Yes, it is well known that the Dictatus Papae was written by Peter Damian in 1059. However, I again suggest that you actually read the primary sources instead of reading excerpts from some average undergrad sourcebook.
I did check the primary sources. What the secondary source is, which apparently comes "from some average undergrad sourcebook" (you don't know what you're talking about, by the way; Foley is a preeminent historian in ecclesiology) was used in a peripheral way to show how dated it is to think the Dictatus Papae is still attributed to Pope Gregory VII.
In the letter where Peter Damian claims authorship, he states that he did so at the behest of Gregory as the papal position on the authority of the Apostolic See.
Oh, well then. I guess we can stop our inquiry
here since there's nothing at all suspicious or questionable about that.
So, while yes the Dictatus Papae wasn’t the wasn’t an official declaration or penned by the hand of Gregory himself, it is in a way similar to Gen. Lee’s lost orders in 1862 in that with it you know what Gregory’s endgame is and Gregory is just as much the author of it as the president is of his speeches or proposals. H.E.J. Cowder says this much in his bio on Gregory.
That has got to be one of the most ridiculous conclusions I've ever read. The medieval period is a difficult one to study because there's simply less sources floating around, and the ones that are around are almost always biased up the wazoo. To say that a source
not even written by the person we're debating about is reliable to establishing Gregory's "endgame" is preposterous. The Dictatus were penned by Cardinal Deusdedit, which was an entirely different person from Peter Damien, who died in 1072 before the initial conflicts in the Investiture Controversy.
Disclaimer: I haven't actually read the H.E.J. Cowder work in question, so I don't know if you're making a bad summary of his work, or this is his legitimate argument, and its only given evidence. If I have free time this week I'll take a look at it.
Also, its not just points IX or XII that are political in nature. It is hard to find a single point that isn’t political in the context of the time period. Ecclesiastical office was political office. Abbots, Bishops, and Archbishops controlled vast amounts of wealth and land (which were largely synonyms in that age) and the peoples and economies within them. Thus the appointment of Ecclesiastical offices had huge political and economic importance in the realms where the see’s were located. While this crisis is mostly seen through the events of the HRE, other monarchs in Europe were threatened by this attach on their historic rights. This was especially true in England, where there was a regal vs. papal battle over investitures that was rivaled only by the slap fight between Henry and Gregory. And if there was more political stability in France and Iberia, the monarchs there would be going to fisticuffs with Gregory just as badly as the HRE and England. In fact if you want to got there, the roots of the reform movement arose in the Peace of God movement in France due to the lack of proper political authority thought out the kingdom. In reference to the historical examples that you bring up, you are right in many way. However, you are missing the key fact that there was no real difference between political and ecclesiastical authority in the early Medieval period. The Emperor derived his power and legitimacy from also being the head of the church in his realm and Gregory’s attempts to take away his right of imperial investitures undermined his authority to rule.
None of this has contradicted anything I've written thus far.
A bedrock of early Medieval kingship was the theory that that kingship was divinely appointed. Gregory himself was using the language of early Medieval kingship. Seriously, go back and read your little sourcebook and pretend that Gregory was a King instead of a Pope and try and tell me that what he’s saying doesn’t make more sense now. Every time Henry gave into Gregory a bit, civil war would erupt.
This is the part where you're no longer adhering to the accepted chain of events and are making correlations that aren't supported by historical evidence. I've already talked about the cause of the various German wars in the 11th century, no point in doing it again.
Gregory knew what he wanted and knew how he wanted to get it. I never meant that he was out to destroy the Salian Dynasty, but his actions led to their ultimate demise.
You said it, but now you don't mean it. Then we're not really arguing over anything at this point, are we? Except the following point:
If Gregory really was all about pious unity for the mother church, then he would have accepted the condemnation in 1080 by 29 (mostly Italian) Bishops. But instead, he gets the Southern Italian Normans to sack Rome, which turned out to be a horrible idea as he was run out of town by the populace by the people of Rome for the bloodshed. Many historians accept that Gregory was out to make an over all Papal theocracy that all Ecclesiastical Sees and Lay Monarchies were subservient to.
If you would cite those "many historians", I'll check out their works and tell you what I think of them. Until then, I'll also say that "many historians" don't agree with that thesis, because it's not actually supported by historical evidence. The stated goal of Gregory VII, which makes more sense in the context of his actions than a conspiracy to become pope-emperor, was to reclaim investiture of bishops that the Reich had taken, and establish other reforms to reduce corruption in the Church. The Kaiser's authority was not the target in itself, but one of the obstacles to this.
1: Please stop trying to look smarter or mature or whatever you’re doing by constantly using the other forms of historical figures names out side of normal English (like Heinrich or Jeanne). This is frowned upon in real history departments as almost childish and stuck-up and since I see you as probably a guy working on a history minor I don’t think that you spend enough time in a real history department to know
Well, I have to say above all that this is pretty hilarious. When you get into a "real history department", people read texts in their original language, and thus frequently (but not always, to be fair) use the native forms like "Heinrich" and "Jeanne." I'm used to those because most of the texts I read use them. I don't know what history professor you've had that thinks it's "childish and stuck-up", but he's probably an imbecile; or he's an editor on Conservapedia.
2: I am well aware that I will not convince you of my side and have been warned by many cfc member that you look at things through your super thick pro-catholic rose colored glasses. I just want you to know that my aim is not anti-Catholic or anti-anything really, I just think you have to look at the checkered past of the Medieval period openly.
I don't have "rose colored glasses." I don't defend the Church because I'm Catholic, rather I'm Catholic because in my studies of history, theology and philosophy I have concluded that the way many many modern writers (especially historians) have portrayed the Church, as well as just very basic cultural ideas that are supported at large like the "Dark Ages" or moral relativism, are just wrong. I'm not ashamed to try and correct people when they're wrong.
p) I transliterate those names the way I do because, in my opinion, it is the most correct way of doing so - rather like using pinyin over Wade-Giles. If I'm in a joking (or supercilious) mood, I might say that it is "objectively superior". It is hardly as though we refer to "Constantine Caramanlius", "Paul Contoriotus", and "George Papandreus" when referring to modern Greeks, is it?
