Digital Continent Feast of Sts. Peter and Paul 2016 | Page 31

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structure that implemented the royal policy of an efficient kingdom.46 The clergy had become
great landowners and were unlikely to pass on land to an heir, thus kings could control and rely
upon ecclesiastic sources of wealth.47 The Salic kings in particular relied heavily on the
episcopate of the Holy Roman Empire for administrative aid and counsel.48 Any interruption of
this system was considered a menace to the established order and revolutionary in nature.49 So
long as the reform program of the papacy remained doctrinal and abstract it was non-threatening.
Put into practice it was considered a danger to the monarchy. The proprietary church system was
the most powerful government and economic instrument at the disposal of wealthy land
owners.50 Its value for the monarchy was priceless and could not be sacrificed.
The evolving close cooperation that existed between kings and ecclesiastics was referred
to as the Ottonian-Salian imperial state-church system, or Reichskirchen. By the tenth and
eleventh centuries it coincided with the development of the monarchy and was expressed by the
king’s control over nominations of bishops and abbots. It was a customary right that pre-dated
Charlemagne and ran counter to canon law. When the Ottonians and Salians ruled, they viewed
their supervisory and protective relationship with the imperial state-church system as an integral
part of their defense against the nobility. After 976 all episcopal sees within the western empire

46

Ibid., 116.

47

Thompson, 468.

48

Blumenthal, The Investiture Controversy, 51.

49

Cushing, 96.

50

Ullman, 143.