Page:EB1911 - Volume 23.djvu/700

Rh that they elected a chief bearing the title of consul, senator, princeps Romanorum, who was officially recognized by the pope, as a patricius presided over the tribunals, and was the head of the commune.

Theophylact was one of the first to assume this dignity. His wife Theodora, known as the senatrix, was one of the women dominating Rome by force of their charms and licentiousness. She was supposed to be the concubine of Pope John X. (914-28), whose election was due to her influence. Her daughter Marozia, in all things her worthy rival, was married to Alberic, a foreign mercenary, of uncertain birth who rose to a position of great influence, and, although an alien, played a leading part in the affairs of the city. He helped to increase the power of Theophylact, who seemingly shared the rule of the city with the pope. In the bloody war that had to be waged against the Saracens of southern Italy, and at the defeat of the latter on the Garigliano (916), Theophylact and Alberic were the Roman leaders, and distinguished themselves by their valour. They disappeared from the scene after this victory, but Marozia retained her power, and bore a son, Alberic, who was destined to greater deeds. The pope found himself caught in this woman's toils, and struggled to escape, but Marozia, gaining fresh influence by her marriage with Hugo, margrave of Tuscany, imprisoned the pontiff himself in the castle of St Angelo (928). This fortress was the property of Marozia and the basis of her strength. The unfortunate John died within its walls. Raised to the chair by Theodora, he was deposed and killed by her daughter. The authority of the latter reached its culminating point in 931, when she succeeded in placing her son John XI. on the papal throne. On the death of her second husband she espoused Hugh of Provence, the same who in 928 had seized the iron crown at Pavia, and now aspired to the empire. Dissolute, ambitious and despotic, he came to Rome in 932, and, leaving his army outside the walls, entered the castle of St Angelo with his knights, instantly began to play the tyrant, and gave a blow to Alberic his stepson, who detested

him as a foreign intruder. This blow proved the cause of a memorable revolution; for Alberic rushed from the castle and harangued the people, crying that the time was come to shake off the tyrannous yoke of a woman and of barbarians who were once the slaves of Rome. Then, putting himself at the head of the populace, he closed the city gates to prevent Hugh's troops from coming to the rescue, and attacked the castle. The king fled; Marozia was imprisoned, Alberic proclaimed lord of the Romans, and the pope confined to the Lateran in the custody of his own brother. Rome was again an independent state, a republic of nobles. Rid of the temporal dominion of emperor and pope, and having expelled the foreigners with great energy and courage, it chose Alberic for its chief with the title of princeps atque omnium Romanorum senator. The tendency of the Roman Republic to elect a supreme authority, first manifested in the case of Theophylact, was repeated in those of Alberic, Brancaleone, Crescenzio, Cola di Rienzo and others. One of the many causes of this tendency maybe traced to the conception of the new empire of which Rome was the original and enduring fountainhead. As Rome had once transferred the empire from Byzantium to the Franks, so Rome was surely entitled to reclaim it. The imperial authority was represented by the office of patrician, now virtually assumed by Alberic. That he gave the name of Octavian to his son is an additional proof of this fact. In the Eternal City the medieval political idea has always the aspect of a resurrection or transformation of classic antiquity. This is another characteristic of the history of the Roman commune.

Alberic's strength was due to his connexion with the nobility, to his father's valiant service against the Saracens at the battle of Garigliano, and to the militia under his command, on which everything depended amid the internal and external dangers now threatening the new state. As yet no genuine municipal constitution was possible in Rome, where neither the people nor the wealthy burghers engaged in industry and commerce

had any fixed organization. All was in the hands of the nobles, and Alberic, as their chief, frequently convened them in council, although obliged to use pressure to keep them united and avoid falling a prey to their disputes. Hence the whole power was concentrated in his grasp; he was at the head of the tribunals as well as of the army. The judices de clero and judices de militia still existed, but no longer met in the Lateran or the Vatican, under the presidency of emperor and pope or their missi. Alberic himself was their president; and, a still more significant fact, their sittings were often held in his private dwelling. There is no longer any mention of prefect or patricius. The papal coinage was inscribed with Alberic's name instead of the emperor's. His chief attention was given to the militia, which was still arranged in scholae, and it is highly probable that he was the author of the new division of the city into twelve regions, with a corresponding classification of the army in as many regiments under twelve flags and twelve banderesi, one for every region. The organization of the scholae could not have been very dissimilar, but doubtless Alberic had some important motive for altering the old method of classification. By means of the armed regions he included the people in the forces. It is certain that after his time we find the army much changed and far more democratic. It was only natural that so excellent a statesman should seek the aid of the popular element as a defence against the arrogance of the nobles, and it was requisite to reinforce the army in order to be prepared for the attacks threatened from abroad. This change effected, Alberic felt prepared for the worst, and began to rule with energy, moderation and justice. His contemporaries award him high praise, and he seems to have been exempt from the vices of his mother and grandmother.

In 933 Hugh made his first attack upon the city, and was repulsed. A second attempt in 936 proved still more unfortunate, for his army was decimated by a pestilence. Thoroughly disheartened, he not only made peace, but gave his daughter in marriage to Alberic, thus satisfying the latter's desire to ally himself with a royal house. But this union led to no conciliation with Hugh. For Alberic, finding his power increased, marched at the head of his troops to consolidate his rule in the Campagna and the Sabine land. On the death of his brother, Pope John XI., in 936, he controlled the election of several successive popes, quelled a conspiracy formed against him by the clergy and certain nobles instigated by Hugh, and brilliantly repulsed, in 941, another attack by that potentate. At last, however, this inveterate foe withdrew from Rome, being summoned to the north by the victories of his rival Berengarius. But Alberic, after procuring the election of various popes who were docile instruments of his will, experienced a check when Agapetus II. (946-55), a man of firmness and resource, was raised to the papal throne. The fortunes of Berengarius were now in the ascendant. In 950 he had seized the iron crown, and ruled in the Pentapolis and the exarchate. This being singularly painful to the pope, he proceeded to make alliance with all those enemies of Berengarius preferring a distant emperor to a neighbouring and effective sovereign, with the Roman nobles who were discontented with Alberic, and with all who foresaw danger, even to Rome, from the extended power of Berengarius. And Agapetus recurred to the old papal policy, by making appeal to Otto I., whose rule in Germany was distinguished by a prestige almost comparable with that of Charlemagne.

Otto immediately responded to the appeal and descended into Italy; but his envoys were indignantly repulsed by Alberic, and, being prudent as well as firm, he decided to wait a more opportune moment for the accomplishment of his designs. Meanwhile Alberic died in 954, and the curtain fell on the first great drama of the Roman Republic. He had reigned for twenty-two years with justice, energy and prudence; he had repelled foreign invaders, maintained order and authority. He seems, however, to have realized that the aspect of affairs was about to change, that the work he had accomplished would be exposed to new dangers. These dangers, in fact, had already begun with the accession of an enterprising pope to the Holy