Henry VII, Holy Roman Emperor

Henry VII (German: Heinrich;

Born around 1273

On 15 August 1309, Henry VII announced his intention to travel to Rome, having sent his ambassadors to Italy to prepare for his arrival, and so consequently expected his troops to be ready to travel by 1 October 1310. Prior to leaving Germany, he sought to smooth relations with the Habsburgs, who had been forced against their will to accept the accession of Henry's son in Bohemia, cowed by the threats of making the Duchy of Austria dependent on the Bohemian crown. He therefore confirmed them in their imperial fiefs by October 1309; in exchange, Leopold of Habsburg agreed to accompany Henry in his Italian expedition, and to provide a body of troops as well.^[12]

Henry felt he needed to obtain a papal imperial coronation, partly because of the lowly origins of his house, and partly because of the concessions he had been forced to make to obtain the German crown in the first place.

Italy

The knights of emperor Henry VII defeat the Guelph faction of Guido della Torre in Milan

Torture and execution of the Guelph captain Teobaldo Brusati at the siege of Brescia

The Emperor in Italy.

After spending two months in Genoa, Henry continued on to Pisa by ship, where he was eagerly received by the inhabitants, who were the traditional enemies of Florence and were Ghibelline.[22] Here he again began negotiating with Robert of Naples, before deciding to enter into an alliance with Frederick III of Sicily, strengthening his position and hopefully putting pressure on Robert of Naples.^[20] He left Pisa in 1312 to go to Rome to be crowned as emperor, but on his way he discovered that Clement V was not going to crown him there.^[23]

Wars against Florence and Robert of Naples

Rome was in a state of confusion as Henry approached the city walls. The Orsini family had adopted the cause of Robert of Naples, while the Colonna family threw their weight behind Henry.^[20] With their partisans fighting in the streets, Henry was also confronted with the news that the Castel Sant'Angelo and the Vatican quarter were securely in the hands of Robert, the Angevin king of Naples,^[24] who had decided, with help from the Florentines^[23] that his own dynastic interests were not in favour of renewed Imperial presence in Italy.^{[citation needed]}

Basilica of St. John Lateran, Santa Maria Maggiore and the Colosseum, Henry was forced to perform his coronation on 29 June 1312 at the Lateran.^{[citation needed]} The ceremony was performed by three Ghibelline cardinals who had joined Henry on his way through Italy.^[17][25] The imperial party was fired upon by hostile crossbowmen in the Lateran’s banqueting hall shortly after the coronation.^[26] Robert of Naples, in the meantime, had made increasing demands upon Henry, including Henry making Robert's son the Imperial vicar of Tuscany, and that Henry had to depart Rome within four days of his coronation.^[22] Henry, in his turn, declared that the imperial prerogative overrode papal authority, and that the entirety of Italy was subject to the emperor.^[22] He then refused to commit, as Pope Clement V had requested, to seek a truce with Robert of Naples, and he didn't rule out attacking the southern kingdom.^[22] After Henry concluded a formal treaty signed with Robert's rival to the Sicilian throne, Frederick of Aragon, the chaos in the city of Rome forced Henry to leave, and, following the advice of Tuscan Ghibellines, he travelled north to Arezzo.^[25]

At Arezzo, in September 1312, Henry proceeded to pass a sentence against Robert of Naples,[27] as a rebel vassal.^[28] Meanwhile, at Carpentras near Avignon, Clement was unwilling to fully support Henry, since Robert, of a cadet line of the French, was the representative of French power in Italy, and Clement was far from independent of French policies, as well as considerations about encirclement by Henry should he successfully defeat Robert.^[27] But before Henry could move against Robert of Naples, he had to deal with the troublesome Florentines,^[27] who had been sending money to the Lombard cities that held out against Henry, and who had been strengthening the city's fortifications in anticipation of a siege.^[25]

In mid September, Henry approached the city and very quickly, it was obvious that the city militia and the Guelph cavalry could not match the emperor in an open battle against his battle-hardened soldiers from the north. The Florentine army was outmanoeuvred and lacking in provisions, so it retreated back into Florence during the night. Siena, Bologna, Lucca, and smaller cities, sent men to help man the walls.

His first target was the Guelph city of Siena, which he began to besiege, but within a week, Henry succumbed to malaria, which fast saw him become seriously ill. Fading rapidly, he left Siena on 22 August, and was sheltering in the little town of Buonconvento near Siena when he died on 24 August 1313.^[27] His body was taken to Pisa. Henry was only 40 years old when he died, and the high hopes for an effective Imperial power in Italy died with him.^[31]

Legacy

At Henry's death, and for the following decades, the central figure in Italian policy remained his nemesis, Robert of Naples.

Tomb of Henry VII, Codex Balduini Trevirensis (ca 1340).

Tomb of Henry VII, August 2012.

Pisa was a

The tomb, constructed in 1315 by Sienese sculptor Tino di Camaino,^[34] was built above the grave itself, with the statue of Henry VII lying above it and many other statues and angels. The tomb did not have a long life: for political reasons it was dismantled and the parts were reused in other places in the square. By 1985, the grave of the Emperor had been shifted to the right transept of the cathedral, near the tomb of Saint Ranieri; a couple of statues were put on the top of the façade and a number of statues portraying Henry VII himself and his counsellors were in the Cemetery. Nowadays the statues, the textiles and goldwork gathered around the funeral shroud have been moved to and are featured in the Museum of the Opera del Duomo [it] in Pisa,^[35] while the tomb remains in the cathedral.^{[citation needed]}

There is a plaster cast (1890) of the tomb in the Cast Courts of the Victoria and Albert Museum.^[34]

Henry VII is the famous alto Arrigo in Dante's Paradiso, in which the poet is shown the seat of honor that awaits Henry in Heaven. Henry in Paradiso xxx.137f is "He who came to reform Italy before she was ready for it". Dante also alludes to him numerous times in Purgatorio as the savior who will bring imperial rule back to Italy, and end the inappropriate temporal control of the Church.^{[citation needed]} In 1921, on the occasion of the 600th anniversary of Dante's death, Henry VII's tomb was opened and examined.^[36]

Henry VII's tomb was opened and studied again in 2013, 700 years after his death. The remains had been wrapped in a large rectangular colorful silk shroud, described in the 1921 study as "a fine shroud woven in bands", which was retrieved from the coffin for analysis and subsequently moved to be displayed at the Museum of the Opera del Duomo.^[36][37] The skeleton was recomposed and its analysis led to the estimation that Henry VII's height was 1.78 metres.^[36] The bones were also examined by X-ray diffraction, infrared spectroscopy, and scanning electron microscopy to study medieval post-mortem practices.^[38]

Family and children

Henry was married in Tervuren 9 July 1292 to Margaret of Brabant, daughter of John I, Duke of Brabant,^[39] and had the following children:

• John I, King of Bohemia (10 August 1296 – 26 August 1346)^[39]
• Marie (1304 – 26 March 1324, Issoudun), married in Paris 21 September 1322 to King Charles IV of France.^[39]
• Beatrix (1305 – 11 November 1319), married 1318 to King Charles I of Hungary. Beatrix died in child birth.^[39]

See also

• Towers and palaces of the Roero

References

Bibliography

Wikimedia Commons has media related to Henry VII, Holy Roman Emperor.

Fundamental for the study of Henry VII and his time are the new Regesta Imperii:

• Kurt-Ulrich Jäschke, Peter Thorau (Bearbeiter): Die Regesten des Kaiserreichs unter Rudolf, Adolf, Albrecht, Heinrich VII. 1273–1313. 4. Abteilung: Heinrich VII. 1288/1308–1313, 1. Lieferung: 1288/1308 – August 1309. Böhlau, Vienna 2006,
  ISBN 3-412-01906-2 (online
  ).
• Kurt-Ulrich Jäschke, Peter Thorau (Bearbeiter): Die Regesten des Kaiserreichs unter Rudolf, Adolf, Albrecht, Heinrich VII. 1273–1313. 4. Abteilung: Die Regesten des Kaiserreichs unter Heinrich VII. 1288/1308–1313, 2. Lieferung: 1. September 1309–23. Oktober 1310. Böhlau, Cologne u. a. 2014,
  ISBN 978-3-412-22181-2 (online
  ).

Secondary literature:

• Michel Pauly (Ed.): Gouvernance européenne au bas moyen âge. Henri VII de Luxembourg et l’Europe des grandes dynasties. = Europäische Governance im Spätmittelalter Heinrich VII. von Luxemburg und die großen Dynastien Europas. Actes des 15es Journées Lotharingiennes, 14 – 17 octobre 2008, Université du Luxembourg. Linden, Luxemburg 2010,
  ISBN 978-2-919979-22-6
• Jones, Michael, The New Cambridge Medieval History, Vol. VI: c. 1300-c. 1415, Cambridge University Press, 2000
• Kleinhenz, Christopher, Medieval Italy: an encyclopedia, Volume 1, Routledge, 2004
• Bryce, James, The Holy Roman Empire, 1913
• Sismondi, J. C. L., Boulting, William, History of the Italian Republics in the Middle Ages, 1906
• Comyn, Robert. History of the Western Empire, from its Restoration by Charlemagne to the Accession of Charles V, Vol. I. 1851
• William M. Bowsky, Henry VII in Italy, Lincoln, 1960.
• Maria Elisabeth Franke, Kaiser Heinrich VII. im Spiegel der Historiographie, Köln/Weimar/Wien, 1992.
• John A. Gades, Luxemburg in the Middle Ages, Brill, 1951.

Henry VII, Holy Roman Emperor House of Luxembourg Born: c. 1273 Died: 1313
Regnal titles
Preceded by Henry VI	Count of Luxembourg 1288–1313	Succeeded by John
Preceded by Gérard I	Count of Durbuy c. 1298–1313
Preceded by Albert I	King of the Romans 1308–1313	Succeeded by Louis IV
Preceded by Conrad IV	King of Italy 1311–1313
Preceded by Frederick II	Holy Roman Emperor 1312–1313