A Source Book for Mediæval History: Selected Documents illustrating the History of Europe in the Middle AgeThatcher, Oliver J. (Oliver Joseph)
History
A Source Book for Mediæval History: Selected Documents illustrating the History of Europe in the Middle Age
Thatcher, Oliver J. (Oliver Joseph)
Europe -- History -- 476-1492 -- Sources; Middle Ages -- Sources
As early as 953 Bruno, archbishop of Cologne, received the ducal
authority over Lothringen. This gave him the power to hold local diets
and to summon both the bishops and secular nobles to attend them. The
Gelnhausen decree, so named because it was published in a diet held at
Gelnhausen, is important because it contains an official account (1) of
the trial of Henry the Lion, and (2) of the partition of the duchy of
Saxony. The archbishop of Cologne now receives the ducal authority over
a part of the duchy of Saxony. There is here a good illustration of the
policy which Frederick I followed of weakening the great duchies by
dividing them.
In the name of the holy and undivided Trinity. Frederick, by divine
mercy emperor of the Romans, Augustus....
Know all faithful subjects of the empire, both present and future, that
Henry, former duke of Bavaria and Westphalia, has oppressed the churches
of God and the nobles of the empire by seizing their lands and violating
their rights, has refused to obey our summons to present himself before
us and has therefore incurred the ban, and even after that has continued
to injure the churches and nobles. Now therefore on account of the
injuries which he has inflicted upon these persons, and on account of
the contempt which he has so often shown to us, and especially on
account of his violation of feudal law, in that he refused to obey the
three summonses to present himself before us, he has been judged
contumacious and by the unanimous sentence of the princes in the diet
held at Würzburg has been deprived of the duchies of Bavaria,
Westphalia, and Engria [that is, Bavaria and Saxony] and of all the
fiefs which he held of the empire, and these territories have been
restored to our control.
Now by the advice of the princes we have divided the duchy of Westphalia
and Engria [Saxony] into two parts and have conferred that part which is
included in the dioceses of Cologne and Paderborn upon our beloved
prince, Philip, archbishop of Cologne, because of his conspicuous
merits, and of his labors and expenditures for the crown. We have given
and granted this territory to the church of Cologne with the counties,
advocates, rights of safe-conduct, domains, farms, fiefs, ministerials,
serfs, and all other things which belong to that duchy; and we have
solemnly invested the aforesaid Philip by the banner [flag] of the
empire with that portion of the duchy which is given to his church. This
was done by the decision of all the princes of the diet, and with the
public consent of our relative, duke Bernard, to whom we have given the
other part of the duchy of Westphalia and Engria....
113. Papal Election Decree of Alexander III, 1179.
Watterich, Pont. Rom. Vitæ, II, pp. 644 f; Doeberl, IV, no. 49.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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