Politicians

Frederick Barbarossa

Holy Roman emperor (1122-1190), the first Hohenstaufen to wear the imperial crown. After his election in 1152 he made the restoration of imperial prestige his life's project, launching six Italian campaigns to subdue the Lombard cities, reviving Roman law at Roncaglia in 1158, and waging an 18-year struggle against three popes. The catastrophic sack of Milan in 1162 and his defeat at Legnano in 1176 forced him toward a pragmatic settlement at Constance in 1183. He drowned in the Saleph River in 1190 while leading the Third Crusade, an end that birthed the Kyffhäuser legend later weaponised by 19th and 20th-century German politics.

View this figure's profile