claims of his ward, young Frederick II, who ultimately
secured the imperial title, in part as a consequence of
Innocent’s support. The new emperor’s gratitude was
deeply (and understandably) tinged with suspicion,
however, and his relations with the pope deteriorated
perceptibly during the latter years of Innocent’s life.
Innocent III was also intensely involved in French
and English politics. In France Innocent had to deal
with the intricate problems raised by the desire of King
Philip Augustus to annul his marriage with his second
wife, Ingeborg of Denmark, and marry Agnes of Meran.
The case not only raised complex questions of canon
law but was also fraught with touchy diplomatic issues.
Ultimately Innocent prevented Philip from divorcing
Ingeborg, but he compromised with the king on the
essential question of the succession to the throne by
legitimizing Philip and Agnes’s two children. Innocent
was simultaneously engaged in a struggle with King
John of England over royal control of English bishoprics
and, in particular, the succession of Stephen Langton
to the archbishopric of Canterbury. The pope placed
England under an interdict and forced John to back
down, surrender his crown to Innocent, and then receive
it back as a papal fi ef.
Innocent’s concept of papal power led him to spon-
sor military campaigns on many fronts against the
foes of Christendom. He strongly encouraged German
colonization and the forcible conversion of pagans in
the eastern Baltic, and he endowed these colonizing
expeditions with the privileges of a crusade. He pro-
claimed other crusades in the Middle East. One of these,
called the Fourth Crusade, made war on the Byzantine
Empire—instead of attacking Egypt as Innocent had
expected—and, to Innocent’s dismay, captured and
looted Constantinople, the capital of the largest Christian
power of the eastern Mediterranean. Undeterred by this,
the pope set in motion a further crusade against Egypt,
often called the Fifth Crusade; it achieved a short-lived
success when the crusaders briefl y captured Damietta,
although Innocent himself did not live to see this. Inno-
cent also used the mechanism of the crusade in Europe
when he launched the fi rst of a series of attacks that
came to be known as the Albigensian Crusade against
Cathar heretics in the south of France.
Innocent was also busy with the internal affairs of
the church establishment. He spent many hours each
day sitting as judge in disputes that had been referred
to the papal court from every part of the Christian
world. He actively promoted and encouraged new
orders of religious men and women, most notably the
Dominican and Franciscan friars, as well as numerous
smaller groups.
The climax of Innocent’s pontifi cate, in many ways,
was the Fourth Lateran Council, a great meeting of
bishops, abbots, and other prelates from throughout
the Christian world. This council met in Rome from
11 to 30 November 1215, after more than two years of
energetic preparations. Its agenda included a wide array
of measures designed to reform the church and to meet
the challenges that the pope and his advisers saw fac-
ing it. Among these were repressing heresy (the council
authorized vigorous new measures against heretics),
reforming the clergy and enforcing clerical discipline
more strictly, establishing a minimum wage for the
clergy, restructuring judicial procedure by abolishing
ordeals as a means of proof, improving the morals of
the laity by requiring every Christian to make an annual
confession of sins and receive communion, institut-
ing a sweeping reform of the church’s marriage law,
and numerous other measures, seventy in all, that the
council formally adopted at its solemn closing session.
The Fourth Lateran Council was thus a major effort to
reshape the Christian west, the culmination of Innocent
Ill’s grand design to place a newly reinvigorated church
at the center of European life and power.
See also Frederick II; Henry VI; Peter the ChanterFurther Reading
Editions
Migne, J.-P. Patrologia Latina, Vols. 214–217.
Regestum Innocentii III papae super negatio Romani imperii,
ed. Friedrich Kempf. Rome: Pontifi cia Università Gregori-
ana, 1947.
Die Register Innocenz III, ed. Othmar Hageneder and Anton
Haidacher. Graz and Cologne: Böhlaus, 1964–.
Studies
Imkamp, Wilhelm. Das Kirchenbild Innocenz’ III. (1198–1216).
Stuttgart: A. Hiersemann, 1983.
Kuttner, Stephan, and António García y García. “A New Eyewit-
ness Account of the Fourth Lateran Council.” Traditio, 20,
1964, pp. 115–178.
Laufs, Manfred. Politik und Recht bei Innozenz III.: Kaiser-
privilegien, Thronstreitregister, und Egerer Goldbulle in
der Reichs- und Rekuperationspolitik Papst Innozenz’ III.
Cologne: Böhlau, 1980.
Luchaire, Achille. Innocent III, 6 vols. Paris: Hachette, 1905–1908.
Maccarrone, Michele. Chiesa e stato nella dottrina di Innocenzo
III. Rome: Facultas Theologica Pontifi cii Athenaei Latera-
nensis, 1940.
Pennington, Kenneth. “The Legal Education of Pope Innocent
III.” Bulletin of Medieval Canon Law, 4, 1974, pp. 70–77.
Roscher, Helmut. Papst Innocenz III. und die Kreuzzüge. Göt-
tingen: Vandenhoeck u. Ruprecht, 1969.
Tillmann, Héiène. Papst Innocenz II. Bonn: L. Rohrscheid, 1954.
James A. BrundageINNOCENT IV, POPE (c. 1190–1254,
r. 25 June 1243–7 December 1254)
Pope Innocent IV (Sinibaldo Fieschi) was born in Ge-
noa. He was a descendant of the counts of Lavagna, who
had traditionally supported the emperor rather than theINNOCENT III, POPE