Prince-bishop
As cities demanded charters from emperors, kings, or their prince-bishops and declared themselves independent of the secular territorial magnates, friction intensified between burghers and bishops.
However, in respect to the lands of the former Holy Roman Empire outside of French control, such as the Habsburg Monarchy, including Austria proper (Salzburg, Seckau), the Lands of the Bohemian Crown (the bulk of Olomouc and parts of Breslau), as well as in respect to the parts of the 1795-partitioned Polish state, including those forming part of the Kingdom of Galicia and Lodomeria or those acquired by the Kingdom of Prussia, the position continued in some cases nominally and was sometimes transformed into a new, titular type, initially recognized by the German Empire and Austria-Hungary until their demise, with the title ultimately abolished altogether by the pope in 1951.
The sole exception is the Bishop of Urgell, Catalonia, who no longer has any secular rights in Spain, but remains ex officio one of two co-princes of Andorra, along with the French head of state (currently its President), and thus the last extant prince-bishop.
Bishops had been involved in the government of the Frankish realm and subsequent Carolingian Empire frequently as the clerical member of a duo of envoys styled Missus dominicus, but that was an individual mandate, not attached to the see.
In turn the first Ottonian (Saxon) king Henry the Fowler and more so his son, Emperor Otto I, intended to weaken the power of the dukes by granting loyal bishops Imperial lands and vest them with regalia privileges.
Emperor Charles IV by the Golden Bull of 1356 confirmed the privileged status of the Prince-Archbishoprics of Mainz, Cologne and Trier as members of the electoral college.
Bishop Albert of Riga in 1207 had received the lands of Livonia as an Imperial fief from the hands of German king Philip of Swabia, he however had to come to terms with the Brothers of the Sword.
At the behest of Pope Innocent III the Terra Mariana confederation was established, whereby Albert had to cede large parts of the episcopal territory to the Livonian Order.
Albert proceeded tactically in the conflict between the Papacy and Emperor Frederick II: in 1225 he reached the acknowledgement of his status as a Prince-Bishop of the Empire, though the Roman Curia insisted on the fact that the Christianized Baltic territories were solely under the suverainty of the Holy See.
Around 1245 the Papal legate William of Modena reached a compromise: though incorporated into the Order's State, the archdiocese and its suffragan bishoprics were acknowledged with their autonomous ecclesiastical territories by the Teutonic Knights.
In the original Prussian lands of the Teutonic Order, Willam of Modena established the suffragan bishoprics of Culm, Pomesania, Samland and Warmia.
From the late 13th century onwards, the appointed Warmia bishops were no longer members of the Teutonic Knights, a special status confirmed by the bestowal of the princely title by Emperor Charles IV in 1356.
For example, at Chalons-sur-Marne the bishop ruled the lands 20 km (12 mi) around the town, while the Archbishop of Rheims demarcated his territory with five fortresses of Courville, Cormicy, Betheneville, Sept-Saulx and Chaumuzy.
[12][13] France also counted a number of prince-bishops formerly within the Holy Roman Empire such those of Besançon, Cambrai, Strasbourg, Metz, Toul, Verdun, and Belley.
[16] It was eventually secularized and became ruled by hereditary princes and ultimately Kings of Montenegro in 1852, as reflected in their styles: The Bishop of Urgell, Catalonia, who no longer has any secular rights in Spain, remains ex officio one of two co-princes of Andorra, along with the French head of state (currently its President)[1][2] The term has been used by Episcopalians in North America to describe modern bishops with commanding personalities usually of previous generations.
