Editing Pope Adrian IV (section)

==Problems in translation, 1157==
By 1157, suggests Whalen, having secured the border with the south (by his alliance with Sicily) and the commune as peaceful as it had been for some time, Adrian was able to reside in Rome again and "stood in a more secure position than any of his predecessors had for decades".{{sfn|Whalen|2014|p=126}} They were made worse in 1157 when, in a letter to the Emperor, Adrian referred to the Empire by the Latin term ''beneficium'', which some of Barbarossa's councillors translated as [[fief]], rather than [[benefice]]. This, they claimed, implied that the Pope saw the empire as subordinate to the papacy.{{sfn|Sayers|2004}}{{refn|The two parties used different terms to mean the same thing. Both originally used ''beneficium'' to mean a feudal holding. The church had begun using the term ''feudum'' a few years earlier; the Empire had not. It is, suggests Robinson, "difficult to believe" that the Curia had forgotten this.{{sfn|Robinson|1996|p=470}}|group=note}} The Emperor had to personally hold back [[Otto I, Duke of Bavaria|Otto of Wittelsbach]] from assaulting the Pope's messengers.{{sfn|Freed|2016|p=201}} Ullmann, however, argues that Adrian's use of the word was "harmless enough...that he conferred the Imperial crown as a favour".{{sfn|Ullmann|1955|p=244}} Duggan too describes the incident as "at best a diplomatic incident—a ''faux pas''—which suggests carelessness on the part of the drafter".{{sfn|Duggan|2003a|p=129}}{{refn|Who may have been Cardinal Roland, suggests Duggan.{{sfn|Duggan|2003a|p=129}}|group=note}} Historians have disagreed as to the degree of deliberation behind the use of the word. [[Peter Munz]], for example, believes it to have been a deliberate provocation, engineered by an anti-Imperial faction within the curia, designed to justify Adrian's treaty with King William. Anne Duggan, on the other hand, suggests this view is "scarcely credible": not only was Adrian in no position of strength from which to threaten Frederick, but he was also aware that the Emperor was planning a campaign against Milan for the following year, and would hardly wish to provoke him into marching on towards the Papal States.{{sfn|Duggan|2003a|p=129}}

In October 1157, Barbarossa was celebrating his wedding in [[Besançon]]{{sfn|Ullmann|2003|p=123}} with [[Diet of Besançon|an Imperial Diet]],{{sfn|Whalen|2014|p=126}}{{refn|Besançon was an important Imperial town, being the capital of [[Upper Burgundy]], and the Emperor's wedding celebration was attended by representatives of the crowned heads of Christendom; thus, notes Norwich, his falling out with the Pope was an exceedingly public one.{{sfn|Norwich|1970|p=180}}|group=note}} when he was visited by Papal legates [[Pope Alexander III|Roland]]{{refn|Roland had been a student of [[Gratian]] and had gone on to teach at the [[University of Bologna]]; with Roland, comments Ullmann, "the dynasty of the great lawyer Popes was to begin".{{sfn|Ullmann|2003|p=124}}|group=note}} and [[Bernard, Cardinal-Bishop of Porto|Bernard]]. Theirs was an important mission{{sfn|Robinson|1996|p=80}} bringing personal letters from Adrian,{{sfn|Barber|1992|p=102}} and they were met "with honour and kindness, claiming (as they did) to be the bearers of good tidings".{{sfn|Freed|2016|p=202}} The Pope complained about the lack of activity in discovering who attacked [[Eskil of Lund|Eskil]], Archbishop of Lund while he travelled through Imperial territory.{{sfn|Barber|1992|p=102}} Eskil, complained Adrian, had been captured somewhere "in the German lands...by certain godless and infamous men", and Frederick had made no attempt to secure his release.{{sfn|Freed|2016|p=203}}{{refn|Eskil at the time was ''persona non grata'' in the Empire, and Freed suggests that Adrian—while never placing his thoughts on paper—"probably suspected Frederick of complicity in Eskil's capture as well as laxity in procuring his release".{{sfn|Freed|2016|pp=203–204}} Duggan suggests that it was wholly political, as Adrian's recent elevation of the Lund Archbishopric had "effectively detached the region from the ecclesiastical jurisdiction" of the Empire.{{sfn|Duggan|2003a|p=127}}|group=note}} Adrian's letter, suggests Godman, both upbraids the Emperor for "dissimulation" and "negligence" while accusing [[Rainald of Dassel]] of being a "wicked counsellor ",{{sfn|Godman|2000|p=197}} although Duggan describes it more as a "mild rebuke".{{sfn|Duggan|2003a|p=127}} Barber comments that "the tone is that of one who is surprised and a little hurt that, having treated Frederick so affectionately and honourably, he had not had a better response, but the actual words used to express these sentiments gave rise to immediate offence".{{sfn|Barber|1992|p=102}} Adrian's defence of Eskil of Lund contributed further to the decline in his relationship with Barbarossa.{{sfn|Robinson|2004|p=350}} Adrian's choice of occasion on which to rebuke the Emperor was bound to offend him, argues Norwich.{{sfn|Norwich|1970|p=180}} But even if unintentional, argues Freed, the Pope should have instructed his delegates to meet with Barbarossa privately rather than in the open. Equally provocative, Freed suggests, was Adrian's later assertion that letters which criticised the Emperor's behaviour were somehow to his advantage.{{sfn|Freed|2016|pp=202–203}} Adrian's "sharp" words also contributed to the Emperor's advisors increasing discontent with his messengers. The Pope had also ordered that, before any negotiations took place, the Emperor's council would accept Adrian's letters "without any hesitation...as though proceeding from our mouth".{{sfn|Freed|2016|p=205}} The cardinals appear to have worsened their reception by calling Frederick "brother".{{sfn|Duggan|2003a|p=132}}

The Emperor was also exasperated to find, on ordering the legates' quarters searched, blank parchments with the Papal seal attached. This he understood to mean that the legates had intended to present supposedly direct instructions from the Pope when they felt it necessary.{{sfn|Freed|2016|p=208}} Barbarossa claimed that he held his crowns directly from God and that Adrian "did not understand his Petrine commission if he thought otherwise".{{sfn|Abulafia|1988|p=63}} Following promulgation of Adrian' letter, says Godman, "there was uproar".{{sfn|Godman|2000|p=197}} Worse, says Barbarossa's contemporary [[chronicler]] [[Otto of Freising]], the legates compounded the insult by asking those present "from whom the does he have the empire, if not from our lord the pope?" The two [[ecclesiast]]s were then nearly beaten up, but the Emperor enabled their swift escape.{{sfn|Barber|1992|p=102}}

=== Retranslation ===
In June 1158, representatives of both sides met in the Imperial town of [[Augsburg]].{{sfn|Freed|2016|p=250}} Adrian attempted to pacify the Emperor and claimed that he meant, not "fief", but "good deed": "Among us ''beneficium'' means not a fief but a good deed", he wrote.{{sfn|Robinson|2004|p=323}} Barber suggests, though, that "his explanation was far from convincing".{{sfn|Barber|1992|p=102}} On the other hand, notes the Emperor's biographer [[John Freed]], Barbarossa was [[illiterate]], and required everything translated. He was thus in constant danger of relying on mistranslations, and it is possible that this happened at Besançon.{{sfn|Freed|2016|p=33}}{{refn|Freed notes that ''beneficium'' had "three different meanings in the twelfth century: 'good deed', as Adrian pointed out in his conciliatory letter of June 1158; 'an ecclesiastical living', the modern English 'benefice'; and 'fief'".{{sfn|Freed|2016|p=204}}|group=note}} Taken at face value, this phrase appeared to assert that Adrian was the Emperor's feudal overlord.{{sfn|Collins|2009|p=239}}
Latowsky argues that the mistranslation was a deliberate ploy by Barbarossa's [[Archchancellor]] Rainald of Dassel—whom she describes as a "multilingual provocateur"—whose Chancery was waging a propaganda war against Adrian.{{sfn|Latowsky|2013|pp=161–162}}{{refn|The [[Latinist]] Peter Godman has described Rainald as "a fomenter of schism and despiser of the Church".{{sfn|Godman|2000|p=198}}|group=note}} The Pope had earlier condemned Rainald's election as Archbishop of Cologne, believing Rainald to be nothing less than the Devil's agent.{{sfn|Godman|2000|pp=221 n.114, 198}}{{refn|Specifically, as ''suggestione perversi hominis zizania seminantis'' or "the machinations of a depraved man sowing [[Tare (tufted grass)|tares]]", a biblical term used in relation to Lucifer.{{sfn|Godman|2014|p=48}} John of Salisbury called him schismatic-in-chief during Adrian's lifetime, and as late as 1166 still believed Rainald to be the "greatest among the locusts of the beasts".{{sfn|Godman|2000|p=198}}|group=note}}
Latowsky suggests that Rainald had intended to cause trouble between Emperor and Pope. If this was the case, he succeeded, as Barbarossa was only just restrained from sending an army against Adrian.{{sfn|Latowsky|2013|p=162}} The Emperor did make a public declaration against Adrian, though, calling for his deposition on the grounds that, as the son of a priest, he was an uncanonical pope. Ullmann notes that canonicity "was indubitably a double-edged weapon; if Adrian was an uncanonical pope, then Frederick was an uncanonical emperor, and that seems the only reason why this point was not pressed further".{{sfn|Ullmann|1955|p=245}} Duggan summarises Adrian's Augsburg letter as being concomitant to one's interpretation of the original offence, noting that "the context...determines everything". While Munz views the Augsburg outcome as a "humiliating" retreat by Adrian, Duggan argues that, if one does not view the Besançon letter as deliberately provocative, "then there was no withdrawal from that provocation".{{sfn|Duggan|2003a|p=130}}

Adrian's choice of words may also have been a "calculated ambiguity", suggests Abulafia,{{sfn|Abulafia|1988|p=63}}{{refn|The ecclesiastical historian Z. N. Brooke has argued that the difference in meaning, while subtle to modern ears, would have been plain to medieval observers; he suggests that "the significance of [Adrian's choice of words] might have escaped us, if we had not got the Emperor's violent protest against it".{{sfn|Brooke|1989|p=140 n.2}}|group=note}}  and in the event, Adrian never publicly acknowledged which of the interpretations he had actually intended. This would have allowed him to suggest the Emperor has misunderstood him while allowing the Pope to intimate to his own church that the Emperor was indeed a Papal vassal.{{sfn|Freed|2016|p=204}} Adrian "trivialised" Barbarossa's anger with irony, commenting that "this should not have vexed the heart of even one in lowly station, to say nothing of so great a man".{{sfn|Freed|2016|p=213}} The Augsburg meeting seems to have improved relations between pope and emperor. As Freed notes, though, "the fundamental question...remained unresolved", and any improvement in relations was temporary, as they fell out again later that year over the appointment of the next [[Archbishop of Ravenna]]. This revived the question of their respective roles, as the nominations were split between each sides' preferences;{{sfn|Freed|2016|p=250}} in the event, the Imperial candidate—Guido of Biandrate—was elected against Adrian's wishes.{{sfn|Duggan|2003a|p=134}} There was also increasing disagreement over the traditional ''[[Jura regalia|fodrum]]'' Imperial taxation levied in north Italy.{{sfn|Whalen|2014|p=127}}