Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: CHAPTER VI CHARLES Iv. AND THE GOLDEN BULL Charles iv. secures the German Crown—His rule in Bohemia—His coronation in Italy—Difficulties in Germany—The Golden Bull—The Papacy and the Golden Bull—The results of the Golden Bull—The intentions of Charles iv.—The Territorial Policy of Charles Iv.—The Succession question in Upper Bavaria—The election and coronation of Wenzel— The Swabian League—The Great Schism—Death of Charles iv.—Partition of the Luxemburg territories. When Charles iv. returned from the campaign in France, which had cost his father's life, he seemed to have very little chance of gaining the imperial throne, to which Positionof he had been elected by the opponents of Lewis the Charles iv. Bavarian. It is true that Bohemia was rich in m I347 mineral wealth, but in territorial power the House of Luxemburg was no match for the House of Wittelsbach, whose various members ruled over the Palatinate, the whole of Bavaria, the marks of Brandenburg, Tyrol, and the border districts of Hainault, Holland, Zeeland, Friesland, and Utrecht. The second son of Lewis, Stephen, was head of the powerful Swabian League, and the imperial towns were all on the side of the Bavarian Emperor. The electors who had given Charles their votes were not prepared to make any sacrifices in his cause, and Albert of Austria, the most powerful of the non- electoral princes, was committed to the cause of Lewis. The chief ally to whom Charles might have looked for support was the French king; but Philip vi. was fully occupied in the war with Edward in., and was thus unable to take any part in the affairs of Germany. And Charles had another great disadvantage in his relationsto the Papacy. In return for the support of Clement vi. he had made very extreme concessions in a treaty arranged at Avign...