Barbarossa himself went with this Second Crusade, as a young
German noble. He was one of the few who escaped death in the Asian
deserts, one of the very few who from the colossal failure of the
expedition returned to Europe with added honor and reputation. He was
elected Emperor. The crusade had been as deadly as the first, though
less successful, and when this nominal leadership of Western Europe
was thus conferred on the gallant Frederick, he found the Teutonic
races weakened by the loss of a million of their most valiant
warriors--that is, of the feudal lords and their retainers.

Here we find at once one of the great causes of the decay of
Feudalism. Many of the old families had become wholly extinct; and
under the feudal system their estates lapsed to their overlords, the
kings. Other families were represented only by heiresses; and the
marrying of these ladies became a recognized move in the game for
power, in which the kings, and especially the emperor Frederick, now
took a foremost part.

Previous emperors had been figureheads; Frederick became the real
ruler of Europe. The kings of Denmark and Poland fully acknowledged
themselves his vassals. So also, though less definitely, did the King
of England. For a moment the imperial unity of Europe seemed reviving.
Only one of the Emperor's great dukes, Henry the Lion, of Saxony,
dared stand against him; and Henry was ultimately crushed. The
war-cries of the two opponents, however, became eternalized as
factional names in the struggle of Frederick's successors against
other foes. For generations whoever upheld the empire was a Waibling,
and whoever would attack it, on whatsoever plea, a Welf. Frederick,
having established his power in Germany, attempted to assert it in
Italy as well; and so the strife passed over the Alps and became that
of Ghibelline against Guelf, in Italian phrase, of emperor against
pope, of monarchy against democracy.

It was this fatal insistence upon Italian authority that brought
disaster upon Frederick and all his house, and ultimately upon the
empire as well, and on the entire German race. The Italians had been
quite content to call themselves subjects of a Holy Roman Empire which
extended but vaguely over Europe, and whose chief took his title from
their ancient city and only came among them to be crowned. They looked
at the matter in a wholly different light when Frederick regarded his
position seriously, and interfered in their affairs