Talk:Investiture Controversy

Edits by 147.226.216.174

Reverted edits. None of the footnotes are accurate, I checked the books in question using Amazon Look Inside and they are bogus refrences. On further research found that the text is copyvio's from other websites. I'm curious if 147.226.216.174 will chime in here and explain why this was done, the intent seemed to be good, but the footnotes and copyrighted are clearly misleading. --Stbalbach 03:47, 16 Dec 2004 (UTC)

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Added a section on the English investiture controversy. Many elusive circumlocutions in bureaucratspeak need to be made more crisp and informative in this sometimes flaccid report. --Wetman 1 July 2005 20:35 (UTC)

WTF? "In addition, the Holy Roman Emperor had the special ability to appoint the pope". This line is nonsense and should be removed. The Bishops of Rome had been elected by the citizenry of the City up until 1059, when Nicholas II restricted the privilege to the Cardinal Priests of the Church. Solicitr (talk) 06:17, 6 August 2008 (UTC)

This claim was inserted by Wetman again, uncited and pointing to his pet proprietary church article, so I removed it again. Requires a verifiable and reliable source if it's going to stick. --Geoff Capp (talk) 00:16, 12 February 2010 (UTC)

"sacredoium"

I do not have much Latin, but I am mostly convinced that this form is corrupt; that it derived from 'sacredotum' (modern spelling sacerdotum; genitive plural of sacerdos, 'priest' or 'cleric') via a faulty OCR scan. I cannot find the form 'sacredoium' in usage anywhere on the web that does *not* trace its origin back to this page, with a single exception (https://archive.org/stream/in.ernet.dli.2015.151204/2015.151204.Early-Tudor-Poetry-1485-1547_djvu.txt) that is itself clearly the proceeds of an OCR scanning project. Recommend changing to 'sacredotus'.Sebum-n-soda (talk) 21:02, 17 April 2020 (UTC)

"holy father"

I would like this article to include information on the rcc's pope's title. If someone can do that in wikipedia standard that would be nice.

The origin of the Roman Catholic title according to http://www.catholiceducation.org/articles/apologetics/ap0038.html was "born" during the Investiture Controversy.

The qualifier “holy” underlines the spiritual dimension of this fatherhood exercised in the name of God; and we have already said that it does not imply a moral judgment on the person of the Pope. The expression “Holy Father” was born in the time of the controversy over lay investiture, and it seemed normal that in its becoming common usage in the acts of the chancery, the Roman Curia had then wished to underscore the spiritual and supernatural level of the mission of the Pope by adding the adjective “holy” — to defend implicitly the superiority of papal power over imperial power.

What is the connection of the assumed title with the Investiture Controversy? Isn't this part of the broader program discussed (badly so far) at Gregorian Reform? --Wetman 17:55, 16 January 2006 (UTC)

Edits by 66.235.44.73

There is NO WAY that the Gregorian Reforms, begun in 1056, are not connected with the Great Schism of 1054. Indeed, the reason behind the Great Schism was Rome's aggressive assertion of Papal Primacy which the Greek Orthodox world could not stomach. This smacks of the very Papal Absolutism characterizing the Gregorian Reforms! Thus, it seems unambiguously clear beyond all doubt that in this period of the 1050s, a Papal Absolutism party took final control of the RCC, leading to a break with the Orthodox East (1054), the absolutist Gregorian Reforms (1056+), the crushing of then-Orthodox England (1066) still in communion with the Greek East, and the Investiture Controversy (1075+), and even the First Crusade (1095). During this period, the RCC aggressively shed all restraints to its absolutist powers and proclaimed itself the inerrant avatar of Almighty God on Earth for all peoples, to wit, Global Ruler. These assertions alienated all of its neighbors, leading to conflicts with the Orthodox World, England, Germany, and the Muslim World.—The preceding unsigned comment was added by 66.235.44.73 (talk • contribs) .

Dominium mundi

Hi, I came across the article Dominium mundi at the list of requests for cleanup after translation. I know absolutely nothing about this topic, but as I worked on the lead section, I came across a few other articles (this one, Separation of church and state (medieval), and others) that seemed to overlap with it in various ways. I think it would be really helpful if someone with knowledge of the history of this period would take a look at the article and see if perhaps parts of it (or all of it) could be merged. - AdelaMae ^{(talk - contribs)} 06:56, 1 December 2006 (UTC)

TERRIBLE

This article is awful - like a bad A-level paper but with too many errors. THe claims in the opening paragraph are laughable. Please, can someone who knows something about this topic write a new piece? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 86.130.58.95 (talk) 12:39, 9 April 2009 (UTC)

Agreed! It is clearly a biased article worthy of a place among Luther's. To quote, "The crisis began when a group within the church, members of the Gregorian Reform, decided to rebel against the rule of simony by forcefully taking the power of investiture from the ruling secular power, i.e. the Holy Roman Emperor and placing that power wholly within control of the church." It completely disregards the fact that the Church had started off with bishops (and pope) elected by the clergy and people; it disregards the Pax Dei movement and Cluniac reforms which are part and parcel of the Gregorian reforms; it disregards the excesses of the "secular" bishops appointed by the Emperor. Instead it paints a picture of a cunning pope eager for power. Simony was one of the gravest sins for the early Church; so no they did not "rebel" against the "rule" of simony. Not that there wasn't a power-grab, but the article needs to be balanced by someone in the know.Chrystomath2 (talk) 10:38, 5 August 2017 (UTC)

An improvement walk (not an improvement drive)

• I plan to chip in bits 'n pieces to this article, a little bit here and there over a longish time period. I knew nothing about this topic before encountering this article & so will be learning as I go. All and sundry who watch this page are cordially invited to let me know where I err. Later! Ling.Nut (talk) 13:39, 25 May 2009 (UTC)
• I'm gonna play with the WP:LEDE here in talk, 'cause I don't wanna completely uglify the article. I'll just be adding scraps and thoughts, and referencing them as best as I can. All or most of the footnotes would be moved to the body text of the article (and out of the lede) if/when this gets moved onto the article page... Don't take whatever you see below as anything other than a working scratchpad of thoughts:

The Investiture Controversy or Investiture Contest was the most significant conflict between Church and state in medieval Europe.

[NOTE: Oh... there wasn't any separation before then, and in fact, not before the 13th century... needs to be reworded].

In the 11th and 12th centuries, a series of popes challenged the authority of European monarchies over control of appointments, or investitures, of church officials such as bishops and abbots. Although the principal conflict began in 1075 between Pope Gregory VII and Henry IV, Holy Roman Emperor, a brief but significant struggle over investiture also occurred between Henry I of England and the papacy of Paschal II in the years 1103 to 1107, and the issue played a minor role in the struggles between church and state in France as well. The entire controversy was finally resolved by the Concordat of Worms in 1122.

In the Holy Roman Empire, there was no clear separation between church and state... the High Churchmen had control over lands and money. They were literate and educated, and were an important administrative force of the empire, and a counterbalance against the rebellious barons. Control over investiture, then, amounted to control over a significant income flow and a large amount of territory (more than one-third the empire)...

By undercutting the Imperial power established by the Salian emperors, the controversy led to nearly 50 years of civil war in Germany, the triumph of the great dukes and abbots, and the disintegration of the Holy Roman Empire from which Germany would not recover until the unification of Germany in the 19th century.{{dooby-ooby-oobius}}

• Bishop, Morris (2001). The Middle Ages. Houghton Mifflin Harcourt. ISBN 061805703X.
• Spruyt, Hendrik (1996). The sovereign state and its competitors: an analysis of systems change. Princeton University Press. ISBN 0691029105.

investiture... alive and well in China

Wow, I didn't know this:

• "China says it has the right to appoint bishops; Vatican says that's the pope's job"
• Chinese underground churches expose rift, CNN article.
• Ling.Nut (talk) 23:58, 25 May 2009 (UTC)

Removal

I removed the following sentence: This radical departure from the balance of power of the Early Middle Ages, among the other Gregorian reforms, eliminated the practice of investiture, the divinely-appointed monarch's right to invest a ..."

There are four problems with that text:

• the word "radical" implies that the changes were an innovation rather than a repudiation of uncanonical practices
• "Balance of power": that a king should be one - the only one! - to appoint bishops in his realm doesn't look like balanced to me, more like something totally imbalanced. Sure, there was a time when the Papacy claimed total supremacy as under Boniface VIII (at least rhetorically) but what one can see in the aftermath of the Investiture Controversy was not an imbalanced distrubution of power but rather one balance two sides.
• "eliminated the practice of investiture" - it did eliminate "lay investiture", not investiture as such, which strictly speaking cannot be eliminated.
• "the divinely-appointed monarch's right to invest" both informs the reader that the monarch was appointed by God and that he had that right - both are quite contentious claims.

12:32, 20 April 2011 (UTC) — Preceding unsigned comment added by Deposuit (talk • contribs)

.... a cat? ...

This article currently has a picture of a cat, described as a "medieval king" by the caption - this is clearly wrong. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.16.144.197 (talk) 00:38, 29 November 2011 (UTC)

Syntax

...their first step was to forcibly gain the papacy from the control of the emperor.

— Gain? Do we mean "wrest" or "remove"? Sca (talk) 00:21, 14 September 2012 (UTC)

Nobility leader

What is a "nobility leader"? The term is used twice in this article, but I can't find any evidence that it is English. Whatever it really means, I'm thinking it must be something wikilinkable. Ntsimp (talk) 20:38, 9 November 2012 (UTC)

Origins

I was wondering why Pope Gelasius, St. Ambrose & St. Augustine were not included in the discussion of origins of this controversy, as the dialogue about separation of church and state is much older than stated.

76.27.193.75 (talk) 21:32, 15 May 2016 (UTC)

Article reviewed

This article was reviewed by a professional Medieval historian and a paper written about it:

David G. Halsted (October 11, 2013). "Accuracy and quality in historical representation: Wikipedia, textbooks and the Investiture Controversy". Digital Medievalist. Archived from the original on January 14, 2016. {{cite web}}: Unknown parameter |deadurl= ignored (|url-status= suggested) (help)

-- GreenC 20:32, 9 April 2017 (UTC)

Interesting. And I generally consider this article to be not nearly as good as it could be. Ealdgyth - Talk 22:47, 9 April 2017 (UTC)

Requested move 26 April 2019

The following is a closed discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. Editors desiring to contest the closing decision should consider a move review after discussing it on the closer's talk page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

The result of the move request was: not moved. (non-admin closure) Calidum 06:06, 12 May 2019 (UTC)

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Investiture Controversy → Investiture controversy – Noun, anyone? PPEMES (talk) 20:14, 26 April 2019 (UTC)--Relisting. DannyS712 (talk) 23:24, 4 May 2019 (UTC)

• Support Julia ☺ 00:00, 27 April 2019 (UTC)
• Support Rezelc (talk) 12:20, 2 May 2019 (UTC)
• The bare support votes and the bland nomination certainly don't help here. Isn't this a specific controversy in history? Has the name ever been used to refer to other conflicts at any other era?. I would note that, sources I consulted do refer to the name as a proper noun as can be seen with Britannica, this book published by Penn Press as well as this book published by a reputable press too. – Ammarpad (talk) 16:29, 4 May 2019 (UTC)
•  Note: I  Relisted this in light of Ammarpad's sources above - pinging @PPEMES, Julia, and Rezelc: so that they have a chance to see them --DannyS712 (talk) 23:24, 4 May 2019 (UTC)
• Oppose - as per User:Ammarpad, this article is about THE Investiture Controversy, not just any old investiture controversy. Ingratis (talk) 02:44, 6 May 2019 (UTC)
  • Comment: Still don't understand how you make this a proper name? Consider article controversy. PPEMES (talk) 06:19, 6 May 2019 (UTC)
    • Consider (e.g.) articles Church Fathers, Stone Age, Opium Wars - that's how. Ammarpad has given an argument + references to back up Investiture Controversy: all you've given is an opinion. Ingratis (talk) 01:02, 8 May 2019 (UTC)
• Oppose. This is a proper noun, like Protestant Reformation. What the hell does "Noun, anyone?" even mean? Srnec (talk) 02:59, 9 May 2019 (UTC)

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The above discussion is preserved as an archive of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on this talk page or in a move review. No further edits should be made to this section.

Merge from Concordat of Worms

The article Concordat of Worms currently contains a lot of information that's not about the concordat, but is actually background on the Investiture Controversy. In fact, it has more information on the controversy than the article on the controversy. As a result, I found it difficult to figure out what the Concordat of Worms did, exactly, just by reading its article. Moving most of the background material to Investiture Controversy would help. And actually the concordat can be explained in a single section, and it has to be explained in the controversy article anyway, because it resolves the whole thing, so unless the amount of material we have on the concordat itself is greatly expanded, I don't see the need to have a separate article for it, even though it's notable. -- Beland (talk) 15:15, 25 March 2020 (UTC)

• Merge Doesn't need to have a separate article. TuorEladar (talk) 14:58, 8 April 2020 (UTC)

Merged. -- Beland (talk) 18:26, 24 April 2020 (UTC)

Bold claims from intro need verification

I removed the following from the intro until it can be verified:

According to historian Norman Cantor, the Investiture Controversy was "the turning-point in medieval civilization", marking the end of the Early Middle Ages with the Germanic peoples' "final and decisive" acceptance of Christianity. More importantly, it set the stage for the religious and political system of the High Middle Ages.

These are very bold claims! I'm wondering to what degree these are accurate summaries of the cited source, so I requested quotations. I'm also wondering to what degree other historians agree with it. I don't see any support for the first idea at Christianisation of the Germanic peoples, though if true of course it could be added. -- Beland (talk) 19:50, 17 April 2020 (UTC)

Claims about taxation and feudalism

I moved the following from Concordat of Worms to this talk page instead of merging it into the article:

A more immediate result of the investiture struggle identified a proprietary right that adhered to sovereign territory, recognizing the right of kings to income from the territory of a vacant diocese and a basis for justifiable taxation. These rights lay outside feudalism, which defined authority in a hierarchy of personal relations, with only a loose relation to territory.

I don't see where the Concordat addresses the issue of taxation. If that's a misreading, the above claim could use a lot more explanation of how this came about. It's also unclear to me there's a single definition of "feudalism" that separates fealty from taxation. That could also use more explanation if that claim is kept. -- Beland (talk) 18:42, 19 April 2020 (UTC)

Second merge from Concordat of Worms

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section. A summary of the conclusions reached follows.

The result of this merge discussion was: not merged. (Closures by involved editors are permitted per WP:MERGECLOSE) Modussiccandi (talk) 11:45, 1 February 2022 (UTC)

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Modussiccandi has created a new version of Concordat of Worms which is well-researched and has better footnotes than the Worms section of Investiture Controversy. But most of the new article is background info on the controversy and two previous unsuccessful summits not previously mentioned in either article. The half that's about the Concordat and its impact will fit neatly into Investiture Controversy#Concordat of Worms (1122). Merging would improve the target article, ease future editing by making only one place to update coverage of the Concordat, reduce repetition, and benefit readers interested in the Concordat with a more thorough background. -- Beland (talk) 18:04, 24 January 2022 (UTC)

• Oppose merge: fundamentally, I believe the concordat should have its own article because it is independently notable form the investiture controversy. The situation, in principle, is the same as with WWI and the Treaty of Versailles. This view is held by many of our sister projects in languages other than English who have created a standalone page. I don't think doubling of content in the background section is a problem per se. Regarding the Investiture Controversy page: it's clear that the page would benefit from content of a higher standard. I have plans to give it a complete re-write and organisation when I have the time. Additionally, I would like to develop the article on the Concordat further, perhaps with a longer reception section and more on the details of the contract. Additions such as these should not go into the Investiture Controversy article. In summary, I think the Concordat is an independently notable topic with potential for expansion that wouldn't not benefit from being covered only in a subpar article on the larger topic. Modussiccandi (talk) 18:49, 24 January 2022 (UTC)
• Comment: I agree with Modussiccandi that the Concordat of Worms is clearly notable in its own right, and that having a well-focused article on the Cordordat will make it easier to keep Investiture Controversy from getting too unwieldy. But I have no objection to Beland's suggestion of moving or, where appropriate, duplicating material from Concordat of Worms to improve Investiture Controversy. Alarichall (talk) 11:42, 29 January 2022 (UTC)

  Same view as Alarichall A. C. Santacruz ⁂ Please ping me! 03:00, 30 January 2022 (UTC)

• Oppose per above. The concordat deserves its own article. (I am shocked to find that it was ever merged. How did I miss that?) There is lots of room for expansion. The current article does not note, for example, that the concordat did not apply to the entire Empire, but only to Germany. Srnec (talk) 04:27, 30 January 2022 (UTC)
• Oppose per Srnec. Totally warrants a WP:STANDALONE article: one of the most important treaties of the middle ages, the effects of which were still being felt 100s of years later. SN54129 13:27, 30 January 2022 (UTC)

• Oppose per above. Concordat of Worms is clearly independently notable. The alleged ease of future maintenance is not viable, as both topics are centuries old, and minimal future academic developments are unlikely. There is no reason both articles cannot be developed in parallel to cover relevant aspects of the topic. –Zfish118^⋉talk 16:44, 30 January 2022 (UTC)

The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.