Battle of Legnano - Aftermath

Aftermath

After the battle, Frederick's rule over Lombardy was decisively broken. The knights that managed to escape gathered in Pavia. There, they brought the news of Frederick's presumed death to his wife Beatrice I, Countess of Burgundy. Beatrice and the Empire mourned Frederick's demise, but after several days the emperor appeared at the gates of Pavia.

H. E. Marshall wrote: "Then, greatly to the joy of all, after three days Barbarossa suddenly appeared before the gates of Pavia. Although wounded and bruised and left for dead Frederick had not been killed."

The victory of the Lombard League forced Frederick to travel to Venice. In the Peace of Venice, 1177, Frederick and Pope Alexander III were reconciled. The emperor acknowledged the pope's sovereignty over the Papal States, and in return Alexander acknowledged the emperor's overlordship of the Imperial Church. The Peace of Venice was heavily instigated by Archbishop Wichmann of Magdeburg, who was amongst the defeated at Legnano. The cities of Lombardy, however, continued to fight until 1183, when, in the Peace of Constance, Frederick conceded their right to freely elect town magistrates. The Treaty was cast in bronze.

Frederick did not forgive Henry the Lion for refusing to come to his aid in 1176. Taking advantage of the hostility of other German princes to Henry, Frederick had Henry tried in absentia by a court of bishops and princes in 1180, declared that imperial law overruled traditional German law, and had Henry stripped of his lands and declared an outlaw.

On January 27, 1186, Frederick's son Henry VI married Constance of Sicily in Milan as a sign that peace had really been established.