Conrad II

Conrad II., the Salic, belonged to the same family as the preceding, and was chosen Emperor in 1024. He reigned for fifteen years with considerable ability, waging a long and successful war against the princes of Saxony, subduing Bohemia, Poland, and Hungary, acquiring the kingdom of Aries, and suppressing serious disorders in Italy. To him the lesser nobles owed the reform that made their fiefs hereditary. He built the cathedral at Speyer, where he was buried in 1039.