Henry IV
Former Holy Roman emperorWikipedia
37
MENTIONS
17
EPISODES
15
PODCASTS
Search complete. 37 mentions across 17 episodes found for "Henry IV".
Oct 24, 2026
Nick HolmesHOST
One of the most striking features of the First Crusade was the scarcity of German crusaders.
Nick HolmesHOST
It was dominated by the French and Normans, and the principal reason for this lay with the German Emperor Henry IV's war with the papacy.
Nick HolmesHOST
As I described in episode 137, in 1095, when Urban II made his famous speech at Clermont, Henry IV was backing a rival pope called Clement III, who controlled the fortress, the Castel San Angelo, in Rome.
Nick HolmesHOST
So, the city of Rome itself was divided between two rival popes, and this conflict between the pope and the German emperor continued.
Nick HolmesHOST
until the Concordat of Worms in 1122, when the Pope won and the German Emperor, who was then Henry V, backed down and allowed him to appoint bishops.
Nick HolmesHOST
This meant, fairly obviously, that Henry IV didn't want to back the First Crusade.
Nick HolmesHOST
The German princes were also less powerful and ambitious than their feudal equivalents in France.
Nick HolmesHOST
And Henry IV also had more authority in Germany than the French King Francis I did in France.
Dave FarinaHOST
He then attacked Bohemia several times during the 1070s.
Dave FarinaHOST
After Gregory VII became Pope in 1073, Boleslav took his side in the conflict with Emperor Henry IV over whether the Pope had the right to appoint the religious officials of the courts of Europe, what historians call the investiture controversy.
Dave FarinaHOST
In return for his support, The Pope blessed Boleslaw's coronation as king in 1076, and he was recognized as such by Henry himself.
Dave FarinaHOST
But in 1079, the Polish nobles who resisted his control stirred up a revolt, which was also supported by the Bishop of Krakow.
Dave FarinaHOST
Bolesław was followed by his brother, Władysław Herman, who reversed his positions on the major policy issues of the time.
Dave FarinaHOST
He forged a marriage alliance with the Bohemian court.
Dave FarinaHOST
He allied himself with Henry IV, including supporting him in his dispute with the Pope, and marrying Henry's sister after his first wife died.
Dave FarinaHOST
He ended Boleslav's alliance with Hungary, and he did not ask to be called a king, even though Henry had decided to extend this same honor to the ruler of Bohemia.
Pamela NagamiNARRATOR
He had to deal with other matters also.
Pamela NagamiNARRATOR
Some of the clergy still refused to abandon their wives, and the wife of the emperor Henry IV was present to complain of treatment unimaginably monstrous on the part of her husband.
Pamela NagamiNARRATOR
Both emperor and clergy must be condemned and brought into obedience, and Urban felt that after such business as this it would be well to reserve his eloquence for another scene.
Pamela NagamiNARRATOR
He therefore dismissed the envoys of Alexios with the assurance that when the hosts of Western Christendom advanced to the rescue of the Holy Sepulchre they would not forget that they had work to do near Constantinople.
37 MINS LATER
Pamela NagamiNARRATOR
In this wild expedition not less, it is said, than three hundred thousand human beings had already paid the penalty of their lives.
Pamela NagamiNARRATOR
Still the first crusade was destined to accomplish more than any of the seven or eight crusades which followed it, and this measure of success it achieved probably because none of the great European sovereigns took part in it.
Pamela NagamiNARRATOR
The Western Emperor, Henry IV, the representative of Charles the Great, was the enemy of the Pope.
Pamela NagamiNARRATOR
Philip I, King of France, had been excommunicated by Urban in the Council of Clermont.
Robert BarronHOST
Same kind of battle between the primacy of the church or the primacy of the state.
Robert BarronHOST
Who holds sway? Another Henry, not of England, but Henry IV, Holy Roman Emperor, maybe the famous, he was excommunicated by the Pope Gregory VII, and then Henry has to go to the pope's winter palace and there beg, you know, in this penitential spirit.
Robert BarronHOST
So, altar, throne, king, pope, church, state, battles, yeah, they raged throughout the Middle Ages, throughout the history of the Church.
Robert BarronHOST
You know, a very interesting place to look here.
Pamela NagamiNARRATOR
The immoderate attempt of Hildebrand aroused opposition on every side, but the fiercest conflict raged in Germany.
Pamela NagamiNARRATOR
The emperor-elect, King Henry IV, threatened with excommunication and deposition for his opposition to the reform, gathered a council of such of the prelates of the empire as dared to answer to his summons, and ordered Hildebrand to descend from the papal throne.
Pamela NagamiNARRATOR
The infuriated Pope gathered a council in his turn at Rome, and issued the dread sentence of excommunication and deposition.
Pamela NagamiNARRATOR
In the name of Almighty God, Father, Son, and Holy Ghost, ran the solemn decree, I withdraw through St. Peter's power and authority from Henry the King, son of Henry the Emperor, who has arisen against the Church with unheard-of insolence, the rule over the whole kingdom of the Germans and over Italy.
Pamela NagamiNARRATOR
It was thus, writes Millman, by trampling their adversaries with vows which they could not decline and from which they could not extricate themselves, by thus consuming their wealth and resources on this wild and remote warfare, that the popes, who themselves decently eluded or were prevented by age or alleged occupations from embarkation in these adventurous expeditions, broke and wasted away the power and influence of the emperors.
Pamela NagamiNARRATOR
The Hohenstaufen suffered again and again from this unsaintly policy of the popes.
Pamela NagamiNARRATOR
The founder of the greatness of the house of Hohenstaufen was one Frederick a knight of Schwabia who served the unhappy emperor Henry IV.
Pamela NagamiNARRATOR
In return for a rare and unswerving loyalty, Henry bestowed upon Frederick the hand of his daughter Agnes with the duchy of Schwabia as her dower.
Lindsay HolidayHOST
Since Charlemagne converted central Europe to Christianity at swordpoint and forced Pope Leo III to crown him Holy Roman Emperor, his heirs fought bitterly with popes about everything from land to who had the right to appoint priests and write laws.
Lindsay HolidayHOST
The Holy Roman Emperor who had the biggest brawl with the papacy was Henry IV.
Lindsay HolidayHOST
He had good reason to resent the Catholic Church.
Lindsay HolidayHOST
He inherited the throne in 1054 at the age of four, and was kidnapped by the Archbishop of Cologne, who took control of his empire.
7 MINS LATER
Lindsay HolidayHOST
But the first description I read was from propaganda written by a Catholic about what Protestants were really up to, and the second was compiled from the statements of victims of witch trials who were tortured into confessions.
Lindsay HolidayHOST
In the 16th century, Protestant reformers exalted Emperor Henry for standing up to the Pope and defending the rights of the people and of local governments to make their own laws.
Lindsay HolidayHOST
Henry IV is considered by some to have been the first Protestant.
Lindsay HolidayHOST
The exorcisms of the King of Spain.
speaker_0HOST
The turning point was the Investiture Controversy of the eleventh century.
speaker_0HOST
At the time, secular rulers, such as Holy Roman Emperor Henry IV, claimed the right to appoint bishops and the pope.
speaker_0HOST
Pope Gregory VII launched a massive reform movement asserting the spiritual independence of the Catholic Church from secular authority.
speaker_0HOST
The ensuing conflict ended in a compromise that established the Church as an independent legal and corporate entity.
Charles WestGUEST
But, you know, Philip would have known that, right? You know who your grandparents are.
Charles WestGUEST
And when we see the genealogies of these kings, we mostly just see these straight lines, right? Philip's the son of Henry, he's the son of, you know, Roberts and so on and so forth.
Charles WestGUEST
All kings of France.
Charles WestGUEST
But if you follow the women, it's a lot more fluid.
Charles WestGUEST
But in the broadest of terms, these networks overall, I think, complement political structures and provide some kind of ballast to them.
Charles WestGUEST
So the odd one out here is the Latin West, because, I mean, as you just mentioned, there are tensions, right? There are big tensions here.
Charles WestGUEST
In particular, in the 11th century, there's a big clash between rulers and popes, which your listeners may have heard of, right? This is the so-called investiture controversy between Henry IV, the emperor, and Gregory VII.
Charles WestGUEST
There's always a strand in Christianity which is suspicious of political authority and the secular world.
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