²⁴⁶ Velly’s Hist, of France, vol. v. p. 193—197.
It was a Frenchman, born at Troyes, who become pope by the name of Urban IV. advanced principally the negociations with the count of Anjou. Impatient to exterminate Manfred, Urban saw too well that the publication of crusades, indulgencies, the equipment of pontifical troops, with all the temporal and spiritual arms of the Holy See, would remain powerless, without the active participation of a sovereign, interested by the allurement of a crown, to complete the ruin of the house of Swabia. Popular commotions rendered the residence of Rome rather uneasy to the sovereign pontiff; Urban had retired to Orvieto, whence by some mutinous acts, he was again driven to Perugia. He was, therefore, solicitous to conclude with Charles of Anjou; although this prince had seemed to detach himself from the pope, in accepting the dignity of senator of Rome, and the treaty, was about to be signed when Urban died: his successor, Clement IV. completed his design.
The incompatibility of the crown of Sicily with the imperial crown, as also with the sovereignty over Lombardy, or over Tuscany; the cession of Beneventum and its territory to the Holy See: annual tributes and subsidies to the church; recognizance of the immunities of the clergy of the Two Sicilies; inheritance of this kingdom reserved to the descendants of Charles alone; in default thereof, power granted to the pope to choose the successors to them. Such were the principal conditions of the treaty, which called Charles of Anjou to reign over the Neapolitans. He would have subscribed to still more humiliating ones. He promised to abdicate before the expiration of three years the title of senator of Rome; even to renounce it sooner, if he completed before this period the conquest of the kingdom which had been bestowed him, and, to neglect nothing to dispose the Romans to concede the disposal of this dignity to the sovereign pontiff: he subjected himself to interdiction, excommunication, deposition, if he should ever break his engagements: he finally pronounced an oath, framed in these terms:²⁴⁷
“I, per− “forming full allegiance and vassalage to the church, “for the kingdom of Sicily, and for all the territory “on this side the Pharos of Messina, to the fron− “tiers of the ecclesiastical state, now and hence− “forward promise to be faithful and obedient to St. “Peter, to the pope my supreme liege, and to his “successors canonically elected; I shall form no “alliance contrary to their interests; and, if from “ignorance I shall be unfortunate enough to form “such, I shall renounce it on the first order which “they may be disposed to signify to me.