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What if Frederick Barbarossa defeats the Lombard League at Legnano causing the absolute crushing of the northern Italian cities in the following years as well as the replacement of Alexander III with a succession of Popes no more than puppets to the Holy Roman Emperor? Frederick Barbarossa never drowns to death and his longer reign secures the survival of the Hohenstaufens more much longer resulting in the centralization of the Holy Roman Empire into something that could be mapped out without losing your sanity?