Innocent IV and Frederick II continue the…

Innocent IV and Frederick II continue the struggle between the Papacy and the Empire.

The pope, forced by the emperor to flee Rome for France in 1244, establishes a papal court-in-exile at the powerful archbishopric of Lyon.

Innocent condemns the emperor in April 1245, and summons him to appear before the Council of Lyon, which convenes successfully despite Frederick’s blocking of the Alpine passes to France; he has captured and imprisoned clerics on their way to the Council.

When Frederick refuses to appear, Innocent induces the council to convict him in absentia and declare him deposed on a triple charge: constant violation of the peace, sacrilege, and heresy.

The pope then attempts to secure the election of a new emperor.

, and in April 1245, he was formally deposed by Innocent IV.

Pope Gregory IX had also earlier offered King Louis' brother, count Robert of Artois, the German throne, but Louis had refused.

The ecumenical council also attempts to assist the Christian forces fighting in the Holy Land and to organize a defense against the Mongol invasion of Europe.

The capture of Jerusalem by the Khwarezmians, recently displaced by the advance of the Mongols, on their way to ally with Egypt, has returned Jerusalem to Muslim control, but European Christians have seen the city pass from Christian to Muslim control numerous times in the past two centuries.

This time, despite calls from the Pope, there is no popular enthusiasm for a new crusade.

The only man interested in beginning one is Louis IX, who declares his intent to go East in 1245.

The Holy Roman Emperor is in no position to crusade.

Béla IV of Hungary is rebooting his devastated kingdom after the Mongol invasion of 1241.

Henry III of England is still struggling with Simon de Montfort, among other his other problems.

Henry and Louis, engaged as they are in the Capetian-Plantagenet struggle, are not on good terms.