For six entire years affairs demanded Otto's presence in Italy, the country in which after him countless Germans were to win glory, but at the same time a bitter hatred and their graves. During his sojourn in Rome he had invested Pandulf, ‘ the Ironhead,’ of Capua with Spoleto and Camerino. He had entrusted a faithful vassal with the fairest domains of Southern Italy, and had made over to him the war with Byzantium, which still continued. He celebrated the Easter of 969 in Ravenna with Pope John, and in a Council restored this city with its territory and other patrimonies to the Church. He then brought his son to Italy in order to secure the succession in his family and to make the Italian kingdom hereditary like the Empire.

Otto II. crowned co-Emperor, Dec. 25, 967

Otto the Second entered the city with his father on December 24th, and on Christmas Day received the Imperial Crown at the hands of John the Thirteenth. The ideas cherished by his father influenced the mind of the boy of fourteen, who suddenly found himself a Caesar standing amid the monuments of world history.