Inauguration and political liturgy in the Hohenstaufen Empire, 1138–1215

The Gregorian reform movement in general, and events at Canossa in 1077 in particular, have been credited with tarnishing the lustre of sacral kingship within the Empire. In this paper narrative, liturgical and material sources are drawn upon, to demonstrate the extent to which the image of kingship within the Hohenstaufen Empire continued to be rooted in biblical and liturgical soil. The paper focuses on the ritual of inauguration and draws a distinction between royal and imperial ceremonies. This makes it apparent that, while scholars have been right to stress the extent to which papal alterations to the imperial rite undermined the liturgical associations of the imperial office, the imperial liturgy developed by the papal curia in Rome had negligible impact on the royal inauguration liturgy used in Aachen. On the contrary, German monarchs continued to make lively use of inauguration liturgy to emphasize, in the face of papal opprobrium, the divinely ordained nature of their rule.