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Henry VI (November 1165 - 28 September 1197) was King of Germany from 1190 to 1197, Holy Roman Emperor from 1191 to 1197 and King of Sicily from 1194 to 1197. Biography Early years Born in Nijmegen, Henry was the second son of the emperor Frederick I and Beatrix of Burgundy, and was crowned King of the Romans at Bamberg in June 1169, at the age of four. After having taken the reins of the Empire from his father, who had gone on the Crusade, in 1189-1190 he suppressed a revolt by Henry the Lion, former duke of Saxony and Bavaria and relative of Frederick. Constance of Sicily was betrothed to Henry in 1184, and they were married on 27 January 1186 in Milan. Constance was the sole legitimate heir of William II of Sicily, and, after the latter's death in November 1189, Henry had the opportunity of adding the Sicilian crown to the imperial one, as his father had died crossing the Saleph River in Cilicia, now part of Turkey 10 June 1190. Coronation as Emperor Holy Roman Emperor In April 1191, in Rome, Henry and Constance were crowned Emperor and Empress by Pope Celestine III. The crown of Sicily, however, was harder to gain, as the barons of southern Italy had chosen a grandson of Roger II, Tancred, count of Lecce, as their king. Henry began his work besieging Naples, but he had to return to Germany (where Henry the Lion had revolted again) after his army had been heavily hit by an epidemic. Constance, who stayed behind in the palace at Salerno, was betrayed by the Salernitans, handed over to Tancred, and only released on the intervention of Celestine III, who in return recognized Tancred as King of Sicily. Henry had a stroke of fortune when Leopold V, Duke of Austria, gave him his prisoner, king Richard I of England, whom he kept in Trifels Castle. Ignoring his excommunication by Pope Celestine III for imprisoning a former crusader, Henry held Richard for a ransom of 150,000 silver marks. Henry was granted free passage in Northern Italy, signing with the Italian communes a treaty in January 1194. The following April he also reached a settlement with Henry the Lion. In February Tancred died, leaving as heir a young boy, William III. Henry met little resistance and entered Palermo, capital city of the Kingdom of Sicily, on 20 November, and was crowned on 25 December. He is also said to have had the young William blinded and castrated, while many Sicilian nobles were burned alive. Some, however, like the Siculo-Greek Eugene of Palermo, transitioned into the new Hohenstaufen government with ease. At that point, Henry was the most powerful monarch in the Mediterranean and Europe, since the Kingdom of Sicily added to his personal and Imperial revenues an income without parallel in Europe. Henry felt strong enough to send home the Pisan and Genoese ships without giving their governments the promised concessions in Southern Italy, and even forced the Byzantine Empire to collect a large tribute, which, however, was not paid before Henry's death. In 1194 his son, Frederick, the future emperor and king of Sicily and Jerusalem, was born. Henry secured his position in Italy, naming his friend Conrad of Urslingen as Duke of Spoleto and giving the Marche to Markward von Annweiler. His next aim was to make the imperial crown hereditary. At the Diet of Würzburg, held in April 1196, he managed to convince the majority of the princes to vote for his proposal, but in the following one at Erfurt (October 1196) he did not achieve the same favourable result. Death In 1197 the tyrannical power of the foreign King in Italy spurred a revolt, especially in southern Sicily, which his German soldiers suppressed mercilessly. In the same year Henry prepared for a Crusade, but, on 28 September, he died of malaria in Messina,[1] although it is also widely believed that he was poisoned.[2] His son Frederick II was to inherit both the Kingdom of Sicily and the Imperial crown. Henry was fluent in Latin and, according to Alberic of Troisfontaines, was "distinguished by gifts of knowledge, wreathed in flowers of eloquence, and learned in canon and Roman law". He was a patron of poets and poetry, and he almost certainly composed the song "Kaiser Heinrich", now among the Weingarten Song Manuscripts. According to his rank and with Imperial Eagle, regalia, and a scroll, he is the first and foremost to be portrayed in the famous Codex Manesse, a fourteenth-century manuscript showing 140 reputed poets (see Minnesänger), and at least three poems are attributed to a young and romantically minded Henry VI. In one of those he describes a romance which makes him forget all his earthly power, and neither riches nor royal dignity can outweigh his yearning for that lady (ê ich mich ir verzige, ich verzige mich ê der krône - before I give her up, I’d rather give up the crown). Sources Jump up ^ In 1197, although “the well-prepared crusade of Emperor Henry VI aimed at winning the Holy Land, it also aimed at attaining the ancient goal of Norm[an] policy in the E[ast]: the conquest of the Byz[antine] Empire.” See Werner Hilgemann and Hermann Kinder, The Anchor Atlas of World History, Volume I: From the Stone Age to the Eve of the French Revolution, trans. Ernest A. Menze (New York: Anchor Books, Doubleday, 1974), 153; “Henry pressed territorial and political claims against Constantinople, demanding territories the Normans had held in 1185 and using a remote family connection to pose as the avenger of the deposed emperor Isaac II. . . . even Pope Innocent III was frightened by the German emperor’s claims of world domination. As events turned out, however, Henry died suddenly in 1197 before he could carry out his plans for eastward expansion.” See Timothy E. Gregory, A History of Byzantium (Malden: Blackwell Publishing, 2005), 273. Jump up ^ "Henry VI died in Messina, poisoned, so it was believed, by his own entourage because of his Italian policy," Page 41, in Kenneth Varty (editor), Reynard The Fox: Social Engagement and Cultural Metamorphoses In the Beast Epic from the Middle Ages to the Present (Berghahn Books, 2000). ISBN 1-57181-737-9 Alberic of Troisfontaines, Chronicon David Abulafia, Frederick II From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia Another version: German King and Holy Roman German Emperor of the Hohenstaufen dynasty who increased his power and that of his dynasty by his acquisition of the Kingdom of Sicily through his marriage to Constance I, posthumous daughter of the Sicilian King Roger II. Although Henry failed in his objective of making the German crown hereditary, like the Sicilian crown, his son Frederick II, who became King of Sicily immediately after Henry VI's death, was subsequently elected Holy Roman German Emperor. A son of the Emperor Frederick I Barbarossa, Henry was chosen German King at Bamberg in June 1169 and crowned at Aachen in August of that year. He was married to Constance, who was 11 years older than he, in January 1186 in Milan. On the departure of Frederick I for the Holy Land on a crusade at Easter 1189, Henry took over the government of the empire. In 1189-90 he suppressed a revolt of Henry the Lion, former duke of Bavaria and Saxony. In November 1189, William II of Sicily died, leaving his father's half sister Constance heiress to the Sicilian kingdom, then consisting of the island of Sicily and the southern part of the Italian peninsula. After the death of Frederick I on crusade in June 1190, Henry VI made peace with Henry the Lion and proceeded to Italy, where he was crowned emperor by Pope Celestine III in April 1191. Meanwhile in Sicily a nationalist party unwilling to be governed by a German emperor chose Tancred, an illegitimate son of Constance's brother Roger, as King of Sicily. After his coronation, Henry, determined to conquer the Sicilian kingdom, besieged Naples. But when Henry the Lion, aided by others, once again revolted, Henry was forced to raise the siege (August 1191) and return to Germany. The Emperor's position was soon strengthened, however, by the imprisonment of King Richard I of England by Leopold V, Duke of Austria, in December 1192. When the Duke turned the English king over to Henry in the following February, Richard, in order to obtain his release, agreed to surrender his kingdom to the Emperor, receive it back as a fief, and pay a ransom of 100,000 silver marks as well as an additional 50,000 marks in lieu of helping Henry conquer the Sicilian kingdom. Henry the Lion came to terms with the Emperor in March 1194, and Henry VI was then free to turn his attention to Sicily. He had already, in January 1194, concluded the Treaty of Vercelli with the towns of Lombardy, thus ensuring their loyalty. His task was also made easier by the death in February 1194 of Tancred, who left as his heir a mere boy, William III. Thus, when Henry went to Italy in May 1194, he met with little resistance. He entered Palermo on November 20 and was crowned King of Sicily on December 25. In the winter of 1195-96, Henry induced about 50 princes to agree to make the succession to the crown of the Holy Roman Empire hereditary, and at the Diet of Würzburg (April 1196) a majority voted for it. A minority, however, continued to oppose it, and at the Diet of Erfurt (October 1196) this opposition was increased. Finally, Henry had to be content with the election of his son Frederick as German king in the customary way in December. In 1197, when Henry was in southern Italy preparing a crusade, a rebellion against his rule broke out in the Sicilian kingdom, which was put down with savage cruelty. In the same year Henry died of malaria at Messina. Encyclopædia Britannica 2006 Ultimate Reference Suite.
William B.
