by a strip of territory on the western frontier, which was annexed to the East Mark. The power of Poland was crushed. On Mesco's death in 1034 the country relapsed into an almost chronic state of civil war in which Conrad, wearied with Polish affairs, was careful not to involve himself.
In the meanwhile difficulties had been growing up in the neighbouring country of Bohemia. Udalrich, for some years past, had shewn insubordination to his feudal lord: in 1031 he had refused his help for the Polish campaign; summoned to the diet of Merseburg (July 1033) to answer for his conduct, he had defiantly remained absent. Conrad was too busily engaged with Odo, his rival to the Burgundian throne, to deal himself with his disobedient vassal. He entrusted the task, therefore, to his son Henry, now a promising youth of sixteen years; his confidence was not misplaced, for a single campaign in the summer brought the duke to subjection[1]. At a court held at Werben he was condemned, banished, and deprived of his lands. His brother, the old Duke Jaromir, was dragged from his prison at Utrecht, where he had languished for more than twenty years, to be set again over the duchy of Bohemia. The arrangement was, however, not a permanent one; Udalrich was pardoned at Ratisbon (April 1034), but not content with the partial restoration of his duchy, he seized and blinded his hapless brother. His misdeeds brought a speedy retribution; he died the same year, choked or perhaps poisoned while eating his dinner. Jaromir was disinclined a third time to undertake the title and duties which had brought him only misfortune; at his wish Břatislav, who had on the whole deserved well of Conrad, received the dukedom as a fief of the Empire.
Further north, a feud had broken out between the Saxons and the Wendish tribe, the Lyutitzi, which gave rise to mutual incursions and plundering. At the request of both parties, the Emperor permitted the issue to be determined by the judgment of God in the form of a duel. Unluckily, the Christian champion fell wounded to the sword of the pagan; the decision was accepted by the Emperor, and the Wends, so elated by their success, would have forthwith attacked their Saxon opponents, had not they been constrained by oath to keep the peace and been menaced by the establishment at Werben of a fortress strongly garrisoned by a body of Saxon knights. But the peace was soon broken, the fortress soon captured; and two expeditions across the Elbe (1035 and 1036) were necessary before the Lyutitzi were reduced to obedience. In the first Conrad was seldom able to bring the enemy to an open fight; they retreated before him into the impenetrable swamps and forests, while the Germans burnt their cities, devastated their lands. We have a picture
- ↑ For an examination into the confused chronology of these events and of the conflicting passage in the Annales Altahenses see Bresslau, Jahrbücher II. Excurs. iii, p. 484 f., and Bretholz, Geschichte Böhmens und Mährens (1912), p. 127. Seydel, Studien zur Kritik Wipos, Dissertation, Berlin, 1898, places these events a year later, 1034.
