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Front Page arrow Titles (by Subject) arrow 90.: Innocent II Grants the Lands of the Countess Matilda as a Fief to Lothar II, 1133. - A Source Book for Mediaeval History. Selected Documents Illustrating the History of Europe in the Middle Age

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Collection: Primary Sources
Subject Area: History

90.: Innocent II Grants the Lands of the Countess Matilda as a Fief to Lothar II, 1133. - Oliver J. Thatcher, A Source Book for Mediaeval History. Selected Documents Illustrating the History of Europe in the Middle Age [1905]

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A Source Book for Mediaeval History. Selected Documents Illustrating the History of Europe in the Middle Age, ed. Oliver J. Thatcher and Edgar Holmes McNeal (New York: Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1905).

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90.

Innocent II Grants the Lands of the Countess Matilda as a Fief to Lothar II, 1133.

Matilda, countess of Tuscany, espoused the cause of the pope, and, on her death, willed all her lands to him. The emperor refused to acknowledge the validity of this will, declaring that her holdings were feudal, and hence must revert to the crown, because they could not be disposed of without imperial consent. [See no. 82.] Lothar here gives up the imperial claim to them and yields them to the pope, but receives them back as a fief. The question was not thereby settled forever, because later emperors refused to be bound by the action of Lothar, and renewed the imperial pretensions. These lands were a fruitful source of contention between the popes and the emperors. This document, as here given, is probably an abstract of two documents, (1) the one by which the lands were conferred on Lothar, and (2) that by which they were later transferred to Lothar’s son-in-law, Henry, duke of Bavaria.

(The document begins with a general exordium, setting forth the common interests of papacy and empire, recalling the services of Lothar in behalf of the church, and stating the obligation of the pope to reward such services.)

It is on these considerations, therefore, that we now grant you by our apostolic authority the allodial lands which the countess Matilda formerly gave to St. Peter. In the presence of our brothers, the archbishops, bishops, and abbots, and princes and barons, we now confer them upon you by the investiture of the ring, on the following conditions: you shall pay 100 pounds of silver annually to us and to our successors; after your death the property shall revert unimpaired and without hindrance to the possession of the holy Roman church; we and our brothers shall always have safe-conduct and suitable entertainment whenever we pass through or visit the land; and, finally, your representative in the government of the land shall take an oath of fidelity to St. Peter and to the pope.

Because of our love for you we graciously concede this land on the same conditions to your son-in-law, Henry, duke of Bavaria, and his wife, your daughter. It is further stipulated that the duke shall do homage to us and take an oath of fidelity to St. Peter and to the pope; and that after their death the land shall revert to the possession of the Roman church, as said above. In all this there shall be no derogation of the rights and ultimate ownership of the holy Roman church.