they learned to arrange by private treaties that no territory should pass from the family while a single representative survived. The cities. The consolidation of the power of the princes was contemporary with the rise of the cities into new importance. Several of them, especially Mainz, Worms and Spires, had received valuable rights from the kings and other lords; they were becoming self-governing and to some extent independent communities and an important and growing element in the state. The increase of trade and a system of taxation provided the governing body with funds, which were used to fortify the city and in other ways to make life and property more secure. The destruction of imperial authority compelled them to organize their resources, so as to be at all times prepared against ambitious neighbours. They began to form leagues which the greatest princes and combinations of princes could not afford to despise. Of these leagues the chief at this time was the Rhenish Confederation, which has been already mentioned. Great importance was also acquired by the Hanseatic League, which had originated during the interregnum in a treaty of alliance between Lübeck and Hamburg. It ultimately included more than eighty cities and became one of the greatest commercial powers in Europe (see HANSEATIC LEAGUE). Rudolph of Habsburg. A political system which allowed the princes to do as they pleased was very much to their liking, and if they had followed their own impulse it is possible that they would never have placed a king over their country. But the pope intervened. He found from his troubles in Italy and from his diminished revenues from Germany that it would be still convenient to have in the latter country a sovereign who, like some of his predecessors, would be the protector of the church. Therefore, after the death of Richard of Cornwall in April 1272, Pope Gregory X., ignoring the absent Alphonso of Castile, told the electors that if they did not choose a king he himself would appoint one. The threat was effective. In September 1273 the electors met and raised to the throne a Swabian noble, Rudolph, count of Habsburg, who proved to possess more energy than they had imagined possible. For some time before this event the most powerful prince in Germany had been Ottakar II., king of Bohemia, who by marriage and conquest had obtained large territories outside his native kingdom, including the duchy of Austria and other possessions of the extinct family of Babenberg. Having himself cherished some hopes of receiving the German crown Ottakar refused to do homage to the new sovereign; after a time war broke out between them, and in August 1278 in a battle at Dürnkrut on the March Ottakar was defeated and slain, his lands, save Bohemia, passing into the possession of the victor. Rudolph had been able to give his whole attention to this enterprise owing to the good understanding which had been reached between himself and the