LOTHAIR III, ROMAN EMPEROR

Reigned Aug. 30, 1125, to Dec. 4, 1137; Count of Supplinburg; b. 1075; d. Breitenwang, Tirol; buried at Königslutter, Braunschweig, which he founded. He was crowned king in aachen on Sept. 13, 1125. Federick, Duke of Swabia, the nephew of the deceased and childless henry v, inherited the imperial property and the hereditary claim to the throne, and, as the Hohenstaufen candidate, remained an enemy of Lothair despite his feudal submission. Since the German princes, led by Adalbert I of Mainz, feared the continuation of a Salian ecclesiastical and territorial policy, they decided in favor of a free election.

Lothair seemed to have been the ideal opponent of the Hohenstaufen. His father had fallen in battle against their grandfather, henry iv (1075). Appointed Duke of Saxony by Henry V (1106), the once insignificant count diplomatically took advantage of opportunities and increased his power in the duchy and in the border marches through profitable inheritances and successful war against the Slavs east of the Elbe, as well as against the Salians themselves (Welfesholze, 1115). Lothair won over Henry the Black, Duke of Bavaria, by giving his only child, Gertrude, in marriage to the Duke's son, Henry the Proud. As king, he intervened in the Bohemian controversy in 1126 and suffered a military defeat, but by shrewd diplomacy managed nevertheless to attain his goals. Conrad, the younger Hohenstaufen, took advantage of the moment, had himself appointed as rival king, and thus gained a temporary foothold in imperial Italy. The Hohenstaufen, however, had overestimated their strength, although Lothair's wife Richenza and (St.) bernard were unable to arrange a settlement before 1135.

Influenced by Bernard during the schism between Anacletus II (see pierleoni) and innocent ii, Lothair decided (1130) in favor of Innocent, from whom he had twice, but in vain, demanded a revision of the Concordat of worms. In 1133 Innocent crowned Lothair emperor at the Lateran, since Anacletus had taken possession of St. Peter's. Lothair's recognition of papal dominion over the estates of matilda of tuscany occasioned anti-imperial propaganda to construe his action as a recognition of feudal supremacy of the pope over the emperor. In 1136 Lothair campaigned against Anacletus and his Norman vassal roger ii. He died while returning from Italy. Such historically far-reaching developments as the guelf and ghibelline controversy, the revival of German eastern colonization and the missions to the Slavs, the consolidation of the southern Italian Norman state, the surrender of further sacral functions on the part of the Empire, and the decay of the royal duchies (Lower Lorraine) either began or took shape during his reign.

Bibliography: Sources. Historia Welforum, ed. e. kÖnig (Stuttgart 1938). Annales Patherbrunnenses, ed. p. schefferboichorst (Innsbruck 1870). Literature. h. vogt, Das Herzogtum Lothars von Süpplingenburg (Hildesheim 1959). h. wolter, Lexikon für Theologie und Kirche, ed. j. hofer and k. rahner (Freiburg 1957–65) 6:1156–57, the birthdate is incorrect. e. wadle, Reichsgut und Königsherrschaft unter Lothar III. (1125–1137) (Berlin 1969). k. hampe, Germany under the Salian and Hohenstaufen Emperors (Oxford 1973). m. l. crone, Untersuchungen zur Reichskirchenpolitik Lothars III. (1125–1137) zwischen reichskirchlicher Tradition und Reformkurie (Frankfurt am Main 1982). h. fuhrmann, Germany in the High Middle Ages, c. 1050–1200, tr. t. reuter (Cambridge 1986). t. gross, Lothar III. und die mathildischen Güter (Frankfurt am Main 1990).

[h. wolfram]