with the strong
hand, crushing their feuds and exacting money tribute. Rebellion was
promptly kindled, and for twenty years one German army after another
dwindled away in the passage of the Alps, wasted under the fevers of
Italian marshes, or was crushed in desperate battle. By the treaty of
Constance, in 1183, Frederick confessed the one defeat of his career.
He acknowledged the practical independence of the Italian cities.[1]

CITIES AND KINGS

The Emperor had in fact encountered a power too strong for him. He had
been struggling against the beginnings of modern democracy, a system
stronger even in its infancy than the ancient rule of the aristocracy
which it has gradually supplanted. The resistance of Italy came not
from its knights and lords, but from its great cities, which had been
slowly growing more and more self-reliant and independent. The rise of
these city republics of the Middle Ages cannot be fully traced.
Everywhere little communities of men seem to have been driven by
desperation to build walls about their group of homes and to defy all
comers. As it was in Italy that the ancient Roman civilization had
been most firmly established and the barbarian dominance least
complete, so it was in Italy that these walled towns first asserted
their importance. Venice indeed, protected by her marshes, we have
seen establishing a somewhat republican form even from her foundation.
She and Genoa and Pisa defended themselves against the Saracens and
built ships and grew to be the chief maritime powers of the
Mediterranean, rulers of island empires. They fought wars against one
another, and Pisa was overwhelmed and ruined in a tremendous conflict
with Genoa. Genoa's fleets carried supplies for the first crusaders.
In later crusades, when the deadly nature of the long journey by land
was more clearly known, the wealthy maritime republics were hired to
carry the crusaders themselves to the East--and profited vastly by the
business.

Gradually the inland cities took courage from their sea-board
neighbors. Florence became the centre of reviving art, her citizens
the chief bankers for all Europe. Milan became chief of the Lombard
cities, leading them against Barbarossa. And when he captured and
destroyed the metropolis in 1161, the burghers of the surrounding
lesser towns rallied to her help. No sooner was the Emperor out of
reach than walls and houses rose again with the speed of magic, till
Milan stood reincarnate, fa