Editing Pope Adrian IV (section)

=== 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}}