Sicilian adventure

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The Sicilian adventure (also Sicilian adventure , English Sicilian affair or Sicilian business ) was the attempt of the English king Henry III. to acquire the Kingdom of Sicily for his younger son Edmund .

background

After years of conflict between Pope Innocent IV and the Staufer Emperor Friedrich II , who was also King of Sicily, the Council of Lyon in 1245 at the instigation of the Pope declared the emperor to be deposed. In order to receive support in the fight against his powerful opponent, the Pope first offered the rights to the rich kingdom of Sicily, which included the island and large parts of southern Italy, to Charles of Anjou , a brother of the French king. When the latter turned down the offer, the Pope turned to Richard of Cornwall , brother of King Henry III of England , in 1252 . Although his brother tried to persuade him to accept the offer, Richard also refused the risky offer, as the Kingdom of Sicily first had to be conquered by King Conrad IV , the son of Frederick II, who died in 1250. When the Pope addressed Henry III in December 1253. turned, he himself now showed interest in the kingdom that he wanted to hand over to his second, then nine-year-old son Edmund.

Innocent IV's offer

At that time the king was staying in his south-west French possessions, where he had to put down unrest. In February 1254 he accepted the Pope's offer in Bazas in Gascony . On March 6, 1254, the papal nuncio in England, Alberto di Parma , who was in charge of the negotiations , officially offered Edmund Sicily, which Pope Innocent IV confirmed on May 14 in Assisi . In May 1254, the young Edmund came to Gascony with his mother and older brother Eduard , where they stayed until December. On May 25th, Heinrich III. the making of a seal for Edmund as King of Sicily. When the Pope learned of the death of Conrad IV, who died on May 21, 1254, he hoped for swift military support from England. Friedrich II. Illegitimate son Manfred had taken over the reign of Sicily for his underage nephew Konradin , but the Pope believed that in the face of a real opponent of the Hohenstaufen their rule in Sicily would collapse. Innocent therefore urged the English king to act energetically, swiftly and forcefully and to send Edmund to Italy with a strong army and sufficient financial means.

Heinrich III. from the beginning of the 1250s began to amass a pot of gold to finance his planned crusade to the Holy Land. In England in the 13th century, silver coins were common, while gold coins were uncommon and rare. In the Holy Land, but also in Sicily, gold coins were common. The king required that fees and penalties be paid in gold instead of silver, which was a heavy burden on both the clergy and the secular population. However, he had already used up most of this gold for the expedition to Gascony. Nevertheless, the unrest there was not completely suppressed, so that he was dependent on further aid from England. In June or July 1254 the king in Gascony must have met Nuncio Alberto di Parma again. The king openly admitted to the papal envoy that he hardly had the means for a campaign to Sicily, which is why he asked the Pope to grant a tithe tax on the English Church. The Pope recently granted this tax to the king to finance his crusade. The king now hoped to be able to use these funds for the campaign to Sicily, in addition he hoped that a campaign to Sicily would fulfill the crusade oath he had taken. The Pope had so far pledged around £ 25,000 to help the King of England conquer Sicily. However, this was far less than what he had previously offered to Karl von Anjou. He had offered him about £ 50,000 to prepare for the campaign, another £ 50,000 if he invaded Sicily, and then £ 100,000 annually until Sicily was conquered. In view of this weakness of the king, Alberto di Parma hesitated to renew the bestowal of Sicily to Edmund.

Without having made concrete agreements with the Pope, Heinrich III traveled. At the end of October 1254 from Gascony via Paris to England, where he did not arrive until early January 1255. The Pope himself had probably already recognized at this point in time that the English king could hardly help him in the fight against the Hohenstaufen. In his attempts to find allies against the Hohenstaufen regent Manfred, he consequently did not prepare diplomatically the transfer of Sicily to Edmund, but instead let the negotiations take place in his name.

The conditions of Pope Alexander IV.

In November 1254, instead of an English army, Peter D'Aigueblanche , the bishop of Hereford from Savoy , and Henricus de Segusio , archbishop of Embrun in Savoy, were envoys of the English king to Italy. On December 7, 1254, Pope Innocent IV died and his attempt to end Manfred's rule over Sicily collapsed. Innocent's successor, Pope Alexander IV , first tried to come to an understanding with Manfred. Only when this failed did he turn to the English king or his envoy in Italy. With them he concluded an agreement on April 9, 1255, which, however, was weighted very differently than the agreement that his predecessor Innocent had promised the English king. Instead of providing financial support to the English king, Alexander now expected financial support from the English king. This should reimburse the Pope for the costs incurred so far for the fight against the Hohenstaufen, which were put at 135,541 marks (£ 90,360). Edmund was to receive Sicily as a fiefdom of the Pope, in return he would pay the Pope 2000 ounces of gold a year and support him with 300 knights for up to three months in the event of war. Since Edmund was only ten years old, Heinrich III. pay homage to the Pope for Sicily in his place, after the age of 15 Edmund should repeat this homage. Only after paying the required sum was the English king to be allowed to lead an army to Sicily, whereby he was to undertake to undertake the campaign by Michaelis , i.e. at the end of September 1256. Should the king fail to meet this deadline, Edmund's claim to Sicily would lapse and the Pope could Henry III. excommunicate and place England under the interdict .

These high demands were clearly determined by the experience the Curia had from previous negotiations with the English king, especially by the disappointed expectations of Innocent IV, who had urged a swift and energetic campaign to Sicily. The strict papal demands suggest that the Curia no longer had any hope of real support from English troops. For this, however, the Pope still hoped for financial support from the English king, which is why he now granted him the right to use the tithe of the English Church for the payment of about £ 90,000 that the Pope was expecting. Surprisingly, the English ambassadors and the English king accepted the almost impossible offer despite the tight financial situation of the king.

Insufficient preparation by the king

Henry III. seemed to really still hope that his son could become king of Sicily. So he started collecting a pot of gold again. However, this comprised a maximum of £ 3800 up to 1257 and was therefore by no means sufficient for a campaign to Italy. However, since Edmund was only ten years old in 1255, his father or some other powerful nobleman should have led the campaign for him. Heinrich himself was not an experienced general who could lead a campaign in distant Sicily. Although he himself had led two campaigns in France, in which he was completely unsuccessful. During his campaign in the Saintonge War in 1242, he barely escaped capture. Against the rebellion in Gascony he proceeded only hesitantly in 1254 and held back from military operations except for the siege of a castle. When planning the Sicilian adventure, he never openly declared himself ready to lead the campaign himself. In addition, there were logistical problems, as the English could only get to Sicily by land and only limited troops were able to bring them to Italy by sea. Therefore, a large part of the army should have consisted of Italian allies and mercenaries recruited in Italy. The English King Richard the Lionheart had landed in Sicily with a fleet as early as 1190 and had successfully intervened on the island, but at that time he was on the way to the Third Crusade . This gave him the formal support of the French king, who had allowed him to embark his troops from Marseilles . However, in the 1250s there was only a fragile armistice between England and France, and Marseille and Provence were under the rule of Charles of Anjou, to whom Pope Innocent had previously offered the Kingdom of Sicily. Karl had refused this offer in 1253, but would hardly support an English prince to become King of Sicily in his place. Heinrich's desire to make his son Edmund King of Sicily encouraged his willingness to find a compromise with the French king, which ultimately led to the conclusion of the Treaty of Paris in 1259.

Failure of the adventure in Parliament

Ultimately, the king did not have sufficient financial resources for the company or the necessary military resources. The only way Henry III could get the funds for a campaign in Sicily was to ask parliament to grant a general tax. In October 1255 the agreement between the king and Pope Alexander, which Heinrich and his council had already decided, became known in parliament. Henry's announcement that he would pay the Pope 135,000 marks by Michaelis 1256 under threat of excommunication, and his vision of leading an army overland through France to Sicily, met with an icy silence in parliament. Despite all the obstacles, the king continued to believe that his son Edmund had a fair chance of becoming king of Sicily. Henry publicly referred to him as King of Sicily, and on October 18, 1255, the papal nuncio, Bishop Giacomo Boncambi of Bologna, reinstated Edmund as King of Sicily. How serious Heinrich III. these plans show marriage negotiations which he conducted in 1256 and after which he wanted to marry Edmund to Plaisance , Queen of Cyprus. In addition, the heir to the throne of Cyprus, Hugo II , should marry Edmund's sister Beatrix . At the same time, efforts were made at the English royal court to propose to the Sicilian King Manfred that Edmund should marry one of his daughters. Then Manfred should forego the crown in favor of his son-in-law. Ultimately, the implementation of this daring project failed completely. Henry III. was unable to pay the requested sum to the Pope, let alone raise the cost of a promising campaign to Sicily, even though the Church alone had paid the Pope about £ 40,000 through its tithe by 1258. Also as Heinrich III. Edmund had Edmund presented to Parliament in Apulian costume in the spring of 1257, he was unable to convince either the magnates or the clergy of the plan to provide the funds for an expensive and ludicrous undertaking such as a campaign in Sicily. On the contrary, the magnates and prelates put together a list of why they considered the project to be impracticable, and accused the king of not having asked their advice sufficiently. It is true that the clergy granted the king £ 52,000 on condition that it was used to pay the king's debts to the Pope. At the same time, however, they increased their resistance to Heinrich's plans. In the face of this opposition, Heinrich began to give in and asked the Pope to extend the deadline in order to meet his conditions.

The role of the Savoyards

The driving force behind the Sicilian adventure was probably not the English king, who was sometimes simple-minded but was aware of his own limited possibilities. In contrast, the relatives of his wife Eleonore von der Provence from Savoy had a significant interest in Sicily . Several of them, Peter of Savoy, Earl of Richmond , Archbishop Boniface of Savoy , Thomas of Savoy and Bishop Peter D'Aigueblanche had considerable influence at the royal court. Both Peter of Savoy and Bishop D'Aigueblanche were in Gascony with the king in February 1254 when he accepted the Pope's offer. The most important envoy who carried the messages between the Pope, his envoy Albert and Henry III. was the papal chaplain from Savoy, John de Ambléon . The committee that Heinrich III. entrusted with the negotiations with the Curia, included Philip of Savoy , elected Archbishop of Lyon, his brothers Peter and Thomas and the Bishop D'Aigueblanche. The half-brothers of the king from south-west France, the so-called Lusignans , who otherwise had considerable influence in the royal court since 1247, were noticeably uninvolved in these negotiations.

One person stands out among the Savoyards, Thomas of Savoy . By marrying the Count of Flanders, he lost this rich county again after the death of his wife in 1244. As a result, he had considerable influence on Henry III. In addition, he had become imperial vicar for Pavia and Lord of Turin in 1248 . After the death of Emperor Friedrich II. In 1250, he changed sides and married a niece of Pope Innocent IV. After the death of his older brother Amadeus , he became regent of Savoy in June 1253. As a result, he became a staunch supporter of the idea of ​​making Edmund King of Sicily. When the Pope confirmed Edmund as king in May 1254, Thomas was at the papal court. Together with John de Ambléon he asked Pope Innocent, that a campaign to Sicily the crusade oath of Henry III. would meet. On October 30, 1254, Thomas was appointed Prince of Capua in Bordeaux in the name of Edmunds , which was probably thanks to him for supporting Edmund's appointment as King of Sicily. Given the weak leadership of Heinrich III. it was openly expected that Thomas of Savoy would become the actual leader of an English army that was to reach Italy via south-west France and then via Sayoven. Letters between the Pope and Thomas of Savoy show that Thomas was hoping for further rewards in Sicily, although it remains to be seen to what extent the English troops could have passed France. At the end of 1254, Thomas was together with Heinrich III. guest of the French king in Paris. Subsequently, the English king was convinced of the success of Edmund's candidacy for the throne. In the acceptance of the offer made by Pope Alexander in 1255, however, presumably neither Thomas of Savoy nor his brother Peter of Savoy were directly involved. Ultimately, however, Thomas of Savoy kept options open to all sides, since a daughter of his brother Amadeus was married to Manfred of Sicily.

consequences

With support from Savoy, Heinrich III. no further construction after Thomas of Savoy was captured by his opponents in Italy in 1256. A new war in Wales from 1256 meant that the king could not save any more funds. The king's continued efforts to obtain a tax from Parliament to finance the Sicilian adventure, as well as the king's failure in the battle with the Welsh princes, led to the rebellion of large sections of the nobility in 1258, which in the Provisions of Oxford succeeded in largely disempowering the king . The barons who had now taken power strove to cancel the agreement between the king and the pope. Thereupon Pope Alexander IV suspended the agreement on December 12, 1258, as long as the requested funds were not paid to him. Henry III. Admittedly continued to hold on to the Sicilian adventure, and the young Edmund also seemed to continue to believe in its realization, but the political unrest in England, which ultimately led to the open war of the barons, ultimately let the project fail completely. Pope Urban IV , who had become Pope in 1261 as Alexander's successor, finally revoked Edmund's elevation to king and released him and his father on July 28, 1263 from fulfilling the agreement with the Pope. Instead, he again offered the Sicilian crown to the French Prince Charles of Anjou, who was actually able to conquer Sicily in 1266.

rating

The widespread rejection of the Sicilian adventure by Heinrich's contemporaries led to the fact that the project is rated as one of the most senseless projects that an English king has ever started . Other historians now see Heinrich's plan in a more nuanced way. Despite the difficulties that finally prevented the implementation of the plans, the project would have been militarily feasible, as the successful campaign of Karl von Anjou proved. The Pope's financial demands could also have been fulfilled, if one compares the sum with the ransom that was raised at the end of the 12th century for the release of Richard the Lionheart.

literature

  • Björn KU Weiler: Henry III and the Sicilian Business. A reinterpretation. In: Historical Research, 74 (2001), pp. 127-50
  • Björn KU Weiler: Henry III of England and the Staufen Empire 1216-1272 . Royal Historical Society et al. a., Woodbridge 2006. ISBN 0-86193-280-3

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Michael Salewski : History of Europe. States and nations from ancient times to the present . Beck, Munich 2000. ISBN 3406461689 , p. 557
  2. ^ David Carpenter: The Meetings of Kings Henry III and Louis IX. In: Thirteenth century England X. Proceedings of the Durham conference 2003. Edited by Michael Prestwich. Boydell, Woodbridge 2005. ISBN 1-84383-122-8 , p. 6
  3. ↑ Natalie Fryde, Hanna Vollrath: The English kings in the Middle Ages. From William the Conqueror to Richard III. Beck, Munich 2004, ISBN 3-406-49463-3 , p. 107
  4. ^ Björn KU Weiler: Henry III of England and the Staufen Empire 1216-1272 . Royal Historical Society et al. a., Woodbridge 2006. ISBN 0-86193-280-3 , s. 153
  5. ↑ Michael Prestwich: Plantagenet England 1225-1360 . Clarendon, Oxford 2007. ISBN 0-19-922687-3 , p. 103