Hugh of Italy has maintained friendly relations with Constantinople and, in 942, Hugh even comes to terms with Alberic, who marries one of Hugh's daughters.

Pope Stephen, emboldened by his success in West Francia, now seeks to break up the alliance against Louis by offering Herbert’s son, Hugh of Vermandois, the office of Archbishop of Reims, a tittle the latter had held from from 925 to 931.

Along with the Pallium (the symbol of office for the archbishop), Stephen had sent another legate, with instructions to the Frankish nobility, insisting that they submit to Louis.

This time, they had been informed that if the pope has not received their embassies by Christmas, notifying him of their intent to submit to the king, they will be excommunicated.

There occurs a shift in support to Louis, as a number of the more important nobles declare for him, and by the end of 942, all of the nobility will have affirmed their loyalty to Louis, and notified the pope of their intent.

Closer to home, things are much more difficult for Stephen.

The continuing domination of the Counts of Tusculum is evident throughout Stephen’s pontificate, as it had been during that of his predecessors and successors.

Although Stephen is subject to Alberic II of Spoleto, Prince of the Romans, and does not in reality rule the Papal States, Stephen himself is not a member of this family, nor has he any relationship with the imprisoned Marozia, who had dominated Roman and papal politics during the preceding decades.

Stephen had, however, been caught up in the ongoing conflict between Alberic II and Hugh of Italy, with Hugh besieging Rome in 940.

After a failed assassination attempt against Alberic, which involved a number of bishops, Alberic had cracked down on any potential dissent in Rome, with his enemies either scourged, beheaded or imprisoned.

If there is any truth to Martin of Opava’s account of the torture and maiming of Stephen VIII by supporters of Alberic.

It must have occurred at this juncture, in the aftermath of the conspiracy, and just prior to Stephen’s death.

On August 17, 942, Alberic summons a council in Rome, where he demonstrates his control over the papacy by making use of various papal officials, such as the Primicerius, the Secundicerius of the Notaries, and the Vestararius.

According to the late thirteenth century chronicler Martin of Opava, Stephen VIII was described as being a German, who was elected pope due to the power and influence of his royal relative, the German king Otto I. Martin states that Otto ignored the will of the cardinals in imposing Stephen upon them, and because Stephen was hated for being a German, he was taken by supporters of Alberic II, who proceeded to maim and disfigure him to such an extent that Stephen was unable to appear in public again.

This version of events has largely been discredited; contemporary and near-contemporary catalogues state that Stephen was a Roman.

Further, Otto’s intervention in and influence over Italian affairs is still over a decade away, and during this period Otto is still trying to consolidate his hold on power in Germany, with major rebellions by the German dukes.

Consequently, Otto would have been too preoccupied to concern himself over the papal succession at this juncture.

Finally, Stephen’s intervention on behalf of the Frankish king Louis IV (who is in conflict with Otto) would not have occurred had Stephen been a relative of the German king, and had Stephen received the papal throne through Otto’s intervention.

The maiming of Stephen may have occurred, however, in the aftermath of the conspiracy against Alberic in the middle of 942.

Stephen dies during October 942, and is succeeded by Marinus II.

Marinus was born in Rome, and prior to becoming pope had been attached to the Church of Saint Cyriacus in the Baths of Diocletian.

He is said to have encountered St. Ulrich on his visit to Rome in 909, and reportedly predicted Ulrich’s eventual appointment as Bishop of Augsburg after the devastation of the Hungarian invasion.

Marinus is elevated to the papacy on October 30, 942 through intervention of Alberic II of Spoleto, Prince of the Romans.

He concentrates on administrative aspects of the papacy, and seeks to reform both the secular and regular clergy.

The Magyars, returning from their devastating sweep through France and northeastern Italy, cross the Carnatic Alps to the valleys of the Drava and Danube Rivers.

They remain in their homeland long enough to assemble a force of some fifty thousand warriors, then invade Bavaria.

Otto, after having put down a rebellion by his son, Liudolf, Duke of Swabia and son-in-law, Conrad, Duke of Lorraine, sets out to Saxony, his duchy.

Upon arriving in Magdeburg, he receives reports of the Hungarian invasion.

The Hungarians had already invaded once before during the course of the rebellion, immediately after he had put down a revolt in Franconia.

Because of unrest among the Polabian Slavs on the lower Elbe, Otto has had to leave most of his Saxons at home.

In addition, Saxony is distant from Augsburg and its environs, and considerable time would have elapsed waiting for their arrival.

(The Battle of Lechfeld takes place six weeks after the first report of an invasion, and historian Hans Delbrück asserts that they could not have possibly made the march in time.)

The king orders his troops to concentrate on the Danube, in the vicinity of Neuburg and Ingolstadt.

He does this in order to march on the Hungarian line of communications and catch them in their rear while they are raiding northeast of Augsburg.

It is also a central point of concentration for all the contingents that are assembling.

Strategically, therefore, this is the best location for Otto to concentrate his forces before making the final descent upon the Hungarians.

There are other troops that are to have an influence on the course of the battle.

On previous occasions, in 932 and 954 for example, there had been Hungarian incursions that had invaded the Germanic lands to the south of the Danube, and then retreated back to their native country via Lotharingia, to the West Frankish Kingdom and finally, through Italy.

That is to say, a wide sweeping U-turn that initially started westward, then progressed to the south, and then finally to the east back to their homeland; and thus escaping retribution in Germany.

The king is aware of the escape of these Hungarians on the above mentioned occasions, and is determined to trap them.

He therefore orders his brother, Archbishop Bruno, to keep the Lotharingian forces in Lorraine.

He has done this with the fear that the Hungarians will follow their plan of retreat on the previous occasions.

However, with a powerful enough force of knights pressing them in the front from the west, and a powerful force of knights chasing them from the East, the Hungarians will be unable to escape.

The Bishop Ulrich defends Augsburg, a border city of Swabia, with a contingent of soldiers.

Motivating them with the 23rd Psalm ("Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death").

While this defense is going on, the king was raising an army to march south.

There is no reliable source on the size of the armies and the numbers are still disputed.

The most accepted view is that Otto called up about eight thousand men.

The eight one-thousand-strong legiones (divisions) include three from Bavaria, two from Swabia, one from Franconia and one from Bohemia, under Prince Boleslav I.

The eighth division, commanded by Otto and slightly larger than the others, includes Saxons, Thuringians, and the king's personal guard.

The king's contingent probably includes seasoned knights of Frankish origin.

According to chronicles, the Hungarian army amounted to about seventeen thousand light cavalry.

Gerhard writes that the Hungarian forces advanced to the Iller river and placed Augsburg under siege.

At this time, Augsburg is not quite touching the left bank of the river, upon which it is basically situated.

The fort is defended by Bishop Ulrich.

Most probably the fiercest battle took place on August 8 at the eastern gate, when the Hungarians tried to storm the fort in large numbers.

The bishop's men defended bravely and killed the leader of the attack, forcing the Hungarians to withdraw.

The next day the Hungarians launched a wider general attack.

During the battle, Berchtold of Risinesburg arrives, which heralds the approach of the German army.

At the end of the day, the siege is suspended, and the Hungarians prepared for the next day's battle.

Count Dietpald leads soldiers to Otto's camp during the night.

The order of march of the German army against the Magyars is as follows: the three Bavarian contingents, the Frankish contingent under Duke Konrad, the royal unit (the center), the two contingents of Swabians and the Bohemian contingent.

The Bavarians are placed at the head of column, according to Delbrück, because they were marching through Bavarian territory and they therefore knew the territory best.

All of these are mounted.

According to the chronicler Widukind of Corvey, Otto "pitched his camp in the territory of the city of Augsburg and joined there the forces of Henry I, Duke of Bavaria, who was himself lying mortally ill nearby, and by Duke Conrad with a large following of Franconian knights. Conrad's unexpected arrival encouraged the warriors so much that they wished to attack the enemy immediately."

The arrival of Conrad, the exiled duke of Lotharingia (Lorraine) and Otto's son-in-law, is particularly heartening because he had recently thrown in his lot with the Magyars, but now returns to fight under Otto; in the ensuing battle, he will lose his life.

A legion of Swabians is commanded by Burchard III, Duke of Swabia, who had married Hedwig, the daughter of Henry, the brother of Otto.

Also among those fighting under Otto is Boleslav of Bohemia.

The Hungarians cross the river and immediately attack the Bohemians, then later the Swabian legions, but retreat after a short fight.

As Otto receives word of the attack, he orders Conrad to recover the baggage train, which Conrad succeeds in doing before returning to the main forces.

For Otto, it becomes evident that this is the time to attack the Hungarians, and he does not hesitate.

Despite a volley of arrows from the Hungarians, Otto's army smashes into the Hungarian line, and begins to sweep over it.

The Germans are able to fight hand-to-hand with the Hungarians, giving the traditionally nomadic warriors no room to use their favorite shoot-and-run tactics.

Bulcsú feigns a retreat with part of his force, in an attempt to lure Otto's men into breaking their line in pursuit, but to no avail.

The German line maintains formation and routs the Magyars from the field.

The German forces maintain discipline and methodically pursue the Magyars for the next couple of days, rather than dispersing jubilantly, as German forces had been known to do in the past.

The captured Magyars are either executed, or sent back to their ruling prince, Taksony, missing their ears and noses.

On their return, the Hungarian dukes Lél, Bulcsú and Sur, who are not Árpáds, are executed.

Duke Conrad had also been killed, after he opened his vest in the summer heat and one arrow struck his throat.

"Never was so bloody a victory gained over so savage a people," was Widukind's conclusion.

The Billung March had been formed in 936, when Otto I, Duke of Saxony and King of East Francia, made Hermann Billung princeps militiae (margrave, literally "prince of the militia"), granting him control of the border with rule over the West Slavic Obotrite tribes, including the Polabians, Warnabi and Wagri, as well as the Redarii, Circipani, and Kissini tribes of the Veleti confederation, and the Danes, who had repeatedly campaigned the territory.

Major parts of the land of the Liutizi and the Hevelli lay beyond Hermann's sphere in the Marca Geronis.

The Slavs of this region are often mutually hostile and so no organized resistance has been met.

Nevertheless, while King Otto is distracted by his campaigns against the Magyars in 955, the Obotrite chief Nako takes the chance and allies with Hermann's nephews, the Saxon counts Wichmann the Younger and Egbert the One-Eyed, in their domestic quarrel with their uncle.

The Obotrites invade Saxony and sack the Cocarescemians' settlement, killing the men of arms-bearing age and carrying off the women and children into slavery.

According to Widukind of Corvey, in the aftermath of Lechfeld, Otto pressed hard into Slav territory, where Wichmann and Egbert had sought refuge.

Otto razed the Slav population centers and soon had encircled them; he offered to spare his enemies if they would surrender.

A Slav embassy came to an assembly Otto held in Saxony and offered to pay annual tribute in return for being allowed self-government; "otherwise," they said, they would "fight for their liberty.

Timothy Reuter argues that this is indicative of a change in German governing practice: a change from overlordship, which the Slavs were willing to accept, to lordship, which the Slavs protested.

According to Reuter, Otto I's army of the day was drawn from every regnum (duchy) of the German kingdom, even Bohemia.

According to Widukind of Corvey, who gave the only surviving detailed record of the battle itself, Otto I's campaign came to a halt at the bank of the Raxa river, where the Obodrites and their allies, led by Stoigniew (Stoinef), had taken a defensive position on the opposite embankment.

Otto's margrave Gero, together with the allied tribe of the Ruani—most probably the earliest mention of the Rani—secretly move to a distinct part of the river to build three bridges, while a feint assault by the remaining forces distracts Stoigniew's army.

Stoigniew realizes too late that Otto's forces are already crossing the river on another side, and the ensuing encounter is won by the latter.

The fate of Stoigniew is described by both Widukind of Corvey and Thietmar of Merseburg.

While both agree that he was decapitated, their accounts on how that happened differ: Widukind says that during the battle, Stoigniew was chased into a wood, run down and killed by a soldier named Hosed, who was handsomely rewarded after presenting Otto with Stoigniew's severed head.

Thietmar of Merseburg says that the captured Stoigniew, whom he calls Stoinneg, was decapitated by Otto.

After the battle, according to Widukind, Stoinegin's head was raised on a pole and seven hundred of captured Slavs were executed before sundown.

Stoigniew’s brother Nako probably accepted Christianity, because there followed roughly thirty years of peace, during which, according to Adam of Bremen, the Slavs were Christian.