Maria Pia Oelker

The lonely king Maria Pia Oelker

As we retrace the life of the king and emperor of Germany Henry IV of Franconia, the king of Canossa, what stands out more than any other is solitude. Loneliness as a child, orphaned of his father at just six years of age; loneliness as a teenager, kidnapped by the nobles at 11 and raised away from his mother, loved and good, but perhaps not quite up to the difficult task of ruler; loneliness as a young king, committed to carrying out a difficult political project against the great men of the kingdom and in favor of new social classes emerging in the cities, abandoned by everyone and constantly fighting against strong enemy coalitions. Finally, the solitude of an old ruler betrayed by his children and taken prisoner. Next to this, however, there are also unyielding courage and unwavering faith in his sacred role of king "by divine right" which brings to the forefront a dramatically complex and sometimes contradictory figure, but, in a certain sense, more human and closer than what has traditionally passed on to us by historical facts. In a century that marked the end of a world and the beginning of a new era, Henry IV embodied both attributes . A king in a sense to be rediscovered, whose sources outline his work in a sometimes highly contradictory way and who is usually only remembered for the penance of Canossa. An intriguing figure to be reinterpreted in a way that allows a glimpse of the man beneath the king, so far away in time to appear barely more than a static figure of a now faded fresco.