parthians
(53 B.C.).
Germany as a realm separate from the Frankish empire
emerged with the Treaties of Verdun (843) and Mersen
(870). After the last of Charlemagne's line died in 911, the
German nobles elected Henry the Fowler, Duke of
Saxony, as King of the Germans. The coronation of his
son Otto in 962 may be taken as the actual foundation of
the Holy Roman Empire. The actual term "Holy Roman
Empire" began to be used only during the reign of
Friedrich Barbarossa two centuries and two dynasties
later.
When Conrad III died in 1152, after taking part in the Second Crusade, and was
succeeded, on his own recommendation, by his nephew Frederick, Duke of Swabia,
who reigned as Frederick I, or Frederick Barbarossa /Red Beard). When Pope
Eugene III crowned him in 1155 he added the word "holy" to the name
The Hohenstaufen Dynasty - Page 19 of 200