FREDERICK III. , Holy Roman emperor—as Frederick IV., German king; as Frederick V., archduke of Aus tria,—son of Ernest of Habsburg, duke of Styria and Carinthia, was born at Innsbruck on Sept. 21, 1415. After his father's death in 1424 he lived at the court of his uncle and guardian, Frederick IV., count of Tirol. In 1435, together with his brother, Albert the Prodigal, he undertook the government of Styria and Carin thia, but there were constant feuds between the brothers, which lasted until Albert's death in 1463. In 1439 the deaths of the German king Albert II. and of Frederick of Tirol left Frederick 'First printed at Augsburg in 1596; German edition by Schopffer (Berlin, 1896).
the senior member of the Habsburg family, and guardian of Sigis mund, count of Tirol. In the following year he also became guar dian of Ladislaus, the posthumous son of Albert II., and heir to Bohemia, Hungary and Austria. On Feb. 2, 1440 Frederick was chosen German king at Frankfort, but, owing to his absence from Germany, the coronation at Aix-la-Chapelle was delayed until June 17, 1442.
Disregarding the neutral attitude of the German electors to wards the papal schism, and acting under the influence of Aeneas Sylvius Piccolomini, afterwards Pope Pius II., Frederick in made a secret treaty with Pope Eugenius IV. This developed into the Concordat of Vienna, signed in 1448 with the succeeding pope, Nicholas V., by which the king, in return for a sum of money and a promise of the imperial crown, pledged the obedience of the German people to Rome, and so checked for a time the rising tide of liberty in the German church. Taking up the quarrel be tween the Habsburgs and the Swiss cantons, Frederick invited the Armagnacs to attack his enemies, but after meeting with a stub born resistance at St. Jacob on Aug. 26, these allies proved faith less, and the king soon lost every vestige of authority in Switzer land. In 1451 Frederick, disregarding the revolts in Austria and Hungary, travelled to Rome where, on March 16, 1452, his mar riage with Leonora of Portugal was celebrated, and three days later he was crowned emperor by pope Nicholas. He was the last emperor crowned in Rome. On his return he found Germany seeth ing with indignation. His capitulation to the pope was not for gotten ; his refusal to attend the diets, and his apathy in the face of Turkish aggressions, constituted a serious danger; and plans for his deposition failed only because the electors could not unite upon a rival king.
In 1457 Ladislaus, king of Hungary and Bohemia, and archduke of Austria, died; Frederick failed to secure either kingdom, but obtained lower Austria, from which however, he was soon driven by his brother Albert, who occupied Vienna. On Albert's death in 1463 the emperor united upper and lower Austria under his rule, but these possessions were constantly ravaged by George Podebrad, king of Bohemia, and by Matthias Corvinus, king of Hungary. A visit to Rome in 1468 to discuss measures against the Turks with Pope Paul II. had no result, and in 1470 Frederick began negotiations for a marriage between his son Maximilian and Mary, daughter and heiress of Charles the Bold, duke of Burgundy. The emperor met the duke at Treves in 1473, when Frederick, unwilling to bestow the title of king upon Charles, left the city secretly, but brought about the marriage after the duke's death in 1477. Again attacked by Matthias, the emperor was driven from Vienna (1490), and soon handed over the government of his lands to Maximilian, whose election as king of the Romans he vainly opposed in 1486. Frederick then retired to Linz, where he passed his time in the study of botany, alchemy and astronomy, until his death on Aug. Frederick was a listless and incapable ruler, lacking alike the qualities of the soldier and of the diplomatist, but possessing a certain cleverness in evading difficulties. With a fine presence, he had many excellent personal qualities, is spoken of as mild and just, and had a real love of learning. He contributed to the aggrandisement of his family by the marriage of Maximilian with Mary of Burgundy, and delighted to inscribe his books and other articles of value with the letters A.E.I.O.U. (Austriae es imperare orbi universo ; or in German, Alles Erdreich ist Oesterreich unterthan). His tomb, in red and white marble, is in the cathedral of St. Stephen at Vienna.
See Aeneas Sylvius Piccolomini, De rebus et gestis Friderici III. (trans. Th. Ilgen, Leipzig, 1889) ; J. Chmel, Geschichte Kaiser Friedrichs IV. and seines Sohnes Maximilians I. (Hamburg, 1840) ; A. Bachmann, Deutsche Reichsgeschichte im Zeitalter Friedrichs III. and Maximilians I. (Leipzig, 2 vols., ; A. Huber, Geschichte Osterreichs (Gotha, 1885-92).