The Holy Roman Empire was a political entity in Western, Central and Southern Europe that developed during the Early Middle Ages and continued until its dissolution in 1806 during the Napoleonic Wars.
The Ottonian dynasty was a Saxon dynasty of German monarchs (919–1024), named after three of its kings and Holy Roman Emperors named Otto, especially its first Emperor Otto I. It is also known as the Saxon dynasty after the family's origin in the German stem duchy of Saxony. The family itself is also sometimes known as the Liudolfings, after its earliest known member Count Liudolf and one of its primary leading-names. The Ottonian rulers were successors of the Germanic king Conrad I who was the only Germanic king to rule in East Francia after the Carolingian dynasty and before this dynasty.
The Salian dynasty or Salic dynasty was a dynasty in the High Middle Ages. The dynasty provided four kings of Germany (1024–1125), all of whom went on to be crowned Holy Roman emperors (1027–1125).
Otto III was Holy Roman Emperor from 996 until his early death in 1002. A member of the Ottonian dynasty, Otto III was the only son of the Emperor Otto II and his wife Theophanu.
Otto II, called the Red, was Holy Roman Emperor from 973 until his death in 983. A member of the Ottonian dynasty, Otto II was the youngest and sole surviving son of Otto the Great and Adelaide of Italy.
Conrad II, also known as Conrad the Elder and Conrad the Salic, was the emperor of the Holy Roman Empire from 1027 until his death in 1039. The first of a succession of four Salian emperors, who reigned for one century until 1125, Conrad ruled the kingdoms of Germany, Italy and Burgundy.
The Holy Roman Emperor, originally and officially the Emperor of the Romans during the Middle Ages, and also known as the German-Roman Emperor since the early modern period, was the ruler and head of state of the Holy Roman Empire. The empire was considered by the Roman Catholic Church to be the only successor of the Roman Empire during the Middle Ages and the early modern period. The title was held in conjunction with the title of king of Italy from the 8th to the 16th century, and, almost without interruption, with the title of king of Germany throughout the 12th to 18th centuries.
A prince-bishop is a bishop who is also the civil ruler of some secular principality and sovereignty. The principality or prince-bishopric (Hochstift) ruled politically by a prince-bishop could wholly or largely overlap with his diocesan jurisdiction, but some parts of his diocese, even the city of his residence, could be exempt from his civil rule, obtaining the status of free imperial city. If the episcopal see is an archbishop, the correct term is prince-archbishop; the equivalent in the regular (monastic) clergy is prince-abbot. A prince-bishop is usually considered an elected monarch.
The Investiture Controversy, also called Investiture Contest, was a conflict between the church and the state in medieval Europe over the ability to choose and install bishops (investiture) and abbots of monasteries and the pope himself. A series of popes in the 11th and 12th centuries undercut the power of the Holy Roman Emperor and other European monarchies, and the controversy led to nearly 50 years of civil war in Germany.
German mediatisation was the major territorial restructuring that took place between 1802 and 1814 in Germany and the surrounding region by means of the mass mediatisation and secularisation of a large number of Imperial Estates. Most ecclesiastical principalities, free imperial cities, secular principalities, and other minor self-ruling entities of the Holy Roman Empire lost their independent status and were absorbed into the remaining states. By the end of the mediatisation process, the number of German states had been reduced from almost 300 to just 39.
A diocesan administrator is a provisional ordinary of a Roman Catholic particular church.
The Prince-Bishopric of Brixen was an ecclesiastical principality of the Holy Roman Empire in the present-day northern Italian province of South Tyrol. It should not be confused with the larger Catholic diocese, over which the prince-bishops exercised only the ecclesiastical authority of an ordinary bishop. The bishopric in the Eisack/Isarco valley was established in the 6th century and gradually received more secular powers. It gained imperial immediacy in 1027 and remained an Imperial Estate until 1803, when it was secularised to Tyrol. The diocese, however, existed until 1964, and is now part of the Diocese of Bolzano-Brixen.
Cambrésis is a former pagus, county and prince-bishopric of the medieval Holy Roman Empire that was annexed to the Kingdom of France in 1679. It is now regarded as one of the "natural regions" of France, and roughly equivalent to the Arrondissement of Cambrai in department Nord. The capital of Cambrésis was Cambrai. Originally ruled by a dynasty of counts, Cambrésis became a prince-bishopric in 1007, comparable to the Prince-Bishopric of Liège and the Prince-Bishopric of Utrecht. It encompassed the territory in which the bishop of Cambrai had secular authority.
The Prince-Bishopric of Bamberg was an ecclesiastical State of the Holy Roman Empire. It goes back to the Roman Catholic Diocese of Bamberg established at the 1007 synod in Frankfurt, at the behest of King Henry II to further expand the spread of Christianity in the Franconian lands. The bishops obtained the status of Imperial immediacy about 1245 and ruled their estates as Prince-bishops until they were subsumed to the Electorate of Bavaria in the course of the German Mediatisation in 1802.
Henry II, also known as Saint Henry the Exuberant, Obl. S. B., was Holy Roman Emperor from 1014. He died without an heir in 1024, and was the last ruler of the Ottonian line. As Duke of Bavaria, appointed in 995, Henry became King of the Romans following the sudden death of his second cousin, Emperor Otto III in 1002, was made King of Italy in 1004, and crowned emperor by Pope Benedict VIII in 1014.
The historic territory of Verden emerged from the Monarchs of the Frankish Diocese of Verden in the area of present-day central and northeastern Lower Saxony and existed as such until 1648. The territory managed by secular lords for the bishops was not identical with that of the bishopric, but was located within its boundaries and made up about a quarter of the diocesan area. The territory was referred to at the time as Stift Verden or Hochstift Verden, roughly equating to Prince-Bishopric of Verden. This territory described in local sources today incorrectly as Bistum Verden and, in 1648, was given the title Principality of Verden, sometimes referred to as the Duchy of Verden.
The Diocese and Prince-bishopric of Schwerin was a Catholic diocese in Schwerin, Mecklenburg, in Germany. The first registered bishop was ordained in the diocese in 1053, and the diocese ceased to exist in 1994.
A diocesan feud is either a warlike conflict between two contenders for the election of a prince-bishop, ruler of a bishopric or archbishopric in the Holy Roman Empire, or an armed conflict between two parties within such a territory. The introduction of the Imperial Church System in the 10th century had intended the position of prince-bishops to be non-hereditary, as all Catholic clergymen were required to be celibate and thus could not produce legitimate offspring to inherit their possessions. Instead, the Holy Roman Emperor would appoint one of his confidants as prince-bishop, upon whose death he could choose a successor himself. However, after the decline of imperial authority over clerical appointments due to the Investiture Controversy (1076–1122), ending with the Concordat of Worms, the cathedral chapters started electing the bishops, and their choice had to be confirmed by the metropolitan bishop. In the 14th century, the Holy See began to reserve the appointment of certain bishops to itself, after which the pope gradually laid claim to the exclusive right to appoint all bishops everywhere.
The Utrecht Schism was a diocesan feud in the Prince-Bishopric of Utrecht from 1423 to 1449. The legitimate prince-bishop of Utrecht was at issue. The war of succession was fought by Zweder van Culemborg and his brother Walraven van Meurs against Rudolf van Diepholt. The conflict mixed with the existing Utrecht factionalism between the Lichtenbergers and Lokhorsten and with the Hook and Cod wars raging in the County of Holland. Some scholars consider the Utrecht Schism to have ended in 1429.
