It is possible that, if the opportunity had been
forthcoming, he would at once have proceeded to Rome for an imperial
coronation. But the Pope, who alone could make an Emperor, was the nominee of a
Roman faction, headed by the ambitious Alberic the Senator who aspired to build
up a secular lordship on the basis of the Papal patrimony. Otto was not invited
to visit Rome. After some hesitation he decided, instead of himself assuming
the unprofitable duties of an Italian King, to restore Berengar on condition of
a renewal of homage. Perhaps the arrangement was intended to be temporary. Otto
was still menaced by conspiracies in Germany; and Berengar might serve to guard
Italy against ambitious Dukes, until the hands of his overlord were free for
Italian adventures. Later events justify some such hypothesis.
Within a few
years the chief difficulties of Otto were removed. A great ducal rising
collapsed; the Hungarians were so decisively beaten at the Lechfeld (955) that
they ceased to trouble Germany; death relieved Otto of his most dangerous rivals,
Archbishop Frederic of Mainz and his own son, Duke Liutolf. Then, in 960,
arrived the long-delayed call from Rome. John XII, a dissipated youth of
twenty-two, the son of Alberic (died 954) but devoid of his father's ability,
invoked the aid of Germany to protect the temporal possessions against
Berengar. Otto required no second summons. Descending upon Italy, he expelled
his vassal, assumed the Italian crown at Pavia (961) and then repaired to Rome.
Here in 962 he was crowned by the Pope as lord of the Holy Roman Empire of the
German Nation. For good or for evil the prerogative of Charles the Great was
inseparably united to the German monarchy.
