In the reign of Conrad I., king of Germany (912-918), the dukes and counts became gradually independent of the sovereign and assumed the right of choosing future monarchs. Elector (German, Kurfurst, 'electoral prince'),

In the 13th century the number of these electors was seven - the Archbishops of Mainz, Cologne, and Treves, the King of Bohemia, the Count Palatine, the Duke of Saxony, and the Markgrave of Brandenburg. In 1648 an eighth electorate was created to make room for Bavaria, and Hanover was added as a ninth in 1692. The votes of the Palatinate and of Bavaria were merged in one in 1777. In 1802 the two ecclesiastical electors of Cologne and Treves were set aside, and Baden, Wuirtemberg, Hesse - Cassel, and Salzburg declared electorates; so that there were ten electors in 1806 when the old German Empire was dissolved.

Henry I. of Germany, surnamed The Fowler, according to tradition because his election to the German empire was announced to him while fowling; born in 876; the son of Otho the Illustrious, duke of Saxony. Henry, on the death of his father, became Duke of Saxony and Thuringia. He was elected emperor of Germany in 919, and was the true founder of the empire. By his prudence and activity Suabia and Bavaria were forced to tender allegiance, and Lorraine was reunited to the German Empire in 925. He was defeated, however, by the Hungarians, and forced to pay a yearly tribute to obtain a truce for nine years. He spent this period in developing a sound military organization, and turning his arms against various Slavonic tribes in the south, was everywhere victorious. At the end of the truce with the Hungarians he refused the tribute, and completely routed them in 933. Besides his military reforms he diminished the feudal privileges, and granted to the cities of the empire their first municipal charters. He died in 936.

Conrad II., king of Germany and emperor of the Romans, reigned from 1024 to 1039, and is regarded as the true founder of the Franconian or Salic line. On his election he proclaimed a God's Truce in order to attempt certain reforms in the kingdom; but his attention was too distracted between Italy and Germany for him to do more than repress some of the more marked evils of the feudal system.

Henry III., Emperor of Germany, the second belonging to the house of the Salian Franks, son of the Emperor Conrad II.; born in 1017; chosen king in 1026; succeeded his father in the imperial dignity 1039. He weakened the power of the great feudal lords; and forced the Duke of Bohemia in 1042, and the king of Hungary in 1044, and again in 1047, to accept their dominions as imperial fiefs. His influence was also paramount in Italy, especially in Milan, and in the south, where the Normans in Apulia and Calabria paid him homage. In 1046 he deposed the rival popes Benedict IX., Sylvester III., and Gregory IV., and caused Suitger, bishop of Bamberg, to be elected in their stead as Clement II. His efforts to secure the permanence of the influence of the empire over the see of Rome were thwarted by Cardinal Hildebrand (Gregory VII.). He died in 1055. His first wife was a daughter of Canute the Great of England.

Henry IV., German emperor, son of Henry III., was born in 1050, and at the death of his father was only five years old. His whole life was a series of troubles, partly of his own causing. His severe treatment of the Saxons led to a rising which was cruelly punished. His treatment of the conquered people was such that they complained to the pope, and Gregory VIL (Hildebrand), accordingly summoned Henry, in 1076, to appear before him at Rome and answer the charge; at the same time forbidding the sale of ecclesiastical dignities. Henry not only disregarded the threat, but instigated the bishops, assembled by his order at Worms, to renounce their obedience to the pope. Gregory, however, pronounced sentence of excommunication against him, and Henry, finding himself deserted, was obliged to go to Italy and make his submission to the pope (1077). The insolence with which the pope used his victory produced a reaction; the Italian princes, who had long been dissatisfied with Gregory, offered Henry their assistance. The German princes, however, at the instigation of the pope, elected Rudolph, duke of Suabia, king. Henry hastened back to Germany and overcame his rival, who lost his life in 1080. Gregory again excommunicated Henry; but at the Council of Brixen, in 1080, he was deposed by the German and Italian bishops as a heretic and a sorcerer, and Guibert, archbishop of Ravenna (Clement III.) set up in his place. In 1084 Henry succeeded in establishing Clement at Rome, but was obliged to return to Germany to maintain his ground against two rivals who successively arose. In 1085 Henry was again obliged to cross the Alps in aid of his protégé Clement III. But the dissatisfaction against him in Germany had not subsided, and though he succeeded in crushing the rebellion of his eldest son, Conrad, who died deserted at Florence in 1101, his second son Henry made himself master of his father's person in 1105 by stratagem, and compelled him to abdicate the throne at Ingelheim. Henry IV. ended his life and his sorrows in neglect at Liegé in 1106.

Conrad III., king of Germany and emperor of the Romans from 1138 to 1152, was the founder of the Suabian dynasty of Hohenstaufen. During the struggle with his rival Henry the Proud the factions of Guelf and Ghibelline, named from the war-cries of the respective parties, came into existence. Conrad, persuaded by Bernard (St.) took part in the second crusade, from 1147 to 1149. His marriage with a Greek princess led to his adoption of the double-headed eagle now appearing on the Austrian arms He was succeeded by his nephew Frederick Barbarossa.

Frederick I., Barbarossa (or, as the Germans call him Rothbart, both surnames meaning Red-beard'), German emperor, son of Frederick, duke of Suabia, was born 1121, and received the imperial crown in 1152 on the death of his uncle the Emperor Conrad III. His principal efforts were directed to the extension and confirmation of his power in Italy. In his first expedition to Italy in 1154 he subdued the towns of Northern Italy, and then got himself crowned at Pavia with the iron crown of Lombardy (April 1155), and afterwards at Rome by Pope Adrian IV. with the imperial crown (June 1155). Soon after his return to Germany the Lombard cities revolted, and Frederick led a second expedition into Italy (1158), took Brescia and Milan, and at the diet of Roncaglia at which all the cities and imperial vassals of Italy were represented, he assumed the sovereignty of the towns and received the homage of the lords. The rights assigned to the empire were so great that many of the cities refused to acknowledge them, and Milan especially prepared for resistance. Meantime Pope Adrian IV. died (1159), and in electing a successor the cardinals were divided, one section choosing Victor IV. and another Alexander III. Frederick supported Victor, and Alexander was compelled to flee from Italy and take refuge in France. Other expeditions into Italy were made in 1161 and 1166, in the latter of which Frederick at first carried everything before him, and was even able to set up in Rome the Anti-pope Paschalis III., whom he supported after the death of Victor IV. His successes were put an end to, however, by a terrible pestilence, which carried off a large part of his army, and compelled him hastily to return to Germany. Scarcely had he settled the most pressing difficulties here when he undertook, in 1174, a fifth expedition into Italy; but he was totally defeated in the battle of Legnano on the 29th of May, 1176, in consequence of which nearly all that he had won in Italy was again lost, and he was compelled to acknowledge Alexander III. as the true pope. In 1188 he assumed the cross, and with an army of 150,000 men and several thousand volunteers set out for Palestine. After leading his army with success into Syria be was drowned in crossing the river Kalykadnus (new Selef) 1190.

Frederick II., Hohenstaufen, grandson of the preceding, born 1194, was son of the Emperor Henry VI. and of the Norman Princess Constance, heiress of the Two Sicilies. He remained under the guardianship of Innocent III. till 1209, when he took upon himself the government of Lower Italy and Sicily. The imperial crown of Germany was now worn by a rival, Otho IV., whose defeat at the battle of Bouvines opened the way to Frederick, who in 1215, after pledging himself to undertake a crusade, was crowned at Aix-la.Chapelle. Ha caused his eldest son Henry to be chosen king of Rome in 1220, and the same year received the imperial crown from the pope. His ambition aimed at the subjugation of Lombardy, the mastership of all Italy, and the reduction of the popes to their old spiritual office as the leading bishops in Christendom. This led him into constant struggles in Germany and Italy. In 1227 he undertook a crusade; but when he did reach the Holy Land he was able to effect nothing permanent, although he had crowned himself at Jerusalem as king of Judea. On his return be had to suppress a revolt of his son Henry, whom he imprisoned for life. In 1287 he broke the power of the Lombard League by a victory at Corte Nuova in Lombardy, and marched on Rome, but did not attack it. The remainder of his life was occupied with his troubles in Italy, and he died in the midst of his wars in 1250. He was one of the ablest and most accomplished of the long line of German emperors, and art, literature, commerce, and agriculture received every encouragement at his hands. He himself was a good linguist, was acquainted with natural history, was a minnesinger, and a writer on philosophy.

Maximilian I., Emperor of Germany, son of the Emperor Frederick III. and of Eleonora of Portugal, was born in 1459; in 1486 was elected king of the Romans, and emperor in 1498. He first became an independent prince by his marriage with Mary of Burgundy, the daughter of Charles the Bold, who was killed in 1477. This match involved him in a war with Louis XI., king of France, in which he was successful, though he was defeated at a later period by the Milanese. He died in 1519, and was succeeded by his grandson Charles V.

		Charles was thus the grandson of the Emperor Maximillian and Mary, daughter of Charles the Bold, last duke of Burgundy, and inherited from his grandparents on both sides the fairest countries in Europe, Aragon, Naples, Sicily, Sardinia, Castile, and the colonies in the New World, Austria, Burgundy, and the Netherlands. On the death of Ferdinand, his grandfather, Charles assumed the title of King of Spain. In 1519 he was elected emperor, and was crowned at Aix-la-Chapelle with extraordinary splendour. The progress of the Reformation in Germany demanded the care of the new emperor, who held a diet at Worms. Luther, who appeared at this diet with a safe-conduct from Charles, defended his case with energy and boldness. The emperor kept silent; but after Luther's departure a severe edict appeared against him in the name of Charles, who thought it his interest to declare himself the defender of the Roman Church.
Charles V., Emperor of Germany and King of Spain (in the latter capacity he is called Charles I.), the eldest son of Philip, archduke of Austria, and of Joanna, the daughter of Ferdinand and Isabella of Spain, was born at Ghent, Feb. 24, 1500.		A war with France, which the rival claims of Francis I. in Italy, the Netherlands, and Navarre made inevitable, broke out in 1521. Neither side had a decided success till the battle of Pavia in 1525, where Francis was totally defeated and taken prisoner. Charles treated his captive with respect, but with great rigour as regarded the conditions of his release.

A league of Italian states headed by Pope Clement VII., was now formed against the overgrown power of Charles; but their ill-directed efforts had no success. Rome itself was stormed and pillaged by the troops of the Constable of Bourbon, and the pope made prisoner.

Nor was the alliance of Henry VIII. of England with Francis against the emperor any more successful, the war ending in a treaty (Cambray, 1529) of which the conditions were favourable to Charles. A war against the Turks by which Solyman was compelled to retreat, and an expedition against the Dey of Tunis by which 20,000 Christian slaves were released, added to the influence of Charles, and acquired for him the reputation of a chivalrous, defender of the faith. In 1537 he made truce with Francis and soon after, while on his way to the Netherlands, spent six days at the court of the latter in Paris. In 1541 another expedition against the African Moors, by which Charles hoped to crown his reputation, was unsuccessful, and he lost a part of his fleet and army before Algiers without gaining any advantage. A new war with France arose regarding the territory of Milan. The quarrel was patched up by the peace of Crespy in 1545. The religious strife was again disturbing the emperor. Charles, who was no bigot, sought to reconcile the two parties, and with this view alternately courted and threatened the Protestants. At length in 1546 the Protestant princes declared war, but were driven from the field and compelled to submit. But the defection of his ally, Maurice of Saxony, whom Charles had invested with the electoral dignity, again turned the tide in favour of the Protestants. Maurice surprised the imperial camp at Innsbruck in the middle of a stormy night, and Charles with great difficulty escaped alone in a litter. The Treaty of Passau was dictated by the Protestants. It gave them equal rights with the Catholics, and was confirmed three years later by the diet of Augsburg (1555). Foiled in his schemes and dejected with repeated failures, Charles resolved to resign the imperial dignity, and transfer his hereditary estates to his son Philip. In 1555 he conferred on him the sovereignty of the Netherlands, and on January 15, 1556, that of Spain, retiring himself to a residence beside the monastery of Yuste in Estremadura, where he amused himself by mechanical labours and the cultivation of a garden. He still took a strong interest in public affairs. though latterly he was very much of an invalid, his ill health being partly caused by his high living. He died on Sept. 21, 1558.

Ferdinand I., brother of Charles V., and born at Alcala, in Spain, 10th March, 1503. In 1522 he received the Austrian lands of the house of Hapsburg from the emperor, to which were afterwards added the kingdoms of Hungary and Bohemia in right of his wife Anna of Hungary. On the abdication of Charles he succeeded to the imperial title. He died 25th July, 1564.

Maximilian II., Emperor of Germany, born 1527, died 1576. He succeeded his father, Ferdinand I., in 1564; was tolerant of the Reformation, but did not join the Protestant church.

Ferdinand II. was born in 1578, and succeeded his uncle Matthias as Emperor of Germany in 1619. He was of a dark and reserved character, and had been brought up by his mother and the Jesuits in fierce hate of Protestantism. The result was a quarrel with his Bohemian subjects, who openly revolted and offered the Bohemian crown to the Elector Palatine, a step which led to the outbreak of the Thirty Years' war. With the help of the Catholic League and John George Elector of Saxony, he was placed firmly on the throne of Bohemia where he relentlessly persecuted the Protestants. He died Feb 15, 1637.

Ferdinand III., son of the preceding, was born in 1608, and succeeded his father in 1637. He had served in the Thirty Years' war and had seen the miseries which it occasioned and was reluctant to continue it. There were eleven years more of it, however, before the Peace of Westphalia was concluded in 1648. Ferdinand died in 1657.

Charles VI., German emperor, the second son of the Emperor Leopold I., was born Oct. 1, 1685. He was destined according to the ordinary rules of inheritance to succeed his relative Charles II. on the throne of Spain. But Charles II. by his will made a French prince, Philip, duke of Anjou, grandson of Louis XIV., heir to the Spanish monarchy. This occasioned the war of the Spanish Succession, in which England and Holland took the part of the Austrian claimant. Charles held possession of Madrid for a time, and was supported by the skill of Marlborough and Eugene, but he was eventually obliged to resign Spain to the French claimant, and content himself with the Spanish subject-land; Milan, Mantua, Sardinia, and the Netherlands (Treaty of Utrecht, 1713, and Treaty of Rastadt, 1714). He became emperor in 1711. In a war against the Turks his armies, led by Eugene of Savoy, gained the decisive victories of Peterwardein and Belgrade. After the death of his only son, Charles directed all his policy and energies to secure the guarantee of the various powers to the Pragmatic Sanction, settling the succession to the Austrian dominions on his daughter Maria Theresa. In 1733 a war with France and Spain regarding the succession in Poland terminated unfavourably for him, he having to surrender Sicily, Naples, and part of Milan to Spain, and Lorraine to France. In 1737 he renewed the war with the Turks, this time unsuccessfully. Charles died Oct. 20, 1740.

Maria Theresa. Queen of Hungary and Bohemia, Arch-duchess of Austria, and Empress of Germany, daughter of the Emperor Charles VI., was born at Vienna 1717, and in 1736 married Francis Stephen, grand-duke of Tuscany. On the death of her father in 1740 she ascended the throne of Hungary, Bohemia, and Austria, and a little later declared her husband joint ruler. Her accession was in accordance with the Pragmatic Sanction, but her claims were at once contested. Frederick the Great made himself master of Silesia; Spain and Naples gained possession of the Austrian territory in Italy; and the French, Bavarians, and Saxons marched into Bohemia, carrying all before them. Charles Albert was proclaimed Archduke of Austria, and shortly after Emperor of Germany; and the young queen fled to Presburg, where she convoked the diet and threw herself upon the sympathy of her Hungarian subjects. The French and Bavarians were speedily driven from her hereditary states; Prussia made a secret peace with the queen, who unwillingly abandoned Silesia and Glatz to Frederick; and though by the Treaty of Aix-la-Chapelle (1748) she was also compelled to give up the duchies of Parma, Piacenza, and Guastalla to Spain, her husband was elected emperor. During the time of peace which followed Maria Theresa, with the aid of her husband and the minister Kaunitz, made great financial reforms; agriculture, manufactures, and commerce flourished, the national revenue greatly increased, and the burdens were diminished. The Seven Years' war again reduced Austria to a state of great exhaustion, but on its conclusion the empress renewed her efforts to promote the prosperity of her dominions. Her son Joseph was elected king of the Romans in 1764, and on the death of her husband, in 1765, she associated the young prince with herself in the government. In 1772 she joined in the dismemberment of Poland, obtaining Galicia and Lodomeria, while in 1777 she acquired Bukowina from the Porte, and in 1779, by the Peace of Teschen, gained the Inn valley.

She died in 1780. Of the sixteen children she bore ten survived, one of whom was the unfortunate Marie Antoinette.

Francis I., Emperor of Germany, eldest son of Leopold, duke of Lorraine, was born in 1708. In 1736 he married Maria Theresa, daughter of the Emperor Charles VI. After the death of Charles VI. (1740) he was declared by his wife co-regent of all the hereditary states of Austria, but without being permitted to take any part in the administration.

After the death of Charles VII. he was elected emperor in 1745. He died in 1765.

Frederick III., Emperor of Germany, born 1831; succeeded William I. March 9, 1888; died June 15, 1888. In 1858 he married the Princess-Royal of Britain, eldest daughter of Queen Victoria. He commanded the army of the Oder in the war with Austria (1866), and in the Franco-German war he led the army which ultimately forced Napoleon III. and his army to surrender at Sedan. He also took a prominent part in the siege of Paris. In 1887 he was attacked by a serious throat affection, which turned out to be of a cancerous character, and which after a series of relapses proved fatal.