The Best of the Bureau/The_Best_of_the_Bureau_Bureau_Development_Inc._1992.iso/dp/0088/00884.txt

Text File | 1992-08-07 | 30KB | 483 lines

$Unique_ID{bob00884}
$Pretitle{}
$Title{History Of Europe During The Middle Ages
Part III}
$Subtitle{}
$Author{Hallam, Henry}
$Affiliation{}
$Subject{footnote
empire
imperial
diet
upon
states
pfeffel
schmidt
cities
germany}
$Date{}
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Title:       History Of Europe During The Middle Ages
Book:        Book V: History Of Germany To The Diet Of Worms In 1495
Author:      Hallam, Henry

Part III

     The period between Rodolph and Frederic III. is distinguished by no
circumstance so interesting as the prosperous state of the free imperial
cities, which had attained their maturity about the commencement of that
interval.  We find the cities of Germany, in the tenth century, divided into
such as depended immediately upon the empire, which were usually governed by
their bishop as imperial vicar, and such as were included in the territories
of the dukes and counts. ^b Some of the former, lying principally upon the
Rhine and in Franconia, acquired a certain degree of importance before the
expiration of the eleventh century.  Worms and Cologne manifested a zealous
attachment to Henry IV., whom they supported in despite of their bishops. ^c
His son Henry V. granted privileges of enfranchisement to the inferior
townsmen or artisans, who had hitherto been distinguished from the upper class
of freemen, and particularly relieved them from oppressive usages, which
either gave the whole of their movable goods to the lord upon their decease,
or at least enabled him to seize the best chattel as his heriot. ^d He took
away the temporal authority of the bishop, at least in several instances, and
restored the cities to a more immediate dependence upon the empire.  The
citizens were classed in companies, according to their several occupations; an
institution which was speedily adopted in other commercial countries.  It does
not appear that any German city had obtained, under this emperor, those
privileges of choosing its own magistrates, which were conceded about the same
time, in a few instances, to those of France.  Gradually, however, they began
to elect councils of citizens, as a sort of senate and magistracy. ^e This
innovation might perhaps take place as early as the reign of Frederic I.; ^f
at least it was fully established in that of his grandson.  They were at first
only assistants to the imperial or episcopal bailiff, who probably continued
to administer criminal justice.  But in the thirteenth century the citizens,
grown richer and stronger, either purchased the jurisdiction, or usurped it
through the lord's neglect, or drove out the bailiff by force. ^g The great
revolution in Franconia and Suabia occasioned by the fall of the Hohenstauffen
family completed the victory of the cities.  Those which had depended upon
mediate lords became immediately connected with the empire; and with the
empire in its state of feebleness, when an occasional present of money would
easily induce its chief to acquiesce in any claims of immunity which the
citizens might prefer.

[Footnote b: Pfeffel, p. 187.  The Othos adopted the same policy in Germany
which they had introduced in Italy,conferring the temporal government of
cities upon the bishops; probably as a counterbalance to the lay aristocracy.
Putter, p. 136; Struvius, p. 252.]

[Footnote c: Schmidt, t. iii. p. 239.]

[Footnote d: Ibid., p. 242; Pfeffel, p. 293; Dumont, Corps Diplomatique, t. i.
p. 64.]

[Footnote e: Schmidt, p. 245.]

[Footnote f: In the charter granted by Frederic I. to Spire in 1182,
confirming and enlarging that of Henry V., though no express mention is made
of any municipal jurisdiction, yet it seems implied in the following words:
Causam in civitate jam lite contestatam non episcopus aut alia potestas extra
civitatem determinari compellet.  Dumont, p. 108.]

[Footnote g: Schmidt, t. iv. p. 96; Pfeffel, p. 441.]

     It was a natural consequence of the importance which the free citizens
had reached, and of their immediacy, that they were admitted to a place in the
diets, or general meetings of the confederacy.  They were tacitly acknowledged
to be equally sovereign with the electors and princes.  No proof exists of any
law by which they were adopted into the diet.  We find it said that Rodolph of
Hapsburg, in 1291, renewed his oath with the princes, lords, and cities.
Under the emperor Henry VII. there is unequivocal mention of the three orders
composing the diet; electors, princes, and deputies from cities. ^h And in
1344 they appear as a third distinct college in the diet of Frankfort. ^i

[Footnote h: Mansit ibi rex sex hebdom adibus cum principibus electoribus et
aliis principibus et civitatum nuntiis, de suo transitu et de praestandis
servitiis in Italian disponendo.  Auctor apud Schmidt, t. vi. p. 31.]

[Footnote i: Pfeffel, p. 552.]

     The inhabitants of these free cities always preserved their respect for
the emperor, and gave him much less vexation than his other subjects. He was
indeed their natural friend.  But the nobility and prelates were their natural
enemies; and the western parts of Germany were the scenes of irreconcilable
warfare between the possessors of fortified castles and the inhabitants of
fortified cities.  Each party was frequently the aggressor. The nobles were
too often mere robbers, who lived upon the plunder of travellers.  But the
citizens were almost equally inattentive to the rights of others.  It was
their policy to offer the privileges of burghership to all strangers.  The
peasantry of feudal lords, flying to a neighboring town, found an asylum
constantly open.  A multitude of aliens, thus seeking as it were sanctuary,
dwelt in the suburbs or liberties, between the city walls and the palisades
which bounded the territory. Hence they were called Pfahlburger, or burgesses
of the palisades; and this encroachment on the rights of the nobility was
positively, but vainly, prohibited by several imperial edicts, especially the
Golden Bull. Another class were the Ausburger, or outburghers, who had been
admitted to privileges of citizenship, though resident at a distance, and
pretended in consequence to be exempted from all dues to their original feudal
superiors.  If a lord resisted so unreasonable a claim, he incurred the danger
of bringing down upon himself the vengeance of the citizens.  These
outburghers are in general classed under the general name of Pfahlburger by
contemporary writers. ^j

[Footnote j: Schmidt, t. iv. p. 98; t. vi. p. 76; Pfeffel, p. 402; Du Cange,
Gloss. v. Pfahlburger, Faubourg is derived from this word.]

     As the towns were conscious of the hatred which the nobility bore towards
them, it was their interest to make a common cause, and render mutual
assistance.  From this necessity of maintaining, by united exertions, their
general liberty, the German cities never suffered the petty jealousies, which
might no doubt exist among them, to ripen into such deadly feuds as sullied
the glory, and ultimately destroyed the freedom, of Lombardy.  They withstood
the bishops and barons by confederacies of their own, framed expressly to
secure their commerce against rapine, or unjust exactions of toll.  More than
sixty cities, with three ecclesiastical electors at their head, formed the
league of the Rhine, in 1255, to repel the inferior nobility, who, having now
become immediate, abused that independence by perpetual robberies. ^k The
Hanseatic Union owes its origin to no other cause, and may be traced perhaps
to rather a higher date.  About the year 1370 a league was formed, which,
though it did not continue so long, seems to have produced more striking
effects in Germany.  The cities of Suabia and the Rhine united themselves in a
strict confederacy against the princes, and especially the families of
Wurtemburg and Bavaria.  It is said that the Emperor Wenceslaus secretly
abetted their projects.  The recent successes of the Swiss, who had now almost
established their republic, inspired their neighbors in the empire with
expectations which the event did not realize; for they were defeated in this
w