(2) Holy Roman Empire: Military History and Notable Events (from 962 to 1806)

939 - Battle of Andernach (All Facts)

• Battle in which Otto the Great defeated Eberhard of Franconia and other rebellious dukes who rebelled against him

  • The rebellion began when the dukes resented Otto the Great’s ambitions to rule not just Saxony but all of Germany

  • Otto the Great’s approach upset Bavarians, Franconians, and even Saxons

  • Otto' the Great’s own brother Henry even joined in the rebellion against him

  • However, all these rivals and opposing forces were crushed

  • Otto did this to gather and unite the Saxons (Saxony), Franconians (Francia), and Bavarians (Bavaria) into one German Kingdom

955 - Battle of Lechfeld (All Facts)

• Battle in which Otto the Great and his German forces decisively defeated the Magyars and consolidated his nobles as a result

• Battle in which 50K Magyar troops besieged the city of Augsburg in Bavaria, but its bishop had held them off until Otto the Great arrived with only 10K German troops

• Battle in which Otto the Great’s mail-clad cavalry inflicted heavy losses on the lightly-protected Magyar army, which fled in disarray as its survivors limped back to their homeland

982 - Battle of Stilo (All Facts)

• Battle in which Otto II and the Germans and Holy Roman Empire were defeated by the Fatimid Caliphate, who had called a Holy War against the Germans to provoke the conflict

1003 - 1018 - German-Polish Wars (All Facts)

• Series of conflicts fought between Boleslaw and his namesake forces and kingdom and Henry II and his forces of the Holy Roman Empire

• Series of conflicts which ended with the Peace of Bautzen

1018 - Peace of Bautzen (All Facts)

• Treaty signed between Boleslaw of Poland and Henry II of Germany / the Holy Roman Empire which ended the German-Polish Wars of 1003

• Treaty in which Boleslaw of Poland consolidated his territorial gains from the War

1076 - 1122 - Investiture Controversy (All Facts)

• Conflict between the Church and the Holy Roman Empire over the ability to choose and install bishops, abbots of monasteries, and the Pope himself

• A series of popes, beginning with Pope Gregory VII, sought to curb the power an authority of the Holy Roman Emperors, beginning with Henry IV, from being able to appoint bishops, abbots, and the Pope

• Conflict which began with the power struggle between Pope Gregory VII and Holy Roman Emperor Henry IV

1083 - Siege of Rome (All Facts)

• Battle in which Holy Roman Emperor Henry IV conquered a part of the namesake city

1084 - Sack of Rome (All Facts)

• Event in which Holy Roman Emperor Henry IV came to the namesake city and besieged and conquered a part of it as part of a continued power struggle and waged attack on Pope Gregory VII after he had dealt with his rivals in Germany

  • However, Pope Gregory VII held out in the Castel Sant’Angelo until he was rescued by Robert Guiscard and the Normans

  • When he realized he was outnumbered by the Norman invaders, he fled from the namesake city and took his antipope Clement III, which he had initially installed there, with him

• Event which saw a pall of smoke cover the namesake city as thousands of bodies lie putrefied in the streets