The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume 06 - (From Barbarossa to Dante) by Unknown
page 76 of 539 (14%)
page 76 of 539 (14%)
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which they had fought so long was now accorded them; the Emperor gave
up all right to the regalia and recognized the Lombard League. His dream of becoming a second Justinian had not been realized. The cities received the privilege of using the woods, meadows, bridges, and mills in their immediate vicinity, and of raising revenues from them; the jurisdiction in ordinary, civil, and criminal cases; the right of making fortifications. The Emperor was, to a certain extent, to be provided for when he chose to come to Italy; but he promised to make no long stay in any one town. The cities were to choose their own consuls, who were to be invested with their dignity by the Emperor or his representatives. The ceremony, however, was to be performed only once in five years. In important matters where more than a certain sum was at stake, appeals to the Emperor were to be allowed. With the city of Alessandria, so long to him a thorn in the flesh, Frederick had already come to a separate agreement by consent of the league. The city was, technically, to be annihilated, and then to be refounded; it was no longer to bear the name of the Pope, but that of the Emperor. Alessandria was to become Cæsarea; yet none of the Inhabitants was to suffer by the change. The treaty is extant; it provided that the people should leave the city and remain without the walls until led back by an imperial envoy. All the male inhabitants of Cæsarea were then to swear fealty to the Emperor and to his son Henry VI. The Lombard cities, from this time forward, remained true to Frederick. |
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