Читать книгу The Empire and the Papacy, 918-1273. Investiture Contest, Crusades & The Famous Conflicts онлайн

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The reconciliation with the Papacy stood the Normans in good stead. Henceforth they posed as the champions of Western Catholicism against Eastern Orthodoxy and Islam. Though the Norman chieftains still wrangled hotly with each other, the tide in south Italy had definitely turned in their favour. In 1071 the capture of Bari, after a three years’ siege, finally expelled the Greeks from Italy. The Lombard principality of Salerno was also absorbed, and the greater part of the territories of the dukes of Benevento, save the city and its neighbourhood, which Robert Guiscard, much to his own disgust, was forced to yield to his papal suzerain. We shall see in other chapters how Robert crossed the Straits of Otranto and aspired to conquer the Greek Empire, how he came to the help of Gregory VII. in his greatest need, and how his son Bohemund took part in the first Crusade and founded the principality of Antioch. When Robert died in 1085, all southern Italy acknowledged him as its lord, save the rival Norman principality of Capua, the half-Greek republics of Amalfi and Naples, and the papal possession of Benevento.