During this period, while the minority of Frederick II left so much time to the cities of Italy to consolidate their independence, and to form real republics, the person most influential and most prominent in history was the pope, Innocent III, who reigned from 1197 to 1216. He caused his power to be felt in the remotest parts of Christendom, but he suffered to be constituted at Rome, under his own eye, a republic, the liberty of which he respected, and over which he assumed no authority. The thirteen districts of Rome each named annually four representatives or _caporioni_; their meeting formed the senate of the republic, who, with the concurrence of the people, exercised the sovereignty, with the exception of the judicial power. This power belonged as in other republics to a foreign military chief, chosen for one year, and assisted by civil judges, dependent on him, but bearing the name of senator, instead of podesta. We have still extant the form of oath taken by the first of these senators, named in 1207. By it he engages to guarantee security and liberty to the pope as well as to his brothers the cardinals, but promises no submission to him for himself. In the beginning of the pontificate of Innocent III, two German generals, to whom Henry VI had given the titles of duke of Spoleto and marquis of Ancona, held in dependence and subjection the provinces nearest Rome. Innocent, to revive the spirit of liberty, sent thither two legates; and by their interference, the cities of these provinces, built for the most part in the mountains, and without any means of becoming either wealthy or populous, threw off the German yoke, and made alliance with those cities which from the preceding period had entered into the league of Lombardy; thus two Guelf leagues were formed, under the protection of the pope; one in the marches, comprehending the cities of Ancona, Fermo, Osimo, Camerino, Fano, Jesi, Sinigaglia, and Pesaro; the other in the duchy, comprehending those of Spoleto, Rieti, Assisi, Foligno, Nocera, Perugia, Agubbio, Todi, and Città di Castello. These leagues, however, in accustoming the cities of these two provinces to regard the pope as their protector, led them afterwards to submit without resistance to the sovereignty of the church.