Comments by "" (@sebe2255) on "The Holiest Of The Holy Roman Emperors" video.

@mueezadam8438 German identity doesn’t predate the HRE, they start developing at around the same time. You probably meant Germanic identity. And while Germanic tribes obviously understood they were related to each other, and different from say Latin speakers they interacted with, a broader Germanic identity that they all adopted or identified with also didn’t exist.
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@Siegbert85 Well medieval historians would obviously try and connect their patron or realm to more prestigious previous realms or figures. Medieval or classical period historians made up all sorts of stories, like Angles descending from Troy. But I think in today’s age it is more often the modern nationalist perspective that informs posts claiming that X figure was X nationality than the medieval legend/prestige perspective. But yes you are correct it isn’t exclusively modern
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@Hugh_Morris I mean, Holy is open for interpretation, and Roman was always a stretch excepy maybe in the first century or two. But in a twist of fate when they did exert direct control over Rome/Italy they didn’t call themselves Holy yet (the Holy was a 12th century addition)
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@Hugh_Morris I think you or forgetting THE other christian Empire, namely the Roman Empire. Also they didn’t really control Rome for centuries. The HRE and Rome often had a complicated and antagonistic relationship. And the Empire itself didn’t refer to itself as holy until the 13th century
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@Hugh_Morris They didn’t control Rome then. It was the Franks who gifted the papcy its own state and lands. And they’d end up fully losing control over Italy as well. So while some emperors may have effectively controlled some popes, they never really heald Rome nor its Roman institution of the papacy But you are forgetting the Roman Empire. It was seen as the Empire. It was that Empire that the (Holy) Roman Empire was trying to usurp. And it was firmly Christian.
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@Hugh_Morris See now you have added qualifier of “Western” Europe, which you hadn’t initially. And you seem to making the distinction between various branches of christianity, again something you didn’t do before. If you move the goalposts it is certainly easier to score.
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@Hugh_Morris Yeah and I said that “Roman” was a stretch except maybe in the first century or two. Holy isn’t really an actual thing, so it is fully open to interpretation. That was my point. Whether it is or is not holy or Roman depends entirely in your perspective
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@Hugh_Morris I mean that is still not a real thing
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@Hugh_Morris So it means nothing. You can say it is holy (or sacred it makes no difference) at any point. It is never true or untrue. Because it isn’t like God actually ordained the Emperor
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@Hugh_Morris They can think whatever they want. That is the point. And there were certainly people who still believed in divine ordaining when Voltaire said his quote, well after the height of the Empire The coronation by the pope was also only important in the earlier history of the Empire. There is a reason they let it go (conflicts with the pope)
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@Hugh_Morris The Empire was still pretty powerful in 1530, even if it wasn’t the height of the Emperor’s authority. It is right before the authority and unity take a full on nosedive (the religious wars). But you don’t get the point. Holy/sacred is not an objective thing. It literally doesn’t matter and it can apply whenever you want it or not. The Empire itself, again, didn’t refer to itself as holy until the 13th century when they were having another papal-imperial conflict
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I don’t think you can count Charlemagne as a German monarch (nor a French one for that matter) because Charlemagne predates the crystallisation of those identities, hell he predates their first mention or formation. Saying that he was a German monarch is anachronistic and has more to so with modern nationalism than actual history. Even though you can say he is a sort of proto-monarch for both states
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