which was as the garden of Eden before them, behind them was a desolate wilderness. King Berengar brought them to bay by the river Brenta. They asked leave to retreat, and rid the land of their presence. The King haughtily refused; his army was routed, and the savages overran the land without further opposition. In after-times the King allied himself with these barbarians against his private enemies.

3. The Troubles of Italy.-Though Berengar was crowned Emperor, he did nothing against the enemies of Italy or of the Pope. He employed himself entirely in seeking to counteract the intrigues of the nobles, which were chiefly set on foot by Ermengarde, daughter of Adalbert of Tuscany, and widow of Adalbert of Ivrea. Rudolf of Burgundy was set up against him, and for the moment succeeded in seizing the crown. Berengar was assassinated, and after his death a new claimant appeared. Hugh of Provence was the son of Bertha, widow of Adalbert, and half-brother of Guido, the reigning Marquess of Tuscany, and of Ermengarde, widow of the Marquess of Ivrea. He thus united the interests of both these great houses. He landed at Pisa in 926, and was received as King by Pope John. Rome was in the power of an infamous woman called Marozia. This is the darkest period in the history of the Papacy. Two celebrated women, Theodora and Marozia, were supreme. The latter was the mother, the mistress, and, perhaps, the murderer of a Pope. She now married King Hugh; but the Romans would not allow the foreigner to come within their walls, and he was forced to keep his court in the Castle of St. Angelo. He was driven away by Alberic, son of Marozia, who restored to the city some republican institutions. Alberic ruled over Rome till he died, and was succeeded by his son, who ruled the city as Consul under the name of Octavian, and as Pope under that of John the Twelfth. Although Hugh was driven out from Rome, he ruled over the rest of Italy. His life was hateful for

its shameful immorality, and he used his kingly power simply as a means of robbery. Conspiracies were formed against him. The most formidable was one to give the throne to Berengar Marquess of Ivrea, the greatest noble of North Italy. He had married Willa, a daughter of Boso, the brother of King Hugh; and his wife stirred him up against her uncle, who, not without reason, was hated by her family. The King found out the conspiracy, and would have blinded Berengar, but he was warned by Lothar, the King's son, and so fled and escaped. The King brought upon himself the hatred of the great nobles, ecclesiastical and civil, because he gave so much to his foreign followers, and so they left him for Berengar, who again came into Italy. Hugh went back to Provence, and left his son Lothar to bear the title of King. In a short time Lothar died, and his death is put down to Berengar, whom he had once saved from his father's anger. After his death Berengar and his son Adalbert took the title of King.

4. Otto the Great in Italy, 951.-Berengar sought Adelheid, the young and beautiful widow of Lothar, in marriage for his son, and on her refusal he shut her up in prison, and used her very cruelly. News of her sad fate were carried across the Alps, and Otto the Great, the German King, came down and delivered her with a strong hand, and afterwards married her. Berengar was powerless before him, and became his man at Pavia. Otto returned home in triumph, and the North of Italy was left to the evil government of King Berengar, until the German came again and claimed the kingdom and Empire. Otto was the representative of the Dukes of Saxony. His father Henry had been elected King of the Germans, and had given the Magyars or Hungarians the first great check on the field of Merseberg. The great work of ridding Europe of this dreadful scourge was carried on by Otto after he came back from Italy. The invasion was ended by the battle of

Lechfeld. The Hungarians were made to settle down, and are henceforth to be reckoned among the nations of Europe. In 957 the discontent which Berengar's oppression caused in Italy was heard by the great German King. His son Ludolf entered Italy, but died shortly after, and Berengar's oppression was increased by jealousy. At last Otto came into Italy with a large army, and in 962 was crowned King and Emperor. Berengar and his wife ended their days in Germany, and the shadowy line of Italian Kings and Emperors came to an end.

5. The Saxon Emperors, 962-1002.-The crown of the Italian kingdom or of Lombardy, and that of the Empire, which latter brought with it rights over Rome and the Lombard Duchies, were now again worn by a German King; and from this time the belief began to grow that he who was chosen King by the Germans had a right to be crowned King of Italy at Milan and Emperor at Rome. The coronation of Otto was a great revival of the Empire, for the Italian Emperors had been no more than Kings of part of Italy with a highsounding, but in their case a meaningless, title. But from that time the great armies of the German Kings made the title of Augustus again venerable. If the Imperial dignity had remained in the hands of Italian Princes, it would certainly have lacked the vast and splendid theories which clustered round it, but possibly the Italian King, aided by so great a name, might have formed a free and united Italy. As it was, the Empire gained in strength by being joined to a great power like Germany; but, as the German King thus became rightful Emperor and King of Italy, it thus strangely happened that the lawful Sovereign of the land was of another nation. As soon as Otto had left Rome, the wicked Pope, John the Twelfth, began to conspire with Berengar, and even with the Magyars. He inherited the influence of his father Alberic; and the Romans, who

hated to be governed, rose against the German soldiers. But the Pope was solemnly deposed for his treachery and other crimes, and the Roman people were put down again and again, until at last the Emperor took away all their independent institutions, and committed the care of the city to Leo the Eighth, a Pope of his own choosing. Thus Otto made himself complete master of the city and the Pope. In South Italy the Emperor tried to secure the allegiance of the Lombard Princes, which wavered between the two Empires. He carried on war against the Eastern Emperor, but had no great success, and on the death of Nikêphoros Phokas he made peace with his successor John Tzimiskês and married his son Otto to Theophanô, daughter of the Emperor Romanos. This marriage made Otto the Second very anxious to join South Italy to his Empire. He made an attempt upon it with the help of the Lombard Duke of Beneventum, but the people allied themselves with the Saracens, and the bloody battle of Crotona saved the Theme of Lombardy for the Eastern Emperor Basil the Second. After this victory the power of the Eastern Emperor in the South greatly increased. The old Lombard duchy of Beneventum finally fell to pieces at the death of Pandulf Ironhead, Otto's ally, and the Eastern Emperors gained considerable power over the small parts into which it was broken up.

6. Otto the Third and Crescentius.-The absence of Otto the Second and the minority of his son gave the Romans fresh hope, and they again set up an independent municipal government under a Consul named Crescentius. This popular leader was a citizen of great wealth and of noble family; he was descended from Theodora and Pope John the Tenth, from the great and wicked house who had ruled so long in Rome. John the Fifteenth, who was a Roman, after a short attempt at resistance, acknowledged the Consul's powers. But, in 996, Otto the Third came down into Italy,

and was crowned Emperor by Gregory the Fifth, a German Pope of his own appointment, and for a time the consular government seemed at an end. As soon as his back was turned Crescentius regained his power, set up a Greek Antipope, and turned to the Eastern Empire for help. But the Emperor came back, and deposed and cruelly tortured the Consul's Antipope, and besieged Crescentius in the Castle of St. Angelo. He persuaded Crescentius to come to terms and to surrender, but faithlessly had him put to death, and thus put an end to the self-government of the Romans, as his grandfather had done. Otto the Third held that he had inherited some rights over the Eastern Empire from his mother, as he had over the Western Empiro from his father. His lofty ambition was to reign over the world, and to this end he sought a Greek wife, still further to strengthen his claims over the East. Thus both the Emperor and his Roman rebels looked to Constantinople for the furtherance of their designs. At the head of Otto's world-wide Empire was to be Rome, the mistress of the world, and the mother of churches of the world, and he therefore earnestly carried on the regeneration of the Papacy which his grandfather had begun, and drew Italy into close connexion with himself and his Teutonic kingdom. His magnificent plans were soon ended, for he was poisoned when he was only twenty-five by Stephania, the widow of Crescentius, who had met with very shameful treatment from the Germans. At his death the city and the Church again turned to the popular government of the house of Crescentius, and, after a while, fell to a lower state of degradation under the Popes and Counts of the great house of Tusculum.

7. The Lombard Cities.-The great cities of North Italy seem to have kept, under one form or another, a good part of the municipal liberty which they had in earlier times.