The Italian cities, which for the most part date the commencement of their liberty from the conflicts between the sovereigns of Italy and Germany, or the invasion of Otto the Great, in 951, had already, at the death of Frederick II, enjoyed for three centuries the protection and progressive improvement of their municipal constitutions. These three centuries, with reference to the rest of Europe, are utterly barbarous. Their history is everywhere obscure and imperfectly known. It records only some great revolution, or the victories and calamities of princes; the people are always left in the shade: a writer would have thought it beneath him to occupy himself about the fate of plebeians; they were not supposed to be worthy of history. The towns of Italy, so prodigiously superior to all others in wealth, intelligence, energy, and independence, were equally regardless of preserving any record of past times. Some grave chroniclers preserved the memory of an important crisis, but in general the cities passed whole centuries without leaving any written memorial; thinking it perhaps good policy not to attract notice, and to envelope themselves in obscurity. They, however, of necessity departed from this system in the last century, owing to the two conflicts, in both of which they remained victorious. From 1150 to 1183, they had fought to obtain the Peace of Constance, which they regarded as their constitutional charter. From 1183 to 1250, they preserved the full exercise of the privileges which they had so gloriously acquired; but while they continually advanced in opulence, while intelligence and the arts became more and more developed, they were led by two passions, equally honourable, to range themselves under two opposite banners. One party, listening only to their faith, their attachment, and their gratitude to a family which had given them many great sovereigns, were ready to venture their all for the cause of the Ghibellines; the other, alarmed for the independence of the church, and the liberty of Italy, by the always increasing grandeur of the house of Hohenstaufen, were not less resolute in their endeavours to wrest from it the sceptre which menaced them. The cities of the Lombard League had reached the summit of their power at the period of this second conflict. During the interregnum which lasted from the death of Frederick II to the entrance into Italy of Henry VII in 1310, the Lombard republics, a prey to the spirit of faction, and more intent on the triumph of either the Guelf or Ghibelline parties, than on securing their own constitutions, all submitted themselves to the military power of some nobles to whom they had intrusted the command of their militias, and thus lost all their liberty. [Sidenote: [1250-1257 A.D.]]