Europe in 1300
Germany
If you thought the political geography of France was difficult, then you're going to be baffled by Germany. Whereas France and England were in full flower, Germany was a mess in 1300 and it wasn't going to get much better.
First of all, even though I and our texts will talk about Germany, you need to get that out of your head. There was no Germany in the sense of a nation or even a kingdom (even though there was indeed a King of the Germans). There was also a title called Emperor of the Romans, which didn't have anything to do with Rome. Or not much, anyway.
You probably have heard the term Holy Roman Empire. That phrase gets invented during our period, but the reality was there well before. It's an inheritance from Charlemagne, who first revived the title of imperator in the West back in 800. In theory, the Emperor was the overlord of the various kings of Europe, but no one took that at all seriously. In practical terms, the Empire consisted of two major kingdoms—the Kingdom of Italy and the Kingdom of Germany—plus a variety of duchies such as Burgundy and Austria, and lesser principalities such as those that made up the area known as the Low Countries. In turn, neither the Kingdom of Italy nor the Kingdom of Germany was much of a kingdom. Rather, these were merely titles representing a claim over a collection of powers that had managed to become more or less independent.
If you want some better reference points, think of it this way. The Emperor claimed to be overlord over northern Italy, but in fact the city-states there were independent. The emperors tried from time to time to exert their control there. Up in Germany, the real powers were various dukes, counts, archbishops, and a few cities or leagues of cities. The emperor himself was only as strong as his own family holdings plus whatever allies he could claim.
Unlike kingship in England and France, the position of Emperor was elective. A tradition was becoming well entrenched that seven great German lords had the right to choose the next emperor, and in 1300 they were still being very careful to make sure that the same family did not keep the title from one generation to the next. The emperor in 1300 was Henry VII, whose family lands were in Luxembourg.