returning from Palestine became, at the instigation of local factions,
Norman adventurers, and their leaders obtaining lands from the local
Princes in return for help, sought confirmation of their title from
some legitimate authority. The Western Empire had never claimed these
lands, but none the less Conrad II and Henry III, in return for the
acceptance of their suzerainty, acknowledged the titles which the
Norman leaders had already gained from Greek or Lombard. Rome was
likely to be their next victim, and Leo IX took the opportunity of a
dispute over the city of Benevento to try conclusions with them. A
humiliating defeat was followed by a mock submission of the conqueror.
The danger was in no sense removed. Pope Stephen's schemes for driving
them out of Italy were cut short by his death, and meanwhile the
Norman power increased. Thus there could be no question of expulsion,
nor could the Papacy risk a repetition of the humiliation of Leo IX.
It was Hildebrand who conceived the idea of turning a dangerous
neighbour into a friend and protector. A meeting was arranged at Melfi
between Pope Nicholas and the Norman princes, and there, while on the
one side canons were issued against clerical marriage, which was rife
in the south of Italy, on the other side Robert Guiscard, the Norman
leader, recognised the Pope as his suzerain, and obtained in return
the title of Duke of Apulia and Calabria and of Sicily when he should
have conquered it. Pope Leo's agreement, six years before, had been
made by a defeated and humiliated ecclesiastic with a band of
unscrupulous adventurers. Pope Nicholas was dealing with an actual
ruler who merely sought legitimate recognition of his title from any
whose hostility would make his hold precarious. Thus resting on the
shadowy basis of the donation of Constantine the Pope substituted
himself for the Emperor, whether of West or of East, over the whole of
Southern Italy. Truly the movement for the emancipation of the Church
from the State was already shaping itself into an attempt at the