section_path: Imperial families and dynasties
section_name: Imperial families and dynasties
paragraph_text: Imperial families and dynasties
  
  Some constituencies of the Holy Roman Empire had additional royal or imperial territories that were, sometimes from the outset, outside the jurisdiction of the Holy Roman Empire. Henry VI, inheriting both German aspirations for imperial sovereignty and the Norman Sicilian kings' dream of hegemony in the Mediterranean, had ambitious design for a world empire. Boettcher remarks that marriage policy also played an important role here, "The marital policy of the Staufer ranged from Iberia to Russia, from Scandinavia to Sicily, from England to Byzantium and to the crusader states in the East. Henry was already casting his eyes beyond Africa and Greece, to Asia Minor and Syria and of course on Jerusalem." His annexation of Sicily changed the strategic balance in the Italian peninsula. The emperor, who wanted to make all his lands hereditary, also asserted that papal fiefs were imperial fiefs. On his death at the age of 31 though, he was unable to pass his powerful position to his son, Frederick II, who had only been elected King of the Romans. The union between Sicily and the Empire thus remained personal union. Frederick II became King of Sicily in 1225 through marriage to Isabella II (or Yolande) of Jerusalem and regained Bethlehem and Nazareth for the Christian side through negotiation with Al-Kamil. The Hohenstaufen dream of world empire ended with Frederick's death in 1250 though.
  
  In its earlier days, the Empire provided the principal medium for Christianity to infiltrate the pagans' realms in the North and the East (Scandinavians, Magyars, Slavic people etc.). By the Reform era, the Empire, in its nature, was defensive and not aggressive, desiring of both internal peace and security against invading forces, a fact that even warlike princes such as Maximilian I appreciated. In the Early Modern age, the association with the Church (the Church Universal for the Luxemburgs, and the Catholic Church for the Habsburgs) as well as the emperor's responsibility for the defence of Central Europe remained a reality though. Even the trigger for the conception of the Imperial Reform under Sigismund was the idea of helping the Church to put its house in order.
  
  Traditionally, German dynasties had exploited the potential of the imperial title to bring Eastern Europe into the fold, in addition to their lands north and south of the Alps. Marriage and inheritance strategies, following by (usually defensive) warfare, played a great role both for the Luxemburgs and the Habsburgs. It was under Sigismund of the Luxemburg, who married Mary, Queen regnal and the rightful heir of Hungary and later consolidated his power with the marriage to the capable and well-connected noblewoman Barbara of Cilli, that the emperor's personal empire expanded to a kingdom outside the boundary of the Holy Roman Empire: Hungary. This last monarch of the Luxemburg dynasty (who wore four royal crowns) had managed to gain an empire almost comparable in scale to the later Habsburg empire, although at the same time they lost the Kingdom of Burgundy and control over Italian territories. The Luxemburgs' focus on the East, especially Hungary, allowed the new Burgundian rulers from the Valois dynasty to foster discontent among German princes. Thus, the Habsburgs were forced to refocus their attention on the West. Frederick III's cousin and predecessor, Albert II of Germany (who was Sigismund's son-in-law and heir through his marriage with Elizabeth of Luxembourg) had managed to combine the crowns of Germany, Hungary, Bohemia and Croatia under his rule, but he died young.
  
  During his rule, Maximilian I had a double focus on both the East and the West. The successful expansion (with the notable role of marriage policy) under Maximilian bolstered his position in the Empire, and also created more pressure for an imperial reform, so that they could get more resources and coordinated help from the German territories to defend their realms and counter hostile powers such as France. Ever since he became King of the Romans in 1486, the Empire provided essential help for his activities in Burgundian Netherlands as well as dealings with Bohemia, Hungary and other eastern polities. In the reigns of his grandsons, Croatia and the remaining rump of the Hungarian kingdom chose Ferdinand as their ruler after he managed to rescue Silesia and Bohemia from Hungary's fate against the Ottoman. Simms notes that their choice was a contractual one, tying Ferdinand's rulership in these kingdoms and territories to his election as King of the Romans and his ability to defend Central Europe. In turn, the Habsburgs' imperial rule also "depended on holding these additional extensive lands as independent sources of wealth and prestige."
  
  The later Austrian Habsburgs from Ferdinand I were careful to maintain a distinction between their dynastic empire and the Holy Roman Empire. Peter Wilson argues that the institutions and structures developed by the Imperial Reform mostly served German lands and, although the Habsburg monarchy "remained closely entwined with the Empire", the Habsburgs deliberately refrained from including their other territories in its framework. "Instead, they developed their own institutions to manage what was, effectively, a parallel dynastic-territorial empire and which gave them an overwhelming superiority of resources, in turn allowing them to retain an almost unbroken grip on the imperial title over the next three centuries." Ferdinand had an interest in keeping Bohemia separate from imperial jurisdiction and making the connection between Bohemia and the Empire looser (Bohemia did not have to pay taxes to the Empire). As he refused the rights of an Imperial Elector as King of Bohemia (which provided him with half of his revenue), he was able to give Bohemia (as well as associated territories such as Upper and Lower Alsatia, Silesia and Moravia) the same privileged status as Austria, therefore affirming his superior position in the Empire. The Habsburgs also tried to mobilize imperial aid for Hungary (which, throughout the 16th century, cost the dynasty more money in defence expenditure than the total revenue it yielded).
  
  Since 1542, Charles V and Ferdinand had been able to collect the Common Penny tax, or Türkenhilfe (Turkish aid), designed to protect the Empire against the Ottomans or France. But as Hungary, unlike Bohemia, was not part of the Empire, the imperial aid for Hungary depended on political factors. The obligation was only in effect if Vienna or the Empire were threatened. Wilson notes that, "In the early 1520s the Reichstag hesitated to vote aid for Hungary's King Louis II, because it regarded him as a foreign prince. This changed once Hungary passed to the Habsburgs on Louis' death in battle in 1526 and the main objective of imperial taxation across the next 90 years was to subsidize the cost of defending the Hungarian frontier against the Ottomans. The bulk of the weaponry and other military materiel was supplied by firms based in the Empire and financed by German banks. The same is true of the troops who eventually evicted the Ottomans from Hungary between 1683 and 1699. The imperial law code of 1532 was used in parts of Hungary until the mid-17th century, but otherwise Hungary had its own legal system and did not import Austrian ones. Hungarian nobles resisted the use of Germanic titles like Graf for count until 1606, and very few acquired the personal status of imperial prince."
  
  Responding to the opinion that the Habsburg's dynastic concerns were damaging to the Holy Roman Empire, Whaley writes that, "There was no fundamental incompatibility between dynasticism and participation in the empire, either for the Habsburgs or for the Saxons or others." Imperial marriage strategies had double-edged effects for the Holy Roman Empire though. The Spanish connection was an example: while it provided a powerful partner in the defence of Christendom against the Ottomans, it allowed Charles V to transfer the Burgundian Netherlands, Franche-Comte as well as other imperial fiefs such as Milan to his son Philip II 's Spanish Empire.
  
  Other than the imperial families, other German princes possessed foreign lands as well, and foreign rulers could also acquire imperial fiefs and thus become imperial princes. This phenomenon contributed to the fragmentation of sovereignty, in which imperial vassals remained semi-sovereign, while strengthening the interconnections (and chances of mutual interference) between the Kingdom of Germany and the Empire in general with other kingdoms such as Denmark and Sweden, who accepted the status of imperial vassals on behalf of their German possessions (which were subjected to imperial laws). The two Scandinanvian monarchies honoured the obligations to come to the aid of the Empire in the wars of 17th and early 18th centuries. They also imported German princely families as rulers, although in both cases, this did not produce direct unions. Denmark consistently tried to take advantage of its influence in imperial institutions to gain new imperial fiefs along the Elbe, although these attempts generally did not succeed.