RELIGIOUS ENCYCLOPEDIA
Alexander
to submit wholly to the papal demands. The culminating point of Alexander's success was marked by the Third Lateran Council (Mar., 1179). Besides approving the crusade against the Cathari of southern France, which had been inaugurated by Raymond of Toulouse with the support of Louis VII., the pope's friend and protector, the 300 bishops of this brilliant assembly passed an important canon regulating papal elections, which confined the electoral power to the cardinals, excluding the lower clergy and the laity and making no mention of imperial confirmation, and required a twothirds vote to elect.
In spite of his apparently complete triumph over his enemies, Alexander never really conquered the Roman people. Soon after the close of the council they drove him once more into exile; and a month after Calixtus III. had formally renounced his pretensions, a new antipope was set up, who took the name of Innocent III. Alexander succeeded in vanquishing this rival, but never returned to Rome, and died at Civita Castellana Aug. 30, 1181, his corpse being followed to its sepulcher in the Lateran by cries of implacable hostility from the populace. His letters are in MPL, cc; his Summa was edited by F. Thaner (Innsbruck, 1874), and his Sentential by A. M. Gietl (Freiburg, 1891).
(A. Hauck.)
Bibliography: Liber pontificalis, ed. Duchesne, ii. 397-446, Paris, 1892; Gesta Alexandri III., in Bouquet, Recueil, xv. 744-977; Jaffe, Regesta, ii. 145 sqq., 761; M. Watterich, Romanorum pontificum . . vita;, ii. 377-451, Leipsic, 1862; K. L. Ring, Friedrich I. im Kampf gegen Alexander III., Stuttgart, 1838; Bower, Popes, ii. 502; H. Reuter, Geschichte Alexanders III. undder Kirche seiner Zeit, 3 vols., 2d ed., Leipsic, 1860-64; P. Scheffer-Boichorst, Kaiser Friedrichs I. letzter Streit mit der Kurie, Berlin, 1866; J. Langen, Geschichte der romischen Kirche, pp. 439 sqq., Bonn, 1893; Milman, Latin Christianity, iv. 288-438; G. Wolfram, Friedrich I. und das Wormier Concordat, Marburg, 1883; Hefele, Conciliengeschichte, v. 571-722; J. R. Green, History of the English People, vol. i., London, 1888-92; A. M. Gietl, Die Sentenzen Rolands, nachmals Papstes Alexander 111., Freiburg, 1891; Hauck, KD, iv. 227-302.
Alexander IV. (Rinaldo de Conti): Pope 1254- 61. He was made a cardinal-deacon in 1227 by his uncle, Gregory IX., and in 1231 cardinal-bishop of Ostia. As a cardinal, he does not seem to have been strongly anti-imperialistic, and Frederick II. is found in 1233 and 1242 writing in a tone of friendship to him. On the death of Innocent IV (Dec. 13, 1254), Alexander was elected to succeed him, and at once began to follow the policy of his predecessors. Conrad IV., on his death-bed, had commended to the guardianship of the Church his two-year-old son Conradin, heir to the duchy of Swabia and the kingdoms of Jerusalem and Sicily. Alexander accepted the charge with the most benevolent promises, but less than two weeks later he demanded that the Swabian nobles should desert Conradin for Alfonso of Castile. On Mar. 25, 1255, he excommunicated Manfred, Conradin's uncle, who had undertaken to defend "the kingdom of Sicily in the child's name, and on Apr. 9 he concluded an alliance with Henry III. of England, on whose son Edmund he bestowed Sicily and Apulia, to be held fs PaPal fiefs. When some of the German princes talked in 1254 of setting up Ottocar of Bohemia
as a claimant of the throne in opposition to William of Holland, the papal prot<Sge\ he forbade them to take any steps for the election of a king in William's lifetime; and when William died, he forbade the archbishops of Cologne, Treves, and Mainz to place Conradin on the throne of his father. In the contest for the crown which now arose between Alfonso X. of Castile and Richard of Cornwall, brother of Henry III. of England, the pope, whose support was asked by both, took the side of the latter, promising him (Apr. 30, 1259) not merely the support of his legates in Germany, but holding out hopes of the imperial crown. In this he was influenced by the English king's money, which was necessary to him in his contest against Manfred. In Aug., 1258, on a rumor of the death of Conradin, Manfred himself assumed the crown of Sicily, and was recognized in northern and central Italy as the head of the Ghibelline party. After the decisive victory of Montaperto had put Florence, the Guelph bulwark, in Manfred's power, Alexander excommunicated every one who should help him in any way, and laid all his dominions under an interdict (Nov. 18, 1260). This was all he could do, since an appeal to the kings of England and Norway to undertake a crusade against Manfred, and a demand for a tenth of the income of the French clergy for the same purpose had both proved unsuccessful.
Alexander had better luck against the notorious Ezzelino da Romano, son-in-law of Frederick II. and leader of the Ghibellines in northern Italy. An army raised by the pope for a crusade against this monster had accomplished little, but finally in 1259 he succumbed to a combination of princes and cities. In Rome, however, the party of Manfred was gaining strength, and in 1261 he was elected to the highest office in the gift of the people, that of senator. How terribly Italy suffered from the demoralization which followed this relentless warfare is evident from the spread of the Flagellants (See Flagellation, Flagellants), whose fanatical processions took place even in Rome (1260). A council was called to meet at Viterbo for the purpose of setting on foot a crusade against the Tatars, but before it convened Alexander died in that city (May 25, 1261). (A. Hauck.)
Bibliography: Bouret de la Ronciere, Lea Registres d' Alexandre IV., parts 1-4, Paris, 1895 sqq.; MGH , Epist. sozculi xiii., hi. (1894) 314-473, 729-730, and Leg., iv., 1896; W. H. Bliss, Calendar of Entries in the Papal Registers relating to Great Britain and Ireland, Papal Letters, i. 309-376, London, 1893; A. Potthast, Regesta, ii. 1286 sqq., Berlin, 1875; C. J. de Cherner, Histoire de la lutte des papes et des empereurs de la maison de Souabe, Paris, 1858; O. Posse, Analecta vaticana, 1 sqq., 120 sqq., Innsbruck, 1878; G. Digard, La Serie des registres pontificaux du treizieme siecle. Pans, 1886; E. Engelmann, Der Anspruch der Papste auf Confirmation und Approbation, 1077-1379, pp. 53 sqq., Breslau, 1886; Bower, Popes, ii. 567-571.
Alexander V. (Peter Philargi): Pope 1409-10. He was an orphan boy from Crete, brought up by the Minorites, which order he afterward entered. After traveling in Italy, England, and France, he acquired a name as a teacher of rhetoric in the University of Paris. Later he held a dignified position at the court of Gian Galeazzo Visconti in Milan, of which see he became archbishop in
■Alexander