Title

Ludwig the Bavarian and the German Estates

Date of Award

1975

Degree Type

Dissertation

Degree Name

Doctor of Philosophy (PhD)

Department

History

Advisor(s)

James M. Powell

Keywords

Medieval Germany, Social change, Political change, Expansion, Localist opportunism

Subject Categories

History

Abstract

The first part of the fourteenth century has always presented a problem to students of medieval Germany because of the complicated interrelationship between the social and poltical changes which occurred in this period. During its first half, the expansion of commerce and growth of cities accompanied the triumph of political particularism, The Golden Bull of 1356 separated the power of the emperor from the restriction of papal confirmation and tied it ever more closely to German domestic interests. Through the legalization of the dependence of the emperor on the electoral princes, this document contributed to the expansion of the German Estates: the electors, the princes, the lesser nobility, and the towns. These groupings within German society eventually brought about a political system in the Empire which was to be based on localist opportunism. By the middle of the fifteenth century the power of the emperor had been so reduced that one could truly speak of an "Age of Princes and Towns."

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