Page:A General Sketch of Political History from the Earlist Times.djvu/220

 2o8 THE LATER MIDDLE AGES When Wenzel's rival, Rupert of the Palatinate, died, Sigis- mund got himself elected German king, though Wenzel had Sigismund, never recognised his own deposition. It is of 14H- interest to note that Brandenburg was now be- stowed by Sigismund on Frederick of Hohenzollern, who thus became the first Elector belonging to the house which has given its kings to Prussia and its present emperor to Germany. Sigismund ultimately was actually crowned emperor. When he died, in 1437, Albert 11. of the house of Hapsburg or Austria was elected : and from that time forward the The ' Hapsburg Imperial Crown was invariably bestowed on some Dynasty, member of that house until the dynasty of Haps- burg was converted into the dynasty of Lorraine by the marriage of its heiress, Maria Theresa, to Francis of Lorraine in the eighteenth century. The Emperor Frederick ill., who succeeded Albert 11., was the last of the emperors who comes within our present period, and was also the last who was actually crowned at Rome. The reign of Sigismund was so closely connected with the ecclesiastical questions of the day, that we must now trace the 3. The fortunes of the papacy during the hundred and Papacy. fifty years preceding his election as German king. We saw that Pope Gregory x. was largely instrumental in the election of Rudolf of Hapsburg as German king. Gregory was himself one of the few popes who was more anxious for the welfare of Christendom than for the aggrandisement of the papacy, and preferred to see order in Germany even at the risk of reviving rivalry between pope and emperor. For a moment it even seemed that he would succeed in reconciling the Greek and the Latin churches, for he still dreamed of a united Christendom and the recovery of the Holy Land. But his reign was all too brief. After an interval, in an unusual 'access of religious sentiment, the cardinals chose, to occupy the chair of St. Peter, a hermit who was credited with exceptional holiness. Unfortunately, he also proved himself exceptionally incompetent, and was deposed by the cardinals, who replaced him by the pope known as Boniface vin.