Frederick I Barbarossa

  General Notes:

Born: 1122, Waiblingen, Germany
Marriage: (1): Adelheid von Vohburg in 1147
Marriage: (2): Beatrix of Burgundy on 10 Jun 1156 in Wurzburg
Died: 10 Jun 1190, River Calycandus, Cilicia at age 68
Cause of his death was he drowned.
General Notes:
FREDERICK BARBAROSSA (ITALIAN: REDBEARD) duke of Swabia (as Frederick III, 1147-90) and German king and Holy Roman emperor (1152-90), who challenged papal authority and sought to establish German predominance in western Europe. He engaged in a long struggle with the cities of northern Italy (1154-83), sending six major expeditions southward. He died while on the Third Crusade to the Holy Land. Early years.Frederick was the son of Frederick II, duke of Swabia, and Judith, daughter of Henry IX, duke of Bavaria, of the rival dynasty of the Welfs. After succeeding his father as duke of Swabia, Frederick was elected German king on March 4, 1152, in Frankfurt, succeeding his uncle, Emperor Conrad III. Frederick's contemporaries believed that, because he united in himself the blood of the Welfs and the Hohenstaufen, he would solve the internal problems of the kingdom. The announcement of his election, which he sent to Pope Eugenius III, made it plain that Frederick I was not ready to recognize the preeminence over the emperors that the popes had won during the quarrel over the right of investiture of bishops and abbots. Frederick, moreover, filled several vacant episcopal sees, thereby violating the Concordat of Worms of 1122. Nevertheless, he was to learn that he could not prevail against the papacy as easily as the earlier emperors, Otto I and Henry III, had done because the political balance of the West had changed. Under the powerful emperor Manuel I Comnenus, the Byzantine Empire had grown to be a political factor in the Mediterranean and in Italy. Southern Italy and Sicily were united in the Norman kingdom of Roger II. The cities of the Lombards, which had been little more than a nuisance to the earlier emperors, had now become invincible.Frederick started his struggle for the old goal of the predominance of the Empire over the European monarchies with great political skill. By not recognizing the treaty of alliance between his predecessor, Conrad III, and Manuel I Comnenus of Byzantium against Roger II of Sicily, Frederick forced Pope Eugenius III to sign the Treaty of Constance (1153) with him because the Pope was more exposed to pressure from the Norman kingdom to the south as well as from Arnold of Brescia in Rome. Frederick promised not to make peace with the Roman commune, headed by Arnold (whom he hanged) or with the Normans without the agreement of the Pope. He also promised not to concede any Italian land to the Byzantine Emperor and, finally, to maintain the position of the papacy (honor papatus). Eugenius III, on his part, promised that Frederick would receive the imperial crown and that the rights of the empire would be maintained. When Manuel of Byzantium offered Frederick a Byzantine princess as wife and attempted to induce him to fight against the Norman kingdom, Frederick refused. The successor of Eugenius III, Pope Adrian IV, honoured the Treaty of Constance and crowned Frederick emperor on June 18, 1155, in Rome. The German princes refused to give Frederick the support necessary to attack the Sicilian kingdom, which, under Roger's son William I (reigned 1154-66), was passing through a crisis. Although Manuel now formed an allegiance with the rebellious Norman barons, the city of Genoa, and the Pope, Adrian still would not accept the Byzantine offer of help against William I of Sicily. After William had brought his crisis to an end, he was able to force the Pope to sign the Concordat of Benevento in 1156 by which Adrian gave William Sicily and the Norman principalities on the mainland as far north as Naples and Capua and granted him special rights for the Sicilian church. This new treaty was in violation of the Treaty of Constance. Cardinal Roland (later Pope Alexander III) was supposed to explain the Pope's new policy to the princes and to the Emperor at the imperial Diet of Besançon 1157. A letter from the Pope, which was translated in an inflammatory manner by the imperial chancellor Rainald of Dassel, caused a critical argument between the papal delegation and the German princes over whether or not the empire was dependent upon the papacy. Adrian explained later that he meant the word beneficium, which had caused all the trouble, to mean benefit and not fief.
Noted events in his life were:
• Acceded: Holy Roman Emperor, 1152.
Frederick married Adelheid von Vohburg, daughter of Diepold III von Vohburg and Unknown, in 1147. The marriage ended in divorce in 1153. (Adelheid von Vohburg was born in 1122 and died in 1190.)
Frederick next married Beatrix of Burgundy, daughter of Rainald III of Burgundy and Agathe de Lorraine, on 10 Jun 1156 in Wurzburg. (Beatrix of Burgundy was born in 1145 and died on 15 Nov 1184.)

Frederick married Beatrix of Burgundy, daughter of Rainald III of Burgundy and Agathe de Lorraine, on 10 Jun 1156 in Wurtzburg. (Beatrix of Burgundy was born in 1146 and died on 15 Nov 1184.)