In 1272 the death of Richard of Cornwall forced his [Sidenote: Election of Rudolf I.] adherents to consider the question of a new election, and at the same time Pope Gregory X., alarmed by the excessive power of the House of Anjou in Italy, and afraid lest German disunion might give occasion for French aggression north of the Alps, used all his influence to urge on the unanimous choice of a new king in Germany. For a long time the right of election had tended to fall into fewer hands. The early German kings were selected by the chief men and approved by the acclamations of a mass meeting of all freemen. Gradually the form of popular approval disappeared, and the princely tenants-in-chief assumed an absolute power of nomination. Since then the practice had grown up of a preliminary choice by some of the chief princes, to be ratified by the rest. But in the thirteenth century the idea arose that certain princes could elect without any further ceremony. Superstition and custom seem to have combined to suggest the number seven for these electors, as they came to be called. But there were several contending claimants for the right to be included in the favoured seven, and it was not till the next century that these disputes were finally settled. On the present occasion the lead was taken by the great Rhenish princes, the Count Palatine with the three Archbishops. The only chance of securing a general adhesion of the princes was to choose a king who was not so strong as to excite either fear or jealousy. Mainly through the exertions of Frederick III. of Hohenzollern, Burggraf of Nürnberg, the choice of the electors fell upon his cousin Rudolf, Count of Hapsburg, who was crowned at Aachen on October 24, 1273. It is not a little curious that the election of the first Hapsburg was brought about by the influence of a Hohenzollern.