Berengar II of Italy

Berengar II
Berengar bows to King Otto, Manuscriptum Mediolanense, c. 1200
King of Italy
Reign	950-961
Predecessor	Lothair II
Successor	Otto I
Margrave of Ivrea
Reign	923-966
Predecessor	Adalbert I
Successor	Adalbert II
Born	c. 900
Died	4 August 966 Bamberg Castle, March of the Nordgau, Kingdom of Germany
Spouse	Willa of Tuscany
Issue	Adalbert of Italy Guy of Ivrea Conrad of Ivrea Rozala of Italy
House	Anscarids
Father	Adalbert I of Ivrea
Mother	Gisela of Friuli

Berengar II (c. 900 – 4 August 966) was the King of Italy from 950 until his deposition in 961. He was a scion of the Anscarid and Unruoching dynasties, and was named after his maternal grandfather, Berengar I. He succeeded his father as Margrave of Ivrea around 923 (whence he is often known as Berengar of Ivrea), and after 940 led the aristocratic opposition to Kings Hugh and Lothair II. In 950 he succeeded the latter and had his son, Adalbert crowned as his co-ruler. In 952 he recognised the suzerainty of Otto I of Germany, but he later joined a revolt against him. In 960 he invaded the Papal States, and the next year his kingdom was conquered by Otto. Berengar remained at large until his surrender in 964. He died imprisoned in Germany two years later.

Berengar was a son of Margrave Adalbert I of Ivrea and his wife Gisela of Friuli, daughter of the Unruoching king Berengar I of Italy. He succeeded his father as margrave about 923 and married Willa, daughter of the Bosonid margrave Boso of Tuscany and niece of King Hugh of Italy. The chronicler Liutprand of Cremona, raised at Berengar's court at Pavia, gives several particularly vivid accounts of her character.

About 940 Berengar led a revolt of Italian nobles against the rule of his uncle. To evade an assault by Hugh's liensmen, he, forewarned by the king's young son Lothair, had to flee to the court of King Otto I of Germany. Otto avoided taking sides, nevertheless in 945 Berengar could return to Italy with hired troops, welcomed by the local nobility. Hugh was defeated and retired to Arles, he was nominally succeeded by Lothair. From the time of Berengar's successful uprising, all real power and patronage in the Kingdom of Italy was concentrated in his hands with Hugh's son Lothair as titular king. Lothair's brief reign ended upon his early death in 950, presumably poisoned.