ABSTRACT
Henry shared the traditional hostility of the Norman kings to the Byzantine Empire, and managed to divide Europe with the Guelf-Ghibelline feud, by holding Richard of England captive for nearly two years. The resulting eastward expansion of the Germans was one of the greatest movements of the middle Ages. While at the end of the Hohenstaufen period old Germany dissolved into a chaos of petty, brawling states, the new states like Brandenburg and Austria displayed great strength; in the fifteenth century the great houses of Germany were the Hohenzollern in Bran-denburg and the Habsburgs in Austria. Innocent had at once made himself the guardian of the young Frederick II, on the ground that the pope was the over-lord of the Norman kingdom in Italy. Frederick II had no mind to abandon the Hohenstaufen tradition, but he wisely saw that it was less practicable to continue a union of Germany and Italy than a union of Italy and Sicily.
