Holy Roman Empire

:This page is about the Germanic empire. For the ancient empire centred on Rome, see Roman Empire.

Character of the empire

[[Image:Electoral princes.png|thumb|right|200px|The prince-electors of the Holy Roman Empire. From Bildatlas der Deutschen

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Geschichte by Dr Paul Knötel (1895)]]

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The Holy Roman Empire was an institution which is unique in world history and therefore difficult to grasp. To understand what it was, it might be helpful to assess first what it was not.

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• It was never a nation state. Despite the German ethnicity of most of its rulers and subjects, from the very beginning many ethnicities constituted the Holy Roman Empire. Many of its most important noble families and appointed officials came from outside the German-speaking communities. At the height of the empire it contained most of the territory of today's Germany, Austria, Switzerland, Liechtenstein, Belgium, the Netherlands, Luxembourg, Czech Republic, Slovenia, as well as eastern France, northern Italy and western Poland. Its languages thus comprised not only German and its many dialects and derivatives, but many Slavic languages, and the languages which became modern French and Italian as well. Furthermore, its division into territories ruled by numerous secular and ecclesiastical princes, prelates, counts, imperial knights, and free cities made it, in the early modern period at least, far less cohesive than the emerging modern states around it.
• However, during most of its time, it was more than a mere confederation. The concept of the Reich not only included the government of a specific territory, but had strong Christian religious connotations (hence the holy prefix). Until 1508, the German Kings were not considered Emperors of the Reich until the Pope had formally crowned them as such.

The Reich can thus best be described as a cross between a state and a religious confederation.

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