Adalbert of Italy

Adalbert (c. 932 – c. 975) was the king of Italy from 950 to 963. He was the son of the Margrave Berengar of Ivrea and Willa.

On 15 December 950, both he and his father were crowned kings of Italy after the death of Lothair II. His father forced Adelaide, widow of the late Lothair, to marry Adalbert and cement their claim to the kingship.

In 951, King Otto I of Germany invaded Italy and rescued Adelaide, marrying her himself. He forced Berengar and Adalbert to do homage to him for their kingdom in 952. In 953, Adalbert began besieging Count Adalbert Azzo of Canossa, in his Canossan castle, where Adelaide had taken refuge two years prior. In 957, Liudolf, Duke of Swabia, invaded Lombardy and caused Berenagar to flee, though Adalbert gathered a large force at Verona. He was defeated, but Liudolf died prematurely and his army left.

In 960, he joined his father in attacking the pope, John XII. Otto came down at the pope's call and defeated the two co-kings and was crowned Emperor. Adalbert fled to Fraxinet, then under the Saracens. From there he fled to Corsica. When he returned, he tried to take Pavia, the Italian capital, but was defeated by another invading Swabian army, this time under Burchard III. Only the interference of his brothers Conrad and Guy, who died fighting, saved him to fight another day, which he never did. His negotiations with the Byzantine Empire fell through and he retired with his wife Gerberga to Burgundy, where he died at Autun sometime between 971 and 975. His widow married Otto-Henry, Duke of Burgundy, and his son, Otto-William, inherited through his stepfather the county of Burgundy and is thus the forefather of the Free Counts and the Hohenstaufen emperors.