268 Readings in European History the nobles killed. The commons he gave over in bondage to his knights, and he compelled the wives of the natives to marry the invaders. In the year of our Lord 1067, King Henry took to wife Bertha, daughter of a certain Otto, an Italian, and of Adel- heid; and he celebrated the wedding at Tribur. Conrad, councilor of the church at Cologne, whom King Henry had designated as bishop of Treves, was taken prisoner by The- odoric, count of that city, and was carried into the forest by his followers and thrown down three times from the top !of a mountain, but since he still remained unhurt, they dis- patched him with a sword. In the year of our Lord 1068, King Henry, with youthful recklessness, began to reside in Saxony alone of all the Roman Empire, to despise the princes, oppress the nobles, exalt the lowborn, and to devote himself (as was said) to the chase, to gaming and other occupations of this kind, more than to the administration of justice. He married the daughters of the nobles to his favorites of low origin, and, full of distrust against the powerful of the empire, he began to build certain castles. By thus recklessly sowing the seeds of discord it fell out that the number of those who proposed to deprive the king not only of his kingdom but even of his life grew rapidly. However, as he had not yet fully reached the years of maturity, many judged that the responsibility did not fall so much upon him as upon Archbishop Adelbert of Bremen, since everything was done on his advice. In the year of our Lord 1069, the Empress Agnes, mother of King Henry, through vexation, or better, through divine inspiration, surrendered the duchy of Bavaria, and, discard- ing the reins of government in her devotion to Christ, betook herself to Rome, where, with marvelous humility, she brought forth the fruits of repentance and after a few years closed this earthly life in the Lord. In the year of our Lord 1070, Margrave Teti, not without the connivance of the Saxon princes, established a tyranny
