#22 – The Father Of The Renaissance (part one)

* I want to pick up our story in the year 1302 * To talk about a man called Pietro di Parenzo di Garzo. * Well actually I want to talk about his SON. * But we’ll get there. * And to get there, we’re going to need to duck in and out of the 800 years we’ve skipped since our last episodes. * So hang in there. * Pietro di Parenzo di Garzo was a notary in FLORENCE. * A contract lawyer. * At some point in 1302, he was falsely charged with faking some documents. * He belonged to the political party of the White Guelphs along with the famous poet Dante, who was its most illustrious member. * The Guelphs and Ghibellines were Italian factions supporting the Pope and the Holy Roman Emperor. * The division goes back to the 12th century and Frederick Barbarossa. * Barbarossa was elected King of Germany at Frankfurt on 4 March 1152. * He was crowned King of Italy on 24 April1155 in Pavia and Roman Emperor by Pope Adrian IV on 18 June 1155 in Rome. * After the fall of the Western Roman Empire in 480, when Julius Nepos was was deposed in 475 by Orestes, the title of Emperor lay dormant until Charlemagne revived it * He was crowned Emperor of the Romans by Pope Leo III in 800, and his successors maintained the title until the death of Berengar I of Italy in 924. * No pope appointed an emperor again until the coronation of the German king Otto the Great in 962. * Who, despite being a German, was the Great-great-great-great grandson of Charlemagne. * The actual Holy Roman Empire is usually considered to have begun with Otto * He was crowned Holy Roman Emperor in 962 by Pope John XII in Rome after he defeated the pagan Magyars and was declared the saviour of Christendom. * Why was the Pope now crowning Emperors? * The Holy Roman Emperor was widely perceived to rule by divine right by Roman Catholic rulers in Europe. * It also goes back to an agreement between the Frankish kings to defend the Popes from their enemies in return for the continued support of the Pope. * The leader of the Catholics could – and often did – cause huge problems for European royalty. * Charlemagne’s father, Pepin the Short, defended the papacy against the Lombards and issued the Donation of Pepin, which granted the land around Rome to the pope as a fief. * In 754, Pope Stephen II crossed the Alps to anoint Pepin king, which enabled the Carolingian family to supplant the old Merovingian royal line. * In return for Stephen’s support, Pepin gave the Pope the lands in Italy which the Lombards had taken from the Byzantine (Eastern Roman) Empire * Pope Stephen II conferred on Pepin the dignity of Patricius Romanus – the Father of the Romans. * And then 46 years later, in 800, Pope Leo III crowned Charlemagne the Roman Emperor. * The first time the title had been used in 300 years. * The precise term “Holy Roman Empire” was not used until the 13th century. * So anyway. * Back to Barbarossa. * Before his imperial election, Frederick was the Duke of Swabia. * He had a castle called Waiblingen (German pronunciation: [ˈvaɪblɪŋən]). * His supported would cry that out in battle. * In Italy, that word became Ghibellino in Italian. * His opponents were from the House of Welf,