The ''Confoederatio cum principibus ecclesiasticis'' ("Treaty with the princes of the church") was decreed on 26 April 1220 by Frederick II as a concession to the German bishops in return for their co-operation in the election of his son

Henry Henry may refer to: People and fictional characters * Henry (given name), including lists of people and fictional characters * Henry (surname) * Henry, a stage name of François-Louis Henry (1786–1855), French baritone Arts and entertainmen ...

King King is a royal title given to a male monarch. A king is an Absolute monarchy, absolute monarch if he holds unrestricted Government, governmental power or exercises full sovereignty over a nation. Conversely, he is a Constitutional monarchy, ...

. It was an important source of law of the

Holy Roman Empire The Holy Roman Empire, also known as the Holy Roman Empire of the German Nation after 1512, was a polity in Central and Western Europe, usually headed by the Holy Roman Emperor. It developed in the Early Middle Ages, and lasted for a millennium ...

, and was counted among its constitutional documents by the editors of the ''

Monumenta Germaniae Historica The (Latin for "Historical Monuments of Germany"), frequently abbreviated MGH, is a comprehensive series of carefully edited and published primary sources, both chronicle and archival, for the study of parts of Northwestern, Central and Souther ...

''. In this law Frederick II relinquished a number of important Royal rights (''Regalia'') to the spiritual princes. Among other things, the bishops received the rights to mint coins and levy tolls in the German part of the Holy Roman Empire and to build fortifications. Moreover, they gained the right to hold courts in their lordships and to receive the assistance of the King or the Emperor in carrying out the sentences passed there. Acceptance of the sentences by the King or Emperor was guaranteed: condemnation by the ecclesiastical courts automatically meant condemnation and punishment by the Royal or Imperial courts as well. Therefore, the pronouncement of

excommunication Excommunication is an institutional act of religious censure used to deprive, suspend, or limit membership in a religious community or to restrict certain rights within it, in particular those of being in Koinonia, communion with other members o ...

by an ecclesiastical court was invariably followed by the sentence of

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from the King or the Emperor. The decreeing of this law, taken in conjunction with the later '' Statutum in favorem principum'', which granted similar concessions to the secular or lay princes, made the power and influence of the spiritual territorial princes in relation to the Empire and the towns extraordinarily great. Frederick's aim was to leave the Empire north of the Alps secure under the direct rule of the princes, allowing him to concentrate his efforts on the southern part of the Empire. This rule of the land by the princes was nevertheless secured at the expense of the centralised power of the monarchy.

Sources

*Zippelius, Reinhold. ''Kleine deutsche Verfassungsgeschichte'', 7th ed. Munich: 2006, . * Dietmar Willoweit: ''Deutsche Verfassungsgeschichte. Vom Frankenreich bis zur Wiedervereinigung Deutschlands''. 5. erweiterte und um eine Zeittafel und einen Kartenanhang ergänzte Auflage. Beck, München 2005, , (''Juristische Kurz-Lehrbücher''), § 10 II 2.

External links

*
Representative edition (MGH)

{{Authority control 1220s in law Law of the Holy Roman Empire 1220s in the Holy Roman Empire 1220 in Europe Frederick II, Holy Roman Emperor