ABSTRACT
Sacred kingship functioned well in the German Empire during the reign of the serious young king Henry III (1039-56). He was 22 years old when he succeeded his illiterate and brutal father, Conrad II (1024-39). Like his predecessors, Henry depended on the resources of the church to rule his kingdom and he exercised his right to appoint bishops and abbots. However, he was personally pious and conscientious in choosing suitable men for church offices. He favoured monastic reform in his realm and he encouraged the moral reform of the secular clergy. He refused to commit simony by taking payments from bishops and abbots but he did not abandon the traditional right to invest churchmen with the symbols of their offices.
