Hohenstaufen

The Hohenstaufen, also called the Staufer, were a Swabian noble family named after their castle on Staufen hill. Frederick I, son of Frederick of Büren, was enfeoffed with the Duchy of Swabia by Emperor Henry IV in 1079 and married the emperor's daughter Agnes. In 1138 Conrad III became the first Hohenstaufen king of the Romans.

Frederick I Barbarossa, crowned emperor in 1155, brought the Empire to its greatest medieval extent and died on crusade in 1190. His son Henry VI, emperor from 1191, inherited Sicily through his wife Constance in 1194. Frederick II, crowned in 1220, ruled mainly from Sicily in a long struggle with the papacy.

After Frederick II died in 1250 the house collapsed: Manfred fell at Benevento in 1266 to Charles of Anjou, and Conradin was beheaded at Naples after Tagliacozzo in 1268, ending the direct line. The last captive, Manfred's son Henry, died at Castel dell'Ovo in 1318; by 1337 the dynasty was extinct, though many later ruling houses descended from it through female lines.