come as an arbitrator to a diet that was to be held at
Augsburg in February 1077. With no way out, Henry
decided in mid-December 1076 to meet Gregory, who
had already left Rome on his way to Augsburg in north-
ern Italy. With his wife Bertha and his two-year-old son
Conrad, Henry managed to cross Mount Cernis in severe
winter weather. When he learned of the king’s arrival,
Gregory withdrew to the fortress of Canossa, owned by
Countess Matilda of Tuscany. Thanks to the mediation
of Henry’s godfather, Abbot Hugh of Cluny, of Matilda,
and of Adelheid of Turin (mother of the queen), Gregory
reconciled Henry IV with the Church on January 28,
- Henry was forced to appear barefoot and dressed
in a penitent’s hair shirt for three days in a row in the
inner courtyard of the castle requesting permission to
enter before he was absolved by the pope.
In fact, though not in theory, when he reconciled
Henry with the church, Gregory again recognized Henry
as king. At the Lenten synod of 1080, however, the
pontiff recognized Rudolf of Rheinfelden, whom the
German opposition had elected in March 1077 despite
the absolution of Canossa, as king. Henry was once
again excommunicated, but, this time, ineffectively. At
the synod of Brixen, June 1080, Henry and the princes
nominated Archbishop Wibert of Ravenna to replace
Gregory, whom the synod then deposed. The death
of Rudolf, and military as well as political successes,
enabled Henry to enter Rome in March 1084 when
Wibert was consecrated Pope Clement III. On Easter
Sunday, Henry IV was crowned emperor. Meanwhile,
Gregory, freed by his vassals from his place of refuge,
the Castello S. Angelo in Rome withdrew to Salerno,
where he died in May 1085.
After his return to Germany, Henry at fi rst was able
to consolidate his position. With the death of Clement
III in 1100 the end of the schism in the Church seemed
possible. However, the negotiations between Henry
IV and Pope Paschal II (1099–1118) always ended in
failure, since Henry refused to give up his right to invest
bishops with the ring and staff, the one demand on which
Paschal insisted.
The collapse of these negotiations with the papacy
lay behind the rebellion of Henry V against his rather in
late 1104. Through a ruse, the younger Henry captured
Henry IV in late 1105. At Ingelheim on December 31,
1105, Henry IV was forced to abdicate. He managed to
fl ee, however, and attempted to regain power. He died
at Liège on August 7, 1106, eventually to be buried in
the cathedral of Speyer.
A contemporary, albeit anonymous, biographer most
movingly bemoaned the death of the emperor, the pro-
tector of the poor, opening with the words of Jeremiah
9.1: “Oh that my head were waters, and mine eyes a
fountain of tears, that I might weep day and night for
the slain daughter of my people.”
See also Anno; Gregory VII, Pope; Henry IIIFurther Reading
Benson, Robert L. ed. Imperial Lives and Letters of the Eleventh
Century, trans. Theodor E. Mommsen and Karl F. Morrison.
New York: Columbia University Press, 1962.
Freed, John B. “Henry IV of Germany.” In Dictionary of the
Middle Ages, vol. 6. New York: Scribner, 1985, p. 163.
Fuhrman, Horst. Germany in the High Middle Ages, trans. Timo-
thy Reuter. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1986.
Leyser, Karl. “The Crisis in Medieval Germany.” In Karl Leyser,
Communications and Po w e r in Medieval Europe, trans. Timo-
thy Reuter. London: Hambledon, 1994, pp. 21–49.
Lynch, J. H. “Hugh I of Cluny’s Sponsorship of Henry IV: Its
Context and Consequences.” Speculum 60 (1985): 800–826.
Struve, Tilman. “Heinrich IV.” In Lexikon des Mittelalters, vol.- Munich: Artemis, 1989, pp. 2041–2043.
von Gladiss, Dietrich, et al., ed. Die Urkunden Heinrichs IV, pts.
1–3. Monumenta Germaniae Historica. Diplomata 6/1–3.
Hanover: Hahn, 1977, 1959, 1978.
Wies, Erbst W. Kaiser Heinrich IV: Canossa und der Kampf um
die Weltherrshaft. Munich and Esslingen: Bechtle, 1996.
Uta-Renate Blumenthal
HENRY THE LION
(1129/1131–August 6, 1195)
Duke of Saxony and Bavaria (Heinrich der Lowe,
Herzog von Sachsen und Bayern), Henry the Lion was
born 1129/1131, the son of the Welf Henry the Proud
(Heinrich der Stolze) and Gertrude, daughter of Lothar
III. His father died in 1139, dispossessed of all his titles
in his feud with Conrad III, but the Empress Richenza,
Henry’s grandmother, and Count Adolf of Holstein
secured the boy’s northern inheritance. Henry was en-
feoffed with Saxony in 1142. (Bavaria had already been
granted to Conrad Ill’s half-brother Henry of Babenberg
[Heinrich Jasomirgott]). Henry became a tough soldier
and a ruthless politician, particularly in his Saxon lands
and in his relationship to the Archbishopric of Bremen,
and participated in the Wendish Crusade in 1147.
Frederick I Barbarossa of Swabia, Henry’s cousin,
became king in 1152. Henry accompanied Frederick
to Italy in 1154–1155, and, during the coronation riots
in Rome, saved his cousin’s life. In 1156 Frederick
returned Bavaria to Henry, but without the East Mark,
which became Austria. Frederick granted that fi efdom
to his uncle Henry Babenberg in the Privilegium minus
(Lesser Privilege).
Over the next twenty years Henry supported Frederick
but also expanded his own power. He founded Munich
in 1157 and Lübeck in 1159, and married Mathilda of
England (daughter of Henry II and Eleanor of Aquitaine)
in 1165. Henry also built the cathedral and the castle
in Brunswick (Braunschweig), was in Italy twice, and
went on a pilgrimage to Jerusalem in 1172.
In 1176, at Chiavenna, Frederick demanded Henry’sHENRY IV, EMPEROR