Page:A General Sketch of Political History from the Earlist Times.djvu/204

 192 THE LATER MIDDLE AGES receive their crown at his hand. Monarchs who in this way submitted themselves to him included the kings of Portugal, innocent ill., Aragon, and Poland, and king John of Eng_ 1198 - land. Throughout the thirteenth century the Church was able to exercise a greater political control than at any other period of its history. Indirectly, also, its influence was greatly increased by the establishment of the orders f of Mendicant Friars, the Franciscans and Dominicans, who, for a time at least, lived up to the principles of their founders, preaching and practising a higher morality than the clergy had taught by precept or example during the past. When Frederick n. wrested the Imperial Crown from the Saxon claimant Otto, the strife with the papacy was renewed. Frederick II., The popes claimed that the Norman kingdom of 1215-1250. Sicily was held as a papal fief. Frederick, known in his own day as the 'wonder of the world,' the most brilliantly accomplished prince who ever occupied a throne, was a man living in an age wholly unsuited to him. His ideas were those which did not become prevalent till centuries after his death. To the men of his own day he seemed no better than an infidel. We have seen how his crusading efforts only intensified the breach between him and Pope Gregory ix. He returned from the east to carry on the contest almost immediately after- wards with Gregory and his successor Innocent iv. Gregory even went so far as to proclaim a crusade against him. Italy was divided between the parties now known as the Guelfs and Ghibellines, equivalent to Papalists and Imperialists. There were Guelf cities and Ghibelline cities, and in most of them a Guelf faction and a Ghibelline faction. Frederick's son Conrad succeeded him in Sicily, and as German king, but never received the Imperial Crown ; and End of the with him, in fact, ended the line of the Hohen- Hohenstaufen. staufen. His half-brother Manfred endeavoured to maintain grip of Sicily and Southern Italy in the name of his nephew Conrad, the actual heir, who is generally known as Conradin. But Manfred was overthrown and slain at the great battle of Benevento. A last effort was made by the gallant young Conradin ; but he, too, was crushed, taken prisoner in