Henry VII (1275 or 1278/79Cf. Kurt-Ulrich Jäschke, Peter Thorau: 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. Vienna 2006, Regest a (online). – 24 August 1313)Kleinhenz, pg. 494 was the King of Germany from 1308 and Holy Roman Emperor from 1312. He was the first emperor of the House of Luxembourg. During his brief career he reinvigorated the imperial cause in Italy, which was racked with the partisan struggles between the divided Guelph and Ghibelline factions, and inspired the praise of Dino Compagni and Dante Alighieri. He was the first emperor since the death of Frederick II in 1250, ending the Great Interregnum of the Holy Roman Empire; however, his premature death threatened to undo his life's work. His son, John of Bohemia, failed to be elected as his successor, and there was briefly another anti-king, Frederick the Fair, who contested the rule of Louis IV.

Life

Election as King of the Romans

Born probably between 1275 or 1278/79Cf. the new Regesta Imperii Kurt-Ulrich Jäschke, Peter Thorau: 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, Regest a (online). in Valenciennes, he was a son of Count Henry VI of Luxembourg and Béatrice from the House of Avesnes.Georgina R. Cole-Baker, The Date of the Emperor Henry VII's Birth, in: The English Historical Review, Vol. 35, No. 138 (Apr. 1920), pp. 224–231, here pg. 227. Raised at the French court, he was the lord of comparatively small properties in a peripheral and predominantly French-speaking part of the Holy Roman Empire.Jones, pg. 530 It was symptomatic of the empire's weakness that during his rule as the Count of Luxembourg, he agreed to become a French vassal, seeking the protection of King Philip the Fair of France.Jones, pg. 517 During his rule of Luxembourg, he ruled effectively, especially in keeping the peace in local feudal disputes.Henry became caught up in the internal political machinations of the Holy Roman Empire with the assassination of King Albert I on 1 May 1308. Almost immediately, King Philip of France began aggressively seeking support for his brother, Charles of Valois, to be elected the next King of the Romans.Jones, pg. 529 Philip thought he had the backing of the French Pope Clement V (established at Avignon), and that his prospects of bringing the empire into the orbit of the French royal house were good. He lavishly spread French money in the hope of bribing the German electors. Although Charles of Valois had the backing of Henry, Archbishop of Cologne, a French supporter, many were not keen to see an expansion of French power, least of all Clement V.Comyn, pg. 408 The principal rival to Charles appeared to be Rudolf, the Count Palatine.

Given his background, although he was a vassal of Philip the Fair, Henry was bound by few national ties, an aspect of his suitability as a compromise candidate among the electors,Comym, pg. 410 the great territorial magnates who had lived without a crowned emperor for decades, and who were unhappy with both Charles and Rudolf. Henry's brother, Baldwin, Archbishop of Trier, won over a number of the electors, including the Archbishop of Cologne, in exchange for some substantial concessions. Consequently, Henry skillfully negotiated his way to the crown, elected with six votes at Frankfurt on 27 November 1308. The only elector who did not support him was Henry, King of Bohemia. Henry was subsequently crowned at Aachen on 6 January 1309.

In July 1309, Pope Clement V confirmed Henry's election.Jones, pg. 531 He agreed to crown Henry emperor at Candlemas 1312 personally, the title having been vacant since the death of Frederick II.Jones, pg. 532 Henry in exchange, swore an oath of protection to the Pope, agreed to defend the rights and not attack the privileges of the cities of the Papal States, and also agreed to go on Crusade once he had been crowned emperor. Yet the newly crowned king had local issues to deal with before he could seek the imperial crown. Henry was approached by part of the Bohemian nobility and some important and influential ecclesiastics to intervene in Bohemia. Unhappy with the rule of Henry of Carinthia, and wary of the claims of the Habsburgs who had some legitimate claim on the crown, they convinced Henry to marry his son John I, Count of Luxemburg to Elizabeth, the daughter of Wenceslas II, and so establish a claim to the Bohemian crown. In July 1310 he engineered the removal of Henry of Carinthia.

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.

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. He also saw it, together with the crowns of Italy and Arles, as a necessary counterweight to the ambitions of the French king. To ensure the success of his Italian expedition, Henry entered into negotiations with Robert, King of Naples in mid-1310, with the intent of marrying his daughter, Beatrix to Robert's son, Charles, Duke of Calabria. It was hoped that this would lessen the tensions in Italy between the anti-imperial Guelphs, who looked to the King of Naples for leadership, and the pro-imperial Ghibellines. Negotiations broke down due to Robert's excessive monetary demands, as well as through the interference of Philip, who did not want such an alliance to succeed.

Descent into Italy

While these negotiations were taking place, Henry began his descent into northern Italy in October 1310, with his eldest son John remaining in Prague as the Imperial vicar. As he crossed the Alps and travelled into the Lombard plain, nobles and prelates of both Guelph and Ghibelline factions hastened to greet him, and Dante circulated an optimistic open letter addressed to the rulers and the people.Jones, pg. 533 As emperor, Henry had planned to restore the glory of the Holy Roman Empire, but he did not reckon on the bitterly divided state that Italy had now become. Decades of warfare and strife had seen the rise of dozens of independent city-states, each one nominally Guelph or Ghibelline, backed by either urban nobles supporting a powerful ruler (such as Milan), or the rising non-noble merchant classes embedded in oligarchic republican states (such as Florence). Each of these contests had created bitter losers, each of whom looked to the emperor-elect for restitution. Henry expressed both his high-minded idealism and lack of political craft in his plan to require all the cities of Lombardy to welcome back their exiles, of whatever their political stripe. He received both parties, Guelph or Ghibelline, courteously; in the beginning he showed no obvious favoritism to either party, hoping that his magnanimity would be reciprocated by both sides.Sismondi, pg. 253 Nevertheless, he insisted that the current rulers in all of the Italian city-states had usurped their powers. He insisted that the towns should come under the immediate control of the Empire, and that their exiles should be recalled. He eventually forced the cities to comply with his demands, and the despots had to surrender their keys. Although Henry rewarded their submission with titles and fiefs, it did cause a great deal of resentment that only grew over time. This was the situation confronting the king when he arrived in Turin in November 1310, at the head of 5,000 soldiers, including 500 cavalry.

After a brief stay at Asti where Henry intervened in the political affairs in the town, much to the consternation of the Italian Guelphs,Kleinhenz, pg. 495 Henry proceeded to Milan, where he was crowned King of Italy with the Iron Crown of Lombardy on 6 January 1311. The Tuscan Guelphs refused to attend the ceremony, and began preparing for resistance to Henry's imperial dreams. As part of his program of political rehabilitation, he recalled the Visconti, the ousted former rulers of Milan from exile. Guido della Torre, who had thrown the Visconti out of Milan, objected and organised a revolt against Henry that was ruthlessly put down, and the Visconti were returned to power, with Henry appointing Matteo I Visconti as the Imperial vicar of Milan.Jones, pg. 534 He also imposed his brother-in-law, Amadeus of Savoy, as the vicar-general in Lombardy. These measures, plus a massive levy imposed on the Italian towns,Jones, pg. 443 caused the Guelph cities to turn against Henry, and he encountered further resistance when he sought to enforce imperial claims on what had become communal lands and rights, and attempted to replace communal regulations with imperial laws. Nevertheless, Henry managed to restore some semblance of imperial power in parts of northern Italy. Cities such as Parma, Lodi, Verona and Padua all accepted his rule.

At the same time any resistance of the north Italian communes was ruthlessly suppressed; however, the punishments levied on cities that submitted stiffened the resistance of others. Cremona was the first to feel Henry's wrath, after the Torriani family and their supportersSismondi, pg. 232 had fled from Milan, falling on 26 April 1311, after which he razed the city walls. Henry then expended much of his initial capital of good-will with delays, such as the four-month siege of Brescia in 1311, delaying his journey to Rome. Popular opinion began to turn against Henry, with Florence allying itself with the Guelph communities of Lucca, Siena and Bologna, and engaging in a propaganda war against the king. This was successful in that Pope Clement V, under increasing pressure from King Philip of France, began to distance himself from Henry and to take up the cause of the Italian Guelphs who had been appealing to the Papacy for support.

Despite plague and desertions, he managed to extract Brescia's surrender in September 1311. Henry then passed through Pavia before arriving in Genoa, where he again tried to mediate between the warring factions within the town. During his stay in the city, his wife Margaret of Brabant died.Comyn, pg. 447 Also while in Genoa he discovered that King Robert of Naples had decided to oppose the spread of imperial power in the Italian peninsula, and resumed his traditional position as head of the Guelph parties,Comyn, pg. 444 as Florence, Lucca, Siena and Perugia all declared their support for Robert. Henry attempted to intimidate Robert by ordering him to attend his imperial coronation, and to swear fealty for his imperial fiefs in Piedmont and Provence.Jones, pg. 535 With Florence's encouragement, much of Lombardy flared into open rebellion against Henry, with uprisings throughout December 1311 and January 1312, while in the Romagna, King Robert strengthened his position. Nevertheless, Henry's supporters managed to capture Vicenza, and he received an embassy from Venice, who offered him the friendship of their city. Henry also began legal proceedings against Florence, laying charges of Lèse majesté against the city and placing it under an Imperial ban in December 1311.