3 - While the Bishop's Away …: Absentee Bishops of Parma during the Investiture Contest

Summary

At the start of the eleventh century the bishops of northern Italy were among the most powerful figures in the region. They typically held a broad array of lands, rights and jurisdictions and, as a result, they featured prominently within the politics of the Empire. By the early decades of the twelfth century, the position of many of these bishops had changed dramatically and in many cities their temporal role was drastically reduced. This collapse of the secular authority of the Italian bishops is often linked to the Investiture Contest and a broader failure of imperial power in northern Italy. It is argued that the Investiture Contest and, in particular, the installation of reforming bishops in Italian cities during this period caused the decline of their secular power. This is in stark contrast with the bishops of the ‘Imperial Church System’ of previous centuries, who are traditionally presented as loyal supporters of the emperor, chosen from his court and empowered through his intervention. The bishops were no longer magnates of the empire concerned with upholding imperial power, but rather tools of the Gregorian reformers dedicated to removing themselves from the corruption of the secular world. This broad narrative of the Investiture Contest has overshadowed analysis of political change on a local level. Many bishops did lose their secular roles during this conflict, but closer inspection of the charter sources suggests that this was more a result of prolonged physical or political absences from their see than an immediate consequence of changing ideologies. This paper will take the bishops of Parma as a case study to demonstrate the gradual nature of this transformation of the political position of the Italian bishops and to highlight the importance of the absence of the bishop in this transition.

Twenty-first-century studies by Miller, Cushing and Stroll, among others, have provided extensive and insightful accounts of historiographical trends relating to the Investiture Contest. As they observe, various historians have highlighted inconsistencies within the narrative of the Investiture Contest and the Gregorian reform movement and how these interacted with the Imperial Church System of the German Empire. Two themes raised by these authors are especially relevant here.