¹⁷⁸ Concilior. vol. 10, p. 883.—Abb. Ursperg. Chron. p. 204. —Muratori’s Antiquities of Italy, med. ævi. vol. 6, p. 72. —Schill. de libertate eccles. German. 1. 4, c. 4, p. 545.
¹⁷⁹ Art of verifying dates, vol. i. p. 283, 284.
Honorius II. who filled the Holy See from 1124 to 1180, is only remarkable for his disputes with Roger, Count of Sicily, whom he wished to prevent uniting Apulia and Calabria, an inheritance left him by William II. his father, to his States. The pope fearing that Roger might become powerful enough to invade the Ecclesiastical States, sent an army against him, which was defeated. The king of France, Louis le Gros, was then exposed to the censures of the bishops of his own kingdom: the seditious conduct of the bishop of Paris having required repressive measures, this prelate, whose temporalities were seized, dared to place his own diocese, and the possessions of the king, under interdict. The most praiseworthy action of Honorius is the removal of this interdict, and the having coldly seconded the ardent zeal of St. Bernard, when this pious abbot, treating his king as an infidel, a persecutor, a second Herod, solicited the pope to bring this affair before the Holy See. Louis was indebted for the tranquillity of the last ten years of his reign; to the prudence of Honorius, whom St, Bernard accused of weak-ness.¹⁸⁰
It was in the pontificate of this Honorius, that the two factions, the imperial and the papal, originating as we have seen, in the tenth centuiy,¹⁸¹ took, in a more decided form, the distinctions of Guelphs and Ghibeli-. nes. These two appellations are the names of two German houses, which in 1125, when Henry V. died, disputed the imperial crown. One of these families, sometimes called* Salique, sometimes Guiebelinga or Waiblinge, reigned in Franconia, and had furnished the four last emperors; it was distinguished by its long disputes with the Church: the other family, originally of Allfort, possessed Bavaria; and many of its heads, devoted to the popes, had borne the name of Welf or Guelpho.
¹⁸⁰ Velly’s Hist, of France, vol. iii. p. 73, 74.
The duke of Saxony, Lothaire, chosen at Mayence, as successor to Henry, was impatient to manifest his attachment to the house of Guelph, by espousing the heiress of Henry duke of Bavaria. The duke of Franconia, Conrade, was then in Palestine; he hastened to combat Lothaire, re-animated the partisans of the house of Ghibeline, and caused himself to be crowned emperor, by the archbishop of Milan, while Honorius II. declared himself in favour of the confederate of the house of Guelph.¹⁸²