Charlemagne

Escape From Rome: The Failure of Empire and the Road to Prosperity

by Walter Scheidel  · 14 Oct 2019  · 1,014pp  · 237,531 words

century CE, Roman preeminence ceased only after an abortive attempt at restoration in the sixth century. Subsequent efforts to rebuild a “Roman” empire proved unsuccessful: Charlemagne managed a modest resurgence around 800 while Ottonian rule produced merely a minute uptick two centuries later. Ottoman expansion in the early modern period likewise

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the empire in the fifth century CE, the corresponding share of the eastern Roman empire plummeted to 20 percent or 30 percent. Ephemeral consolidation under Charlemagne was followed by an entire millennium of persistent polycentrism as the most populous power did not normally rule even a fifth of all Europeans. Neither

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Roman empire in the mid-sixth century; the conquests of the Umayyad caliphate in the early eighth century; the ascent of the Frankish empire under Charlemagne; repeated efforts by rulers of the German empire from the tenth through the thirteenth centuries; the Mongol irruption into Central Europe in the mid-thirteenth

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of the 750s, when the Franks completed their takeover. In the 760s, the latter fully subdued Aquitaine, and at the end of the eighth century Charlemagne’s forces crossed the Pyrenees to establish strongholds on the other side. I relate these events in some detail to clarify the central trend, which

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time. Because of this, the Iberian peninsula was completely unsuitable as a staging area for further advances into Europe, even as Frankish power declined after Charlemagne: the Western European powers fractured but the westernmost Arab regimes were weaker still. Moreover, the mid-eighth-century secession of Spain was part of a

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entered into an alliance with the papacy and intervened on its behalf against the Lombards in Italy), and most strikingly from 772 to 814, under Charlemagne. This fourth and longest phase of unity produced the most ambitious advances: Frankish forces subjugated the Saxons between the lower Rhine and the Elbe, annexed

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accept tributary obligations, campaigned south of the Pyrenees, and, most important, overcame Lombard resistance in northern and central Italy. The last of these accomplishments enabled Charlemagne to share control over the Duchy of Rome and parts of the northern Italian peninsula with the papacy and offer it protection. In return, in

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what had been the western half of the Roman empire to bear this title after a 320-year hiatus (figure 5.4). At that point, Charlemagne claimed suzerainty over up to one-third of the people who then lived in the territories that had once been held by Rome, and perhaps

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ninth century, the pace of its expansion during the preceding decades, and the serious shortcomings of its main competitors in Europe, we might reasonably expect Charlemagne’s immediate successors (the emperor himself passed away in 814 at the ripe old age of seventy-two) to have been in a strong position

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more durable unity along the lines of the Roman model. What happened was exactly the opposite. In keeping with Frankish custom reaching back three centuries, Charlemagne had made arrangements for dividing his kingdom among three sons (for the Franks, Lombards, and Aquitaine). After two of them predeceased him, the remaining one

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-in—almost homeostatic—constraint on durable state formation.40 As noted, only periods of unity sustained expansion and consolidation. In this respect, one might consider Charlemagne’s efflorescence the rare product of unusually good luck. His brother and rival king Carloman died after only three years of corule, opening up the

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path to an exceptionally long spell of one-man rule—Charlemagne’s longevity was almost twice the average life span of the other eight Carolingian monarchs (all of whom appear to have died of natural causes

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), seventy-two compared to thirty-eight and a half years. The Frankish apogee under Charlemagne was the exception that proved the rule. But even more powerful processes were steadily eroding state capabilities: the loss of centralized fiscal extraction and redistribution

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booty were the most reliable means of attracting aristocratic support.45 This opportunistic approach helps explain the successes of Charles Martel, Pepin the Short, and Charlemagne, who were able to marshal dedicated armies in exchange for material benefits: conquests produced “unmatched patronage opportunities for the Carolingian family, with a host of

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. However, as service became contingent on profit, war abated as soon as the Franks ran out of lucrative targets. This slowdown was already visible in Charlemagne’s final years, when his campaigns against the Danes proved both unprofitable and unpopular. Falling income from plunder rapidly depleted the royal treasury.46 Meanwhile

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that it allowed for “internal redistribution of wealth as an alternative to external expansion”: war-making turned inward, as it were, undermining the state. Moreover, Charlemagne’s reign witnessed efforts to demarcate Franks from other (often arbitrarily defined) ethnic groups within the empire, which were placed in a subordinate position. This

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resurgent regionalization.47 Taken together, these dynamics go a long way in accounting for the persistent divisions and conflicts that rocked the Frankish empire after Charlemagne’s demise. Negotiation with powerbrokers replaced royal command, and by the end of the ninth century, top magnates had assumed quasi-regal status.48 Although

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the Frankish emperors did not go down without a fight, the system proved too resistant to change. In his later years, Charlemagne showed growing concern over the service obligations of his vassals, seeking to impel them by specifying their duties and imposing fines. He may even have

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succumb to determined external challengers. Government was fairly minimal and interpersonal relationships ruled supreme, which allowed for quick shifts in loyalty and territorial configuration. Even Charlemagne’s reach remained rather limited: good intentions, however widely advertised, were hard to put into practice, and his royal agents (missi), who were supposed to

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resembling the Roman empire in Europe. Other constraints of arguably lesser significance further reinforced this outcome. For instance, environmental conditions may have contributed both to Charlemagne’s successes and the misfortunes of his successors. Exceptionally harsh winters that were frequently linked to volcanic activity became more common after

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Charlemagne’s reign, and associated famines appear to have been more severe.53 In the ideological sphere, the vision of “Roma renascens,” of a putative rebirth

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being driven by a desire to rebuild Roman power, Carolingian expansion sought to recover (and where possible augment) the Merovingian domain.54 In any case, Charlemagne’s realm, with its poor infrastructure, primitive communications network, feeble urbanism, part-time military, ethnic divisions, and highly personalized rule bore little resemblance to the

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Middle Ages.63 Power relations were further complicated by the influence of the church. The new “Roman” empire itself had arisen from an agreement between Charlemagne and the pope in which the latter initially had the weaker hand: the papacy relied on imperial protection, and renegade popes could be deposed. At

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population of Western and central Europe.33 Yet notwithstanding the pronouncements of eulogists who cast the Habsburgs as descendants of Aeneas via Augustus, Constantine, and Charlemagne, Charles’s position was dramatically different from that of a Roman emperor. His domain was characterized, and effectively riven, by intense particularism, resembling, in Anthony

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diversity of Charles’s dominions, which lacked both a capital and a unified administration: as a result, he was always on the move, much as Charlemagne, the first of many post-Roman “Roman” emperors, had been 750 years earlier. Another was the soaring cost of war, driven by mercenaries, gunpowder, and

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Western one between the 620s and 650s CE, or prevailed in Korea in the 660s, or dominated Vietnam. With the brief and partial exception of Charlemagne’s reign, no such hegemon ever existed in post-Roman (and pre-Napoleonic) Europe.15 Similar qualifications apply to a fashionable modern academic scenario that

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touched on the dynamics that enfeebled and splintered the Carolingian domain. The power of nobles, enhanced by a phase of lucrative expansion that culminated under Charlemagne, turned against the center once gains from conquest dried up. Dynastic feuding—fueled by the lack of primogeniture in the royal succession—not only weakened

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medieval European state could hope to muster. The first post-Roman polities in Europe to encompass 10 million people—leaving aside a brief blip under Charlemagne and Louis the Pious—were Germany and France in the High Middle Ages. But European rulers would have been ignorant of this fact and could

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once again highly centralized.63 These capacities dwarfed anything that could have been achieved in Europe at that time, even in the headiest days of Charlemagne. Rulers could only guess at the number of their subjects, found it increasingly hard to draft them, and no longer had any hope of taxing

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, Rome’s fall did little to change the scope of this process: the successor states barely extended beyond the old Rhine–Danube frontier, and only Charlemagne regained what Augustus might once have projected as Rome’s Elbe frontier.21 What Peter Heather calls “the ancient world order in western Eurasia: a

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–101. 50. Fouracre 1995: 108–9. 51. Successor states: Halsall 2007: 508–12; S. F. Johnson 2012: 50. Government: S. F. Johnson 2012: 48, 550. Charlemagne: Fouracre 1995: 107. 52. Halsall 2003: 119–33; Barbero 2004: 249–71, esp. 252, 256–59, 265–68. 53. McCormick, Dutton, and Mayewski 2007, esp

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. 875–89; Newfield 2013: 169. “Charlemagne was more than vigorous and smart: he was, with respect to volcanic aerosols and rapid climate change, a very lucky ruler” (McCormick, Dutton, and Mayewski

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Drusus reached the Elbe, and the short-lived trans-Rhenanian Roman province of Germania appears to have reached as far as the lower Elbe. For Charlemagne’s expansion, see chapter 5 in this volume. 22. Heather 2009: xv (quotes); 386–451 (spread of Slavs), 520–76 (later state formation and development

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–1950. Copenhagen: NIAS. Banniard, Michel. 2013. “The transition from Latin to the Romance languages.” In Maiden, Smith, and Ledgeway 2013, 57–106. Barbero, Alessandro. 2004. Charlemagne: Father of a continent. Berkeley: University of California Press. Barcelo, Pedro A. 1988. Karthago und die iberische Halbinsel vor den Barkiden: Studien zur karthagischen Präsenz

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of, 240; elites as warriors in, 159–60, 162; expansion of, 160, 163; factional conflict in, 160–61; income from land grants in, 159; post-Charlemagne, 158, 161; taxes in, 159 Carthage: in counterfactual to Roman empire, 113, 116–19, 521, 524; maritime exploration by, 430; population of, 549n6; as rival

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, 279–80 Celtic language, 311, 312 Celtic society, 522–23, 526 Central America, 10, 46, 466. See also New World Chagatai khanate, 175, 183, 185 Charlemagne (Frankish king), 35, 36, 154–56, 160–63, 171, 231, 240, 244, 267 Charles the Bald (Frankish king), 161 Charles the Fat (Frankish king), 157

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Charles Martel, 154, 160 Charles V (Habsburg ruler and Holy Roman emperor), 193–98; abdication by, 198; army size and, 199; compared to Charlemagne, 199–200; counterfactual scenario for, 200–201, 203; credit to finance wars of, 199; fighting against France, 195, 196, 198; fiscal constraints in waging war

The Library: A Fragile History

by Arthur Der Weduwen and Andrew Pettegree  · 14 Oct 2021  · 457pp  · 173,326 words

at the same time provided a means to extend a family’s influence within the growing ecclesiastical power structure. It was under the patronage of Charlemagne (742–814) that the monasteries assumed greater political importance and took on a more active role as book producers. Over the course of his long

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much of western and central Europe. This was a military as much as an administrative endeavour. The great ambition of Charlemagne, the first emperor in the West since the fall of Rome, was to reform the disparate territories and peoples under his Christian rule, uniting them

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in administration, law and faith.15 This extraordinary undertaking required a ruler with the administrative talent and vision of Charlemagne, yet it could not have been achieved without the ecclesiastical network of monasteries. The Christian Church was the common denominator in

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Charlemagne’s empire, and Latin was the only tongue that could unite it. One of Charlemagne’s primary concerns was the accuracy of language and its proper usage by his clergy, administrators and subjects

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precise performance of ecclesiastical rituals that underpinned Christian worship. Efficient governance also relied on effective communication; in Charlemagne’s vast empire, communication became increasingly written, which prompted demand for a standardised language.16 In 784, Charlemagne wrote to all monasteries and bishops in his realm, stating that he ‘deemed it useful that

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the monasteries but noted that letters which he received from them often revealed their poor command of Latin. In a decree issued five years later, Charlemagne specifically addressed the need for proper schools, where boys could learn to read, and the need for monasteries to prepare better books, ‘because often some

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desire to pray to God properly, but they pray badly because of the incorrect books’.17 The proliferation of such ‘incorrect books’, in Charlemagne’s eyes, provided the impetus for an intense period of book production and circulation, unlike anything that Europe had seen since the days of the

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were the school books of late Roman authors like Aelius Donatus and Martianus Capella, which dominated the curriculum of Carolingian education. It was appropriate that Charlemagne, who busied himself so greatly with the correctness of literature, should also come into the possession of a rich collection of books. Some of these

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were made for him by monasteries or by talented scribes at court, and included sumptuous books: the Godescalc Evangelistary, a liturgical work made for Charlemagne’s court chapel, was written on purple-dyed parchment using gold and silver ink.19 Many other similarly magnificent books, which had their bindings decorated

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the staples of the monasteries, and they would remain so after the Carolingian empire was divided, and ultimately crumbled. It was to his credit that Charlemagne did not concentrate book production around his own court but allowed it to remain common practice in the monasteries, ensuring that the habit of scholarship

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and scribal activity would outlast the period of political instability that followed Charlemagne’s death. The organisation of monasteries and nunneries into separate orders, with houses spread out across the continent, provided a natural network for the circulation

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, decorated with gold leaf and bound in bejewelled covers, had been a mainstay of the libraries of European monasteries and courts since the age of Charlemagne. Yet it was in the workshops of Paris, Bruges and Florence that the art of bookmaking reached its apogee, driven by specialisation, the division of

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library in Paris. Neither would have an enduring future. A Contested Inheritance The origins of the town library can be traced to the era of Charlemagne.2 In 802, the Synod of Aachen had made parish churches responsible for keeping a minimal number of liturgical books. Books were required for worship

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: Bloomsbury, 2018). 14. Yaniv Fox, Power and Religion in Merovingian Gaul: Columbanian Monasticism and the Frankish Elites (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2014). 15. Rosamond McKitterick, Charlemagne: The Formation of a European Identity (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2008), p. 306. 16. Rosamond McKitterick, The Carolingians and the Written Word (Cambridge: Cambridge University

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. 316. 18. James Stuart Beddie, ‘The Ancient Classics in the Mediaeval Libraries’, Speculum, 5 (1930), pp. 3–20. 19. McKitterick, Charlemagne, pp. 331–2. 20. Donald Bullough, ‘Charlemagne’s court library revisited’, Early Mediaeval Europe, 12 (2003), pp. 339–63, here p. 341. 21. Laura Cleaver, ‘The circulation of history books in

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Italian Renaissance Library’, Theoria: A Journal of Social and Political Theory, 26 (1966), pp. 61–80. Bischoff, Bernhard, Manuscripts and Libraries in the Age of Charlemagne (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1994). Brett, Edward T., ‘The Dominican Library in the Thirteenth Century’, The Journal of Library History, 15 (1980), pp. 303–308

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. Bullough, Donald, ‘Charlemagne’s court library revisited’, Early Medieval Europe, 12 (2003), pp. 339–63. Christ, Karl, The Handbook of Medieval Library History, ed. and trans. Theophil M

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Moyen Age au milieu du XVIIe siècle (Paris: Promodis, 1982). McKitterick, Rosamond, The Carolingians and the Written Word (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1989). McKitterick, Rosamond, Charlemagne: The Formation of a European Identity (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2008). Meeder, Sven, The Irish Scholarly Presence at St. Gall: Networks of Knowledge in the

Venice: A New History

by Thomas F. Madden  · 24 Oct 2012  · 466pp  · 146,982 words

. The popes would rule this state until 1870. Pepin’s achievements were impressive, but dwarfed by those of his more famous son, Charlemagne. His fame is certainly warranted. Charlemagne oversaw a small intellectual revival in Europe, ordered the reform of the monasteries that dotted the landscape, and paid close attention to the

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the north German forests, sometimes the Muslim powers in Spain, and sometimes the troublesome Lombards in northern Italy. The last were so thoroughly defeated that Charlemagne established a new government in the region, adding “King of the Lombards” to his growing list of titles. As a result of all this warfare

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, Charlemagne had cobbled together a mighty kingdom that included what is today France, Germany, and northern Italy. It almost seemed as if the days of the

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before the pope to receive his blessing. Leo produced a crown, which he placed on Charlemagne’s head, proclaiming him “emperor of the Romans.” Although Charlemagne later insisted that he knew nothing of the pope’s plans, he made no attempt to reject the title. Quite the contrary—he spent the

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rest of his life trying to live up to it. The coronation of Charlemagne was a bold statement from a recovering West. It asserted that the Roman Empire was once again restored in Europe, only this time by means

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of the papacy and one very successful Germanic warlord. Naturally, the real Roman government in Constantinople took a dim view of the ceremony in Rome. Charlemagne was a Frank, a barbarian, a descendant of those Germans who had dismembered the Roman Empire. The true emperor (or, in 800, empress) was the

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scoffing at the spectacle was about all that the Byzantines could do in response. For his part, Charlemagne eagerly sought their approval, even offering to marry Empress Irene, a proposal that was swiftly rejected. Charlemagne’s rise to power and his new imperial title raised interesting questions in the Venetian lagoon, where

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the inhabitants still claimed to be subjects of the Roman Empire. The power of Charlemagne’s family (known today as the Carolingians) was truly impressive. Indeed, it extended across Lombardy and the Veneto, having completely displaced the old Lombard masters

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mightily from Carolingian friendship. It was for this reason that a powerful minority of Venetians, led by Patriarch John of Grado, urged closer ties with Charlemagne and the Franks. This, of course, would mean turning away from Venice’s traditional allegiance to Constantinople. It appears that most Venetians, including the doge

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even the lagoon dwellers, who were not unaccustomed to a little blood in their politics, and turned many of them against the doge. News of Charlemagne’s coronation as Roman emperor in 800 may have further swayed some Venetians to the pro-Frankish side. The murdered Patriarch John was succeeded by

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an attack on Frankish Comacchio, not far from Ravenna. Although a military failure, the Byzantine strike launched from the Venetian lagoon captured the attention of Charlemagne’s son, Pepin, who ruled from Ravenna as “King of the Lombards.” Pepin came to the conclusion that Doge Obelerio either had switched to the

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him. The problem of Venice’s unique status, however, was not resolved and it would only be ironed out between Charlemagne and the Byzantines two years later. As he grew older, Charlemagne became obsessed with a desire to have Constantinople recognize him as the western Roman emperor. Rather than face more wars

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in Italy and Istria, the emperor in Constantinople agreed to send a delegation to the tiny Frankish capital at Aachen to hail Charlemagne as emperor. As part

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of the deal, Charlemagne confirmed that the Venetian lagoon was under the jurisdiction of the eastern emperor, and therefore not part of the Carolingian empire

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reluctantly and with a grim determination to complete his task quickly. Doge Orseolo’s first priority was establishing peace with Germany. The distant successor to Charlemagne, Otto II, had been crowned Holy Roman emperor by Pope John XIII in 967. He was beside himself with rage over the treatment of Waldrada

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. The Holy Roman emperors in Germany had once again established themselves as the preeminent power in the West, although they no longer ruled all of Charlemagne’s great empire. Carved out of it to the west was the kingdom of France, now led by the Capetian monarchs, whose dynasty would last

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the rightful ruler of northern and central Italy, including some of the pope’s territories, but, of course, excluding Venice. These claims dated back to Charlemagne, Frederick’s predecessor centuries past. In truth, though, Holy Roman emperors generally had their hands full just trying to rule Germany. Northern Italian (or Lombard

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. Before the twelfth century, Venetians used Byzantine coins (bezants, hyperpers, and others), coins from Muslim states (known as saraceni), or imperial coins from Verona. Although Charlemagne minted few coins, he nonetheless established in western Europe the basis of a monetary system that was itself based loosely on the old Roman one

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, 165–68, 199 priests in, 80–82 usury condemned by, 268–69, 271 Venetian reforms in, 80–85, 93 Cavelli, Giacomo, 222 Cavour, Camillo, 388 Charlemagne, 33–35, 38, 95, 261 Charles I, 335 Charles IV, 204, 229 Charles V, 310, 311, 324, 326, 327, 329, 332 Charles VI, 338, 339

Lotharingia: A Personal History of Europe's Lost Country

by Simon Winder  · 22 Apr 2019

find. The theme of this book is defined by one of the most important if accidental moments in European history. Charles I ‘the Great’ (Charlemagne) spent a long and enjoyable career carving out a huge empire across much of north-west mainland Europe. It was very much a personal achievement

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, whose only asset was ownership of a pair of sandals once owned – and rather scuffed up – by Jesus and given to the monks by Charlemagne’s father Pippin, kept its semi-independence and attracted an endless stream of pilgrims with surprising success for many centuries, only totally losing its status

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number of acts of eradicatory chauvinism and counter-chauvinism. A further complication for France is that the Duchy of Flanders in the original division of Charlemagne’s Empire was made part of ‘West Francia’, i.e. France, but its counts were often able to maintain a sort of semi-independence.

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crowning of the King of the French in Rheims (he only officially became Emperor when crowned by the Pope). As the equally legitimate successor to Charlemagne, the Emperor/King had his own historical explanation for Lotharingia, seeing it all as uncontestably part of the Holy Roman Empire. The Emperor had

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of St Brice in the 1650s of the tomb of Childeric I. This accidental find catapulted everything back some two hundred and fifty years before Charlemagne, to the century after the Western Roman Empire had collapsed, a world which must have still been densely Roman in its appearance, probably with

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towns and more limited trade. Childeric’s son, Clovis I, was baptized, united the Frankish tribes and founded the Merovingian dynasty which lasted until Charlemagne’s dad put the last of them into a monastery. The management of Childeric’s rediscovered tomb has not exactly been a curatorial model. It

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to pray here (and was an important patron, giving thanks here after he defeated an Ummayad army at Narbonne in 737 on Servatius’s birthday); Charlemagne, Charles V, Philip II, most recently John Paul II. The church above it has been swept aside repeatedly by invaders and accidents, but somehow

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nothing would have survived – we would be wholly ignorant of Tacitus and his friends. One curiosity was the role of Irish monks, particularly at Charlemagne’s court. When the Irish had been converted to Christianity they had no written language of their own, so took the shaping and purity of

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ancient lichen and facial repairs. Eaten at by centuries of smoke and guano, nearly killed off by a huge fire in the eighteenth century, this Charlemagne is a figure who demands respect. It seems a shame not to have ritual bowls filled with floating flowers, guttering oil lamps, temple guards in

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smart outfits, worshippers pressing their foreheads to the cold stone floor – plus a few bits of bunting and perhaps something dreadful involving animals. Charlemagne, who persuaded the Pope to crown him the new Roman Emperor in a great ceremony on Christmas Day in the propitious year of 800, had

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, had made himself King of the Franks, the Frankish kingdom being an ancient, sprawling and complex entity, directly if stormily linked to Roman Gaul. Charlemagne’s birthright included most of modern France, all of the Netherlands and much of what is now western Germany. But by his anti-pagan campaigns

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to make Europe Christian, and aligned with Rome rather than Constantinople. It is hair-raising how thin the thread is by which we know about Charlemagne’s actions – a handful of chronicles, letters and a couple of biographies (one by the enjoyably named Notker the Stammerer), which are fascinating, but

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frustratingly without any means by which they can be double-checked. Einhard, who worked closely with Charlemagne for many years, wrote his life so that the events of the present would not be ‘condemned to silence and oblivion’ – and it is

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blank reigns of these centuries appear desolate and poorly managed simply because historians have no vivid sources. Even with what we do have about Charlemagne it is often impossible to know if some tall tale, monk’s failure of memory or ancient lie has become for ever enshrined in

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oddly intimate link between ourselves and the people who stood in the same place, it feels, really quite recently. Like most of his family, Charlemagne came from the modern German–Dutch–Belgian border area. He both inherited a huge swath of land and extended it through campaigning into the east

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Avar Empire, which had controlled Central Europe for some two centuries, bringing back to Aachen ‘fifteen oxcarts’ of Avar treasure. However, to think of Charlemagne as the acknowledged ruler of everywhere between the Pyrenees and Denmark, the mountains of Bohemia and central Italy, would be a mistake. Many of these

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imposing his will – sometimes only temporarily – from Spain to the Baltic. Just as his grandfather Charles Martel had ended serious Arab incursions into France, so Charlemagne carved out new Christian areas in Central Europe and fought back the ‘Northmen’. With these last, it gets a bit awkward as an accidental side

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had time on their hands and could lean back on their rough-hewn stools, wondering whether their berserkers might enjoy going abroad for a bit. Charlemagne had not been buried long before his children and grandchildren learned a lot more about these seafaring tourists. CHAPTER TWO The split inheritance » Margraves,

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As mentioned at the beginning of the comparatively cheap book you are currently reading, Lotharingia (initially known as Middle Francia) emerged from the manoeuvres of Charlemagne’s grandsons. We probably have more grounds for regretting the fall of the old empire than its inhabitants did. Historians love large political units because

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Duke of Württemberg later on. Sticking to the post-Treaty of Ribemont world of 880, this was the last partition of what was still recognizably Charlemagne’s inheritance. It enshrined Lotharingia – Middle Francia – as a huge zone which both the French king and German king could equally lay dynastic claim

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The treaty was signed by Louis III for West Francia and Louis III for East Francia, respectively great-great-grandson and great-grandson of Charlemagne, each named after Charlemagne’s first successor Louis I ‘the Pious’. Each twist and turn over the coming centuries, as the digits piled up after each further

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choose to know nothing at all about, say, the Battles of Formigny and Castillon, which threw the English out of France. As discussed earlier, Charlemagne’s inheritors had in West Francia and East Francia created two opposing blocs and in Lotharingia an intermediate bloc linked to East Francia. But Lotharingia

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, and where Otto is buried – a vast jump forward, some three hundred miles east from the old stamping ground at Aachen. In parallel with Charlemagne’s wars with the Saxons and Avars and Otto’s further march east in the following century, although with very tangled and widely variegated roots

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and of a seemingly limitless supply of mean, disloyal vassals. By 882, in a thoughtful piece of symbolic redecoration, a Viking army had converted Charlemagne’s chapel at Aachen into stables. The Emperor and the Pope and their fates were so entangled that their tumbling prestige dragged everyone down into

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Here was Philip associating himself with expiatory chivalry (despite backing out of his single combat with Duke Humphrey), and with the power and glamour of Charlemagne. It is hard not to wonder whether the Dukes (and indeed other rulers of the period) and their guests got a bit bored with being

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compared to the same people over and over – there is always a tapestry of Godefroy of Bouillon or Charlemagne. But perhaps the static nature of the iconography was the point: that greatness and legitimacy created a permanent present, where both dynastic heroes and

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like to think that Bosch and his anonymous sculptor vied with one other for rival compelling mutant effects in their different media. As with the Charlemagne sculpture in Zürich, there can be few more atmospheric objects than statues designed for high places but now brought down after centuries of erosion

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Constantinople made noises suggesting that Rome was merely its Johnny-come-lately low-comedy offshoot. Much of the elaborate ceremony around the Pope crowning Charlemagne and his successors as Roman Emperor and the elaborate iconography around the Theban Legion martyrs and ancient sites associated with Constantine was to counter the

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violent anti-Protestant edict, wrote to the Pope that ‘no Roman pontiff has received such a harvest of joys from Germany since the time of Charlemagne’ – in other words directly comparing Protestants to pagan Saxons and Avars. As Ferdinand’s advisers flapped their arms about with excitement, not knowing whether

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Emperor of Austria as, confusingly, Francis I. Both Napoleon and Franz could draw on the Treaty of Verdun as the French and German inheritors of Charlemagne, although Napoleon had pole position in now owning Aachen and the Rhineland imperial sites. The Holy Roman Empire, with its ancient, confused roots, was

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Wellington were in attendance, with other figures such as Goethe and some senior Rothschilds. There was a fun visit to see the sacred relics of Charlemagne, effectively, in the wake of Napoleon’s visit there, decontaminating the place with a strong spray of hysterical reactionary mysticism. There were discussions about

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Nietzsche and Wagner were both knitting together different cultures in much the same way Philipp Franz von Siebold had linked things Dutch and Japanese. Charlemagne’s regular invasions of the Ruhr to kill Saxons had unfortunately deprived Germany of paganism and had indeed been so thorough that no trace of

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and a horned helmet just to buy a stamp from it, and one of the world’s very few medieval-style water-towers. With its Charlemagne Hall, mythological, faux-runic carvings and hunkered down Romanesque clock-tower, the station is almost lovable, even if originally designed just as a backdrop

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to compete with the real Monkey Island of the Schloß. Wilhelm would hang out here with his friends, surrounded by pictures of his great predecessors Charlemagne, Godefroy of Bouillon, King Arthur and King David, with stuffed capercaillies and hundreds of old weapons. Guests would come in through the carved gateway

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and lies of the mongrel Allied coalition. CHAPTER FOURTEEN Dreams of Corfu » Walls and bridges » The Kingdom of Mattresses » The road to Strasbourg » Armageddon » Charlemagne comes home Dreams of Corfu A few miles outside Utrecht is a grand house which must have a fair claim to be one of the

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themselves in places they no longer recognized, sometimes with wives who had long settled down with someone else. One final collaborationist flourish was the SS Charlemagne Division of French Fascist volunteers. The number of men actively fighting with the Germans was never huge – the ‘Rexist’ Belgian leader Léon Degrelle’s

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Walloon Legion was only a few thousand men, mostly killed on the Eastern Front.5 The Charlemagne Division was almost self-consciously set up to perform a last stand in 1944, filled with brutalized scrapings from the collapsing Vichy regime, while the

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senior political leaders escaped to the Swabian castle of Sigmaringen to await their fates. Members of the Charlemagne Division found a sort of martyrdom as the very last defenders of Hitler’s bunker. I mention it here because of its curious badge.

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Avar gold than with this engineering marvel, but in other ways, of course, it is an inspired name. This refreshed and overhauled symbolism around Charlemagne came together in the early 1950s. It turned out that the future did not lie in France trying to pinch places like the Saarland, but

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enmity by joining together. They would go on to make three core Lotharingian cities into their capitals: Brussels, Luxembourg and Strasbourg. In addition the Charlemagne Prize was set up by the City of Aachen to be awarded to whoever its judges viewed as contributing most to the promotion of unity

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Prussia (London, 2006) Richard Cobb, French and Germans, Germans and French (Hanover, NH, 1983) Alexander Cockburn, Corruptions of Empire (New York, 1988) Roger Collins, Charlemagne (Basingstoke, 1998) Philippe de Commynes, Memoirs: The Reign of Louis XI, 1461–83, trans. Michael Jones (Harmondsworth, 1972) Philip Conisbee (ed.), Georges de la Tour

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, Diary of His Journey to the Netherlands, introduced by J.-A. Goris and G. Marlier (London, 1971) Einhard and Notker the Stammerer, Two Lives of Charlemagne, trans. David Ganz (London, 2008) Carlos M. N. Eire, Reformations: The Early Modern World, 1450–1650 (New Haven, 2016) Amos Elon, The Pity of

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1300–1914 (Cambridge, 2000) Stefan Fischer, Hieronymus Bosch (Köln, 2016) John B. Freed, Frederick Barbarossa: The Prince and the Myth (New Haven, 2016) Johannes Fried, Charlemagne (Cambridge, MA, 2016) Robert Gerwarth, The Vanquished: Why the First World War Failed to End, 1917–1923 (London, 2016) Robert Gildea, Children of the Revolution

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to search for terms of interest. For your reference, the terms that appear in the print index are listed below. Aachen (Aix-la-Chapelle) and Charlemagne Charlemagne Prize Congress of (1818) coronations in and famine and Napoleon Treasury and the Vikings Aare, River Aargau abbeys Acre, fall of (1291) Adam Adelaide

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on the Rhine fossils Fouquet, Jean France Arab incursions into and the Austrian Netherlands and the Black Death and Britain and Burgundy Capetian dynasty and Charlemagne Concordat of Worms (1122) and England and the First World War and Flanders and the ‘Fronde’ rebellion geography and Germany and the Holy Roman

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King Neerwinden, Battle of (1793) Nether Rhine River Netherlands, Kingdom of the and Albrecht Dürer and Amsterdam and Baarle-Hertog and Belgium and Britain and Charlemagne and England and the First World War and flooding and France and Margaret of Austria and Neutral Moresnet northern partitioning (1640s) and religion St Elizabeth

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Spanish Road Spanish Succession, War of the (1701–14) Spanish Truce see Twelve Years Truce spas Speyer Cathedral Spinola, Ambrogio Splinter Sands, Dunkirk SS Charlemagne Division Stanley, Henry Morton Statue of Liberty Stavelot Stavelot Abbey Stavelot-Malmédy Stellingabund Sterne, Laurence A Sentimental Journey Tristram Shandy Stevinus, Simon Stiftskirche, Baden-Baden

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Red, yellow and blue » Shame on the Rhine Chapter Fourteen Dreams of Corfu » Walls and bridges » The Kingdom of Mattresses » The road to Strasbourg » Armageddon » Charlemagne comes home Postscript Notes Acknowledgements Bibliography Index Illustration Credits Also by Simon Winder A Note About the Author Copyright Farrar, Straus and Giroux 175 Varick

Why the West Rules--For Now: The Patterns of History, and What They Reveal About the Future

by Ian Morris  · 11 Oct 2010  · 1,152pp  · 266,246 words

time for the Franks. In the 750s the pope in Rome sought their protection against local bullies, and on Christmas morning, 800, the Frankish king Charlemagne* was even able to get Pope Leo III to kneel before him in St. Peter’s and crown him Roman emperor

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. Charlemagne vigorously tried to build a kingdom worthy of the title he claimed. His armies carried fire, the sword, and Christianity into eastern Europe and pushed

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Rome yet to be,” one of his court poets called it), created a stable coinage, and oversaw a trade revival. It is tempting to compare Charlemagne to Xiaowen, who, three centuries before, had moved the Northern Wei kingdom on China’s rough frontier toward the high end, jump-starting the process

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that led to the reunification of the Eastern core. Charlemagne’s coronation in Rome certainly speaks of ambitions like Xiaowen’s, as do the embassies he sent to seek Baghdad’s friendship. So impressed was

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the caliph, Frankish chronicles say, that he sent Charlemagne an elephant. Arab sources, however, mention neither Franks nor elephants. Charlemagne was no Xiaowen, and apparently counted for little in the caliph’s councils. Nor did

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Charlemagne’s claim to be Roman emperor move the Byzantine empress Irene* to abdicate in his favor. The reality was that the Frankish kingdom never moved

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very far toward the high end. For all Charlemagne’s pretensions, he had no chance of reuniting the core or even turning the Christian fringe into a single state. One of the things

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Charlemagne did achieve, unfortunately, was to raise social development enough to lure raiders into his empire from the even wilder lands beyond the Christian periphery. By

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or not at all. Increasingly, countryfolk turned to local big men to defend them, and townspeople turned to their bishops and mayors. By the time Charlemagne’s three grandsons divided the empire among themselves in 843, kings had ceased to mean much to most of their subjects. UNDER PRESSURE As if

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were quarried, more than for Egypt’s Great Pyramid. Scholarship had declined in western Europe along with the Roman Empire and only partially recovered in Charlemagne’s France, but after 1000, teachers began clustering around the new cathedrals, setting up schools rather like those of the independent muftis in the Islamic

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.” Herding its squabbling princes normally cost more than the throne was worth, but all the same, whoever sat on the imperial throne was, in principle, Charlemagne’s heir—no small matter when rallying Europe against the Turk. Many observers foresaw only two alternatives for western Europe: conquest by Islam or subjugation

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you. He has raised you above all the kings and princes of Christendom to a power such as no sovereign has enjoyed since your ancestor Charlemagne. He has set you on the way toward a world monarchy, toward the uniting of Christendom under a single shepherd.” Had either the ambassador or

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–88. Ghosh 1992 gives a delightful personal account. Ninth-century Turkish slave armies: M. Gordon 2001. Seljuks: D. Morgan 1988. Islamic economies: A. Watson 1982. Charlemagne: Barbero 2004, Hodges and Whitehouse 1983, Verhulst 2002. Sypeck 2006 is an entertaining comparative account. The eighth-century West generally: Hansen and Wickham 2000. Expansion

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~ 1.8 kyr BP.” Journal of Geophysical Research 109 (2004), 10.1029/2003JD003787. Barber, Elizabeth. The Mummies of Ürümchi. New York: Norton, 1999. Barbero, Alessandro. Charlemagne: Father of a Continent. Berkeley: University of California Press, 2004. Barfield, Thomas. The Perilous Frontier: Nomadic Empires and China, 221 BC-AD 1757. Oxford: Blackwell

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of Europe. Oxford: Blackwell, 1990. ———. The Leopard’s Tale: Revealing the Mysteries of Çatalhöyük. London: Thames and Hudson, 2006. Hodges, Richard, and David Whitehouse. Mohammad, Charlemagne, and the Origins of Europe. London: Routledge, 1983. Hodos, Tamar. Local Responses to Colonization in the Iron Age Mediterranean. London: Routledge, 2006. Holcombe, Charles. In

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and a Serpent’s Tail: Ming China and the First Great East Asian War, 1592–1598. Norman: University of Oklahoma Press, 2009. Sypeck, Jeff. Becoming Charlemagne: Europe, Baghdad, and the Empires of A.D. 800. New York: Harper, 2006. Tetlock, Philip, and Aaron Belkin, eds. Counterfactual Thought Experiments in World Politics

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’an (China), 153, 289, 293n, 298–99, 305, 306, 321, 337–38, 340, 342, 355, 359, 377 Chariots of the Gods? (von Däniken), 182, 410 Charlemagne, 362–63, 370, 403n, 446 Charles V, Holy Roman Emperor, 446–49, 573 Chauvet Cave (France), 74–77, 79 Cheng, King, 230, 232 Chengdu (China

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China after 771 BCE, they were mere figure-heads. Emirs would normally mention the caliph in their Friday prayers but otherwise ignore him. *Charlemagne’s actual name was Carolus; Charlemagne is a Gallicized version of Carolus Magnus, “Charles the Great.” *Irene was a worthy rival to Theodora and Wu; she seized the

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not really the end of the Roman Empire: the last Byzantine outpost, at Trabzon, hung on until 1461, and the Holy Roman Empire founded by Charlemagne lingered on, in theory at least, until Napoleon disbanded it in 1806. But most historians follow Gibbon in drawing a line under the Roman Empire

The Power of Gold: The History of an Obsession

by Peter L. Bernstein  · 1 Jan 2000  · 497pp  · 153,755 words

explains why it was the Merovingian monarchs who led the way back to gold coinage in Europe after the fall of Rome. In 773-774, Charlemagne, Merovingian king of the Franks, conquered the Lombard kingdom outright and annexed it to his own empire. In return, the pope crowned him emperor of

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century AD via Egypt and Greece to satisfy the Roman demand for luxurious articles, but it was Charlemagne who launched the European art that has come down to us as the illuminated manuscript. Charlemagne insisted on the highest standard for books produced during his reign and gave primary responsibility for that task

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cleric, Alcuin of York. The most famous of the books produced under Alcuin's supervision were the Godescalc Gospels, which were written in 783 for Charlemagne, and the Saint-Methard Gospel Books, both of which now reside at the Bibliotheque Nationale in Paris. The SaintMethard books were written entirely in gold

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into a number of small kingdoms. Credit for this innovation goes to Offa (757-796), king of Mercia, a powerful ruler, and a contemporary of Charlemagne. Offa's domain extended through central England as far north as the Ouse and Trent Rivers around today's York and Manchester and as far

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network of more than seventy local mints spread around the country.9 In the year 800, not long after Offa had started minting his pennies, Charlemagne, king of the Franks and victor over the Lombards, traveled to Rome so that the pope could crown him emperor of the Holy Roman Empire

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as a reward. A short while earlier, in 798, Charlemagne and Emperor Irene of Byzantium had opened diplomatic relations; Charlemagne contemplated marriage with her, undeterred by Irene's lust for power. In view of Charlemagne's impending coronation, this would have been the greatest merger and acquisition in history

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. One of Irene's favorites frustrated the match, and two years later she was on her way to exile as a spinster. Charlemagne took the Byzantine emperors as his model by focusing on gold rather than silver. It was probably Irene who stimulated his interest in coinage, although

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he was also a friend and admirer of Offa. Charlemagne must have had much more gold available to him than other European rulers who either preceded or followed him for a long time afterward. He

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gold scepter, shield, and sword. Plundering gold from beaten enemies, as always, was important as a source of gold for these luxuries. For example, when Charlemagne defeated the Avars in 796, an Asian tribe who had founded the first Mongol empire in AD 407,1 he needed fifteen wagons, each pulled

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by four oxen, to carry the captured booty of gold and jewels." All that splendor would have been incomplete without a gold coinage. Charlemagne set his pound equal to twenty shillings and 240 pence and a pound weight of twelve ounces-like the Romans before him and like the

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system the English were later to follow. Charlemagne's coinage was to enjoy only a brief life span, however, despite the longevity of his system of denominations and weights.t2 His progeny spent

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limit that could not be breached without the introduction of new gold supplies from some source beyond Europe. Offa's silver coinage fared better than Charlemagne's gold coins, even though Offa's English kingdom also fragmented after his death. Offa's coins situated the penny as the core of the

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King Charles I of Spain through his mother, the daughter of Ferdinand and Isabella; he was also Charles V, emperor of the Holy Roman Empire (Charlemagne having been Charles I in that role). Generally known as Charles Quint at the time, he is most often referred to today as Charles V

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many amours, and observed that "A court without women is a year without spring and a spring without roses. 9121 In 1515, Francis followed in Charlemagne's footsteps in fighting the Lombards: he conquered northern Italy and was feasted by the pope. Francis now considered himself the most powerful monarch in

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stocks; in 1980, the $1.6 trillion invested in gold exceeded the market value of $1.4 trillion in U.S. stocks."' If only Croesus, Charlemagne, and Pizarro had lived to see such a triumphant march in the value of their precious gold! Nevertheless, the raw data exaggerate the happiness that

Germany

by Andrea Schulte-Peevers  · 17 Oct 2010

to Ulm’s Münster, while the Berliner Dom in Berlin claims to be Germany’s largest Protestant cathedral. Older than all by several centuries is Charlemagne’s octagonal palace chapel, now part of Aachen’s Dom. Fans of Romanesque architecture will hit the trifecta along the Rhine with the awe-inspiring

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War division, peaceful reunification and the country that we know today. * * * Two Lives of Charlemagne edited by Betty Radice is a striking biography of Charlemagne, beautifully composed by a monk and a courtier who spent 23 years in Charlemagne’s court. * * * Return to beginning of chapter TRIBES & THE ROMANS The early inhabitants of

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Carolingians, who introduced hierarchical Church structures. Kloster Lorsch in present-day Hesse is one fine relic of this era. From his grandiose residence in Aachen, Charlemagne (r 768–814), the Reich’s most important king, conquered Lombardy, won territory in Bavaria, waged a 30-year war against the Saxons in the

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were reshuffled in the 9th century, when attacks by Danes, Saracens and Magyars threw the eastern portion of Charlemagne’s empire into turmoil and four dominant duchies emerged – Bavaria, Franconia, Swabia and Saxony. Charlemagne’s burial in Aachen Dom (Aachen Cathedral; ) turned a court chapel into a major pilgrimage site (and it

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today). The Treaty of Verdun (843) saw a gradual carve-up of the Reich and, when Louis the Child (r 900–11) – a grandson of Charlemagne’s brother – died heirless, the East Frankish (ie German) dukes elected a king from their own ranks. Thus, the first German monarch was created. * * * The

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first rulers to promote a strong German identity were Charlemagne’s grandson, Louis the German (r 843–76), and Konrad I (r 911–18). * * * Return to beginning of chapter EARLY MIDDLE AGES Strong regionalism in

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, which hosted the coronation and burial of dozens of German kings from 936. Otto I was first up in the cathedral. In 962 he renewed Charlemagne’s pledge to protect the papacy and the pope reciprocated with a pledge of loyalty to the Kaiser. This made the Kaiser and pope strange

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’). * * * Under Friedrich I Barbarossa (r 1152–90), Aachen assumed the role of Reich capital and was granted its rights of liberty in 1165, the year Charlemagne was canonised. Meanwhile, Heinrich der Löwe (Henry the Lion), a Welf with an eye for Saxony and Bavaria, extended influence eastwards in campaigns to Germanise

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very good one. It grew out of the Frankish Reich, which was seen as the successor to the defunct Roman Empire. When Charlemagne’s father, Pippin, helped a beleaguered pope (Charlemagne would later do the same), he received the title Patricius Romanorum (Protector of Rome), virtually making him Caesar’s successor. Having

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retaken the papal territories from the Lombards, he presented them to the Church (the last of these territories is the modern Vatican state). Charlemagne’s reconstituted ‘Roman Empire’ then passed into German hands. The empire was known by various names throughout its lifetime. It formally began (for historians, at

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of Tours and stops the progress of Muslims into Western Europe from the Iberian Peninsula, preserving Christianity in the Frankish Reich. 773–800 The Carolingian Charlemagne, grandson of Charles Martel, answers a call for help from the pope. In return he is crowned Kaiser by the pope and under him the

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Roman Empire in 962 when Otto I is crowned Holy Roman Emperor by the pope, reaffirming the precedent established by Charlemagne. 1165 Friedrich I Barbarossa is crowned in Aachen; he canonises Charlemagne and later drowns while bathing in a river in present-day Turkey while co-leading the Third Crusade. 1241 Hamburg

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Central Council of Jews at www.zentralratdjuden.de (in German). * * * Return to beginning of chapter ARTS Literature EARLY LITERATURE Oral literature during the reign of Charlemagne (c 800) and secular epics performed by 12th-century knights are the earliest surviving literary forms, but the man who shook up the literary language

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beginning of chapter Architecture CAROLINGIAN TO ART NOUVEAU Among the grand buildings of the Carolingian period, Aachen’s Byzantine-inspired cathedral Click here – built for Charlemagne from 786 to about 800 – and Fulda’s Michaelskirche are surviving masterpieces. A century on, Carolingian, Christian (Roman) and Byzantine influences flowed together in a

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twin-bed rooms. * * * * * * WITCHES & WARLOCKS The Bodetal was first inhabited by Celts, whose fortresses were conquered by Germanic tribes and used for pagan rituals before Charlemagne embarked upon campaigns to subjugate and Christianise the local population during the 8th-century Saxon Wars. Harz mythology blends these pagan and Christian elements. One

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secret gatherings to carry out their rituals. They are said to have darkened their faces one night and, armed with broomsticks and pitchforks, scared off Charlemagne’s guards, who mistook them for witches and devils. In fact the name ‘Walpurgisnacht’ itself probably derives from St Walpurga, but the festival tradition may

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built to house the Wittelsbachs’ huge antique collection. Other highlights include the Ancestral Gallery, with portraits of the rulers of Bavaria including the great conqueror Charlemagne; the Schlachtensäle (Battle Halls); the Porcelain Chambers, containing 19th-century porcelain from Berlin, Meissen and Nymphenburg; and the Asian Collections, with precious Chinese and Japanese

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. The church owns two relics of enormous importance: branches that are thought to come from Christ’s crown of thorns, and a victory cross of Charlemagne, whose army overran much of Western Europe in the 9th century. In the Holy Chapel the votive candles, some of them over 1m tall, are

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billing. The works on display give an insight into the artist’s enormous prestige at the Holy Roman court; his commissions included portraits for emperors Charlemagne and Sigrimund, whose faces appeared on the doors of the imperial chambers. The artist’s celebrated Hercules Slaying the Stymphalian Birds confirms his superb grasp

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and a flash of mischief (Dürer put his own facial features on the Greek hero). The many other gems include Albrecht Altdorfer’s Victory of Charlemagne over the Avars near Regensburg, whose impossible detail tests the human eye. The museum’s main entrance is on Kartäusergasse, which is dominated by the

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in the area had a go at ruling Worms, including the Huns, the Alemans and finally the Franks, and it was under the Frankish leader, Charlemagne, that the city flourished in the 9th century. The most impressive reminder of Worms’ medieval heyday is its majestic, late-Romanesque Dom. A Jewish community

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. Must-sees include Cologne with its lofty Dom (cathedral), Bonn with its Beethoven legacy and fabulous museums, the Unesco-listed baroque palaces in Brühl, and Charlemagne’s imperial capital of Aachen. The lively Ruhrgebiet and placid Lower Rhine are best for off-beat experiences. There are historical cities such as Münster

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0241 / pop 246,000 The Romans nursed their war wounds and stiff joints in the steaming waters of Aachen’s mineral springs, but it was Charlemagne who put the city firmly on the European map. The emperor too enjoyed a dip now and then, but it was more for strategic reasons

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. Today, Aachen is still a quintessentially international city, not in the least because of its location in the border triangle with the Netherlands and Belgium. Charlemagne’s legacy lives on in the stunning Dom which, in 1978, became Germany’s first Unesco World Heritage Site. Aachen is also the birthplace of

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of Aachen’s magnificent cathedral ( 4770 9144; www.aachendom.de, in German; Münsterplatz; 7am-6pm Nov-Mar, 7am-7pm Apr-Oct). The burial place of Charlemagne, it’s where more than 30 German kings were crowned and where pilgrims have flocked since the 12th century. The oldest and most impressive section

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is Charlemagne’s palace chapel, the Pfalzkapelle, an outstanding example of Carolingian architecture. Completed in 800, the year of the emperor’s coronation, it’s an octagonal

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encircled by a 16-sided ambulatory supported by antique Italian pillars. The colossal brass chandelier was a gift from Emperor Friedrich Barbarossa during whose reign Charlemagne was canonised in 1165. Pilgrims have poured into town ever since that time, drawn in as much by the cult surrounding

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Charlemagne as by the prized relics – said to include Christ’s loincloth – that he had brought to Aachen. These are still displayed every seven years (next

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Christ’s Passion, and the jewel-encrusted gilded copper pulpit, both fashioned in the 11th century. At the far end is the gilded shrine of Charlemagne that has held the emperor’s remains since 1215. In front, the equally fanciful shrine of St Mary shelters the cathedral’s four premium relics

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. Unless you join a guided tour (adult/concession €3/2.50, 45 minutes), you’ll only catch a glimpse of Charlemagne’s white marble imperial throne in the upstairs gallery. Reached via six steps – just like King Solomon’s throne – it served as the coronation throne

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veritable mother lode of gold, silver and jewels. Focus your attention on the Lotharkreuz, a 10th-century processional cross, and the marble sarcophagus that held Charlemagne’s bones until his canonisation; the relief shows the rape of Persephone. RATHAUS The Dom gazes serenely over Aachen’s Rathaus ( 432 7310; Markt; adult

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50 life-size statues of German rulers, including the 30 kings crowned in town. It was built in the 14th century atop the foundations of Charlemagne’s palace of which only the eastern tower, the Granusturm, survives. Inside, the undisputed highlights are the Kaisersaal with its epic 19th-century frescoes by

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the rotating Drehturmcafe ( 10am-6pm). Get there by cutting north on Kupferstrasse from Ludwigsallee, then left on Belvedereallee. * * * * * * ROUTE CHARLEMAGNE In 2008 Aachen embarked on a multi-year project called Route Charlemagne to showcase its 1200-year tradition as a European city of culture and science. By 2012 a variety of themed

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, the carriage containing his coffin rolled all the way to Dortmund, stopping on the spot of the church. There’s a statue of him, opposite Charlemagne, at the entrance to the choir. Of outstanding artistic merit is the late-Gothic high altar (ask nicely in the sacristy for a close-up

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’s shortest river. About 200 springs surfacing in the Paderquellgebiet, a landscaped park in the city centre, spurt out an average of 5000L per second. Charlemagne used the royal seat and bishop-ric he had established here to control the Christianisation of the Saxon tribes. A visit by Pope Leo III

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in 799 led to the establishment of the Western Roman Empire, a precursor to the Holy Roman Empire, and Charlemagne’s coronation as its emperor in Rome the following year. Paderborn remains a pious place to this day – churches abound, and religious sculpture and motifs

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northwest, which hosts frequent cultural events in summer. East along Am Abdinghof to the north of the Dom are the remnants of the Carolingian Kaiserpfalz, Charlemagne’s palace where that historic meeting with Pope Leo took place. It was destroyed by fire and replaced in the 11th century by the Ottonian

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der Kaiserpfalz ( 105 110; Am Ikenberg 2; adult/concession €2.50/1.50; 10am-6pm Tue-Sun), which presents excavated items from the days of Charlemagne, including drinking vessels and fresco remnants. The only original palace building is the twee Bartholomäuskapelle ( 10am-6pm) next door. Consecrated in 1017, it’s considered

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developed near today’s centre from about 100 AD, and one settlement in particular that in 787 was given its own bishop’s seat by Charlemagne. In its earliest days, it was known as the ‘Rome of the North’ and developed as a base for Christianising Scandinavia. Despite this, it gradually

Europe: A History

by Norman Davies  · 1 Jan 1996

covers the period from Constantine to Thomas More in eight volumes.4 The German Handbuch der europâischen Geschichte (1968–79) covers the twelve centuries from Charlemagne to the Greek colonels in seven similarly weighty tomes.5 It is common practice to give greater coverage to the contemporary than to the ancient

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overseas empires, on the material prosperity of the EEC, and on the desire to limit the influence of the ‘Anglo-Saxons’. It looked back to Charlemagne, and forward to a federal Europe united under the leadership of its founding members. So long as the community confined its principal activities to the

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was the emblem of the Ascension. Throughout European history, the imperial eagle has been co-opted by rulers who claimed superiority over their fellow princes. Charlemagne wore an eagle-embossed cloak; and Canute the Great was buried in one.2 Both Napoleon I and Napoleon III used eagle symbolism with relish

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other had even begun. Constantine himself was no European. One must not forget the sequence of events. The span of time which separated Constantine from Charlemagne was greater than that which separated Constantine from Caesar and Augustus. It was equal to the span which encompasses the whole of modern history, from

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forced to turn to the Franks, and to embark on the enterprise of the ‘Papacy’. The Franks saw their chance to back the Pope. Indirectly, Charlemagne was the product of Muhammad (see below, pp. 284–90). According to Henri Pirenne, whose thesis shattered earlier conceptions as surely as Islam shattered the

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ancient world, ‘The Frankish Empire would probably never have existed without Islam, and Charlemagne without Mahomet would be inconceivable.’17 The arguments of Pirenne have been diminished on detailed points, especially regarding the alleged break in commercial relations. But

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they revolutionized the study of the transition from the ancient to the medieval worlds. To talk of Muhammad and Charlemagne, however, is not enough. Islam affected Eastern Europe even more directly than it affected Western Europe. Its appearance set the bounds of a new, compact

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prospect of choosing between the two dominant religions. Above all, it created the cultural bulwark against which European identity could be defined. Europe, let alone Charlemagne, is inconceivable without Muhammad. Christianity’s rivalry with Islam raised moral and psychological problems no less profound than those already existing between Christianity and Judaism

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onwards, faltering thoughts about a new political order were stimulated by continuing depredations from beyond the fringe of Christendom. The foundation of the Empire of Charlemagne in 800, of the Holy Roman Empire from 962, and eventually of the Tsardom of Moscow can only be understood in conjunction with the activities

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with the Ottoman Turks in the thirteenth (see p. 386). The story of their epic wanderings encompasses the whole span which in the West separated Charlemagne from the end of the Crusades. DING THE custom among Germanic tribes of holding popular assemblies was described by Tacitus: and there is little doubt

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of absolute monarchy, the tradition of local democracy may help to explain the strength of constitutionalism and representative government in modern times. The empire of Charlemagne consummated the alliance between the Roman Papacy and the growing kingdom of the Franks. It was an ephemeral affair, barely surviving its founder’s death

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and disappearing completely within a century. None the less, its impact was profound. Charlemagne, or Charles the Great (r. 768–814), great-grandson of Charles Martel, united the two halves of his forebears’ realm, Neustria and Austrasia, in

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, it was protected by the Christian buffer states which took root in Aragon and in the County of Barcelona. Relative security in the west gave Charlemagne and his successors the chance to turn their attention to problems elsewhere, notably in the east and in Italy, [MADONNA] The Franco-papal alliance

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, the Pope slipped an imperial crown on his head. The congregation acclaimed him ‘Caesar’ and ‘Augustus’, and the Pope knelt in homage before him. Einhard, Charlemagne’s biographer, claims that the coronation occurred spontaneously; in all probability it was carefully rehearsed. In terms of tradition it was entirely irregular: Pope Leo

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had no recognized right to confer the imperial title, and Charlemagne had no right to receive it. But it happened. Henceforth, there was a Catholic Emperor in the West independent of the Byzantine Empire. The barbaric

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insisted that he eat it whole, without removing the crust. Delighted, he promptly ordered two batches of Brie to be sent to Aachen every year. Charlemagne’s secretary, Einhard, recorded a similar incident four years later during the Saracen wars. Stopping in the district of Rouergue in the Midi, the King

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‘enclosures’ in the Burgundian vineyard at Aloxe-Corton, whose choicest Grand Cru white, ‘smelling of cinnamon and tasting of gunflint’, is still marketed as CORTON-CHARLEMAGNE.2 Brie de Meaux, one of France’s 500 listed cheeses, dates from the era of early monastic farming. After renneting and airing, the curd

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inherently credible in the fable for it to have persisted so long. Joan herself may not have been historical. But the fable certainly was.1 Charlemagne, however, was an energetic builder. He built palaces at Nijmegen, Engelheim, and Aachen. He bridged the Rhine at Mainz, and linked the tributaries of

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the Rhine and Danube with a canal, the Kaisergrab. He was the pioneer of romanesque architecture north of the Alps. By reputation, Charlemagne was also a great patron of learning. He himself, though a forceful orator, was illiterate. But he employed scholars of repute—Alcuin of York, Peter

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, and ballads. His lifestory, the Vita Karoli by Abbot Einhard, has been called ‘the first secular biography’. Not everyone is impressed: one historian has blamed Charlemagne for ‘saddling us with a literary tradition of derivative book-learning which hangs today like a millstone round the neck of our educational system’.3

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rewarded by canonization, though the process was obstructed for 351 years by reports that his sexual conquests were no less extensive than his territorial ones. Charlemagne died on 28 January 814. On his tomb in Aachen, since lost, a portrait was placed, and an inscription: Beneath this tomb lies the

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was the first European centralist. PFALZ AACHEN takes its name from the Roman spa of Aquisgranium, ‘Waters of Apollo-Granus’. Its warm, healing waters explain Charlemagne’s choice for the site of his favourite residence, the Kaiserpfalz. The French name, Aix-la-Chapelle, marks the famous chapel, now part of Aachen

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Cathedral, which Charlemagne added to his palace. Charlemagne’s chapel was completed in 805. It is a three-tiered octagon, built in the Byzantine style of San Vitale in Ravenna, which

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CONDIDIT, ESSE VELIT. Which Charles the Prince has founded on a solid base. The decoration of the chapel is heavy with the imperial symbolism which Charlemagne and his successors had revived in a new and naïve Christian setting. A mosaic inside the dome represents the Adoration of the Lamb. The ambo

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a casket of solid gold. It was surrounded by a collection of suitable relics—the loincloth of Christ, the Virgin’s girdle, a splinter of Charlemagne’s skull—all placed in precious reliquaries. Barbarossa himself donated a huge, wheel-shaped, iron chandelier, the ‘Crown of Lights’, which is suspended in

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Western Europe’s greatest memorial to a time when romanesque was a novelty, and when the centre of civilization still lay in the East.1 Charlemagne’s lifeblood had been the cement of the realm. His inheritance was immediately disputed by his son and grandsons. Repeated partitions ensured its early disintegration

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Verdun created the core of both the future Germany and the future France. The ‘Middle Kingdom’ was left a bone of eternal contention between them. Charlemagne’s ultimate legacy was not just the example of fragile unity but, equally, the prospect of unending strife, [KRAL] The feuding of the Carolingians or

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in Polish, korol’ in Russian. The Franks gave the Slavs their first model of Christian kingship. (Kral even means ‘king’ in Turkish.) In the West, Charlemagne was adopted as the presiding monarch of numerous medieval legends, the supreme hero of the chansons de geste.’1 Already in the ninth century, a

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monk of St Gall composed a largely fabulous chronicle, De Gestis Karoli Magni. Soon Charlemagne was to be portrayed by the troubadours as the ubiquitous champion of Christendom, swinging his sacred sword ‘Joyeuse’, smiting the infidel, riding at the head

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—Roland, Ganelon, Naimes of Bavaria, Ogier the Dane, Guillaume of Toulouse, Turpin the battling Archbishop of Reims. In the French tradition the ‘twelve peers’ of Charlemagne consisted of the three Dukes of Normandy, Burgundy, and Aquitaine, the three Counts of Champagne, Toulouse, and Flanders, and the six spiritual peers, the Bishops

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of Reims, Laon, Châlons, Beauvais, Langres, and Noyon. In the German legends Charlemagne was often said to be sleeping, waiting for the call to wake and save his beloved subjects from their ills. In the Bavarian tale he

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paid off the Vikings with 700 lb of silver and packed them off into Burgundy. In the British Isles, which had escaped the attentions of Charlemagne, the impact of the Vikings was particularly severe. The Danish invasions created divisions which persisted for 200 years. Egbert, King of Wessex, had been

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have a continuous existence. The leadership of the house of Capet inevitably turned the centre of gravity to the West. Of course, the memory of Charlemagne, and the claims to Lotharingia remained; but the kingdom had lost its essentially Frankish character. Contrary to later assertions, it was not involved in ceaseless

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in Asia Minor, and the Pechenegs before the walls of Constantinople combined to provoke the onset of irreversible decline, [BOGUMIL] In the three centuries after Charlemagne the frontiers of Christendom were greatly extended. The countries converted were (in the order of their conversion) Moravia, Bulgaria, Bohemia, Poland, Hungary, and Kievan Rus

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the early eleventh century. Henceforth, Rus’ was to be an unshakeable member of Christendom. [NOVGOROD] Volodymyr or Vladimir, Prince of Kiev, is frequendy likened to Charlemagne, creator of another vast but ephemeral realm.20 The parallel is apt enough, not least because both men became heroes of later national legends. Of

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Kievan heritage; and modern Russian propaganda has done everything in its power to suppress rival claims and traditions, notably among the Ukrainians. Meanwhile, just as Charlemagne was turned into the national hero of the chansons de geste, so the saintly ‘Prince Vladimir’ was turned into the central figure of medieval Russian

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had run for centuries until the Peace of Brussels in 1253. Her subjugation of the fierce inhabitants of Frisia or Friesland, who remained pagan until Charlemagne’s time, had been concluded more by the inundations of the sea than by successful conquest. Together with the excess population of the crowded Flemish

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lapsed. Moscow was free. By that time Ivan had started to refer to himself as ‘Tsar’ and ‘Samodyerzhets’—Russian equivalents of Caesar and Autokrator. Like Charlemagne almost 700 years before, a semi-barbarian prince was building his image not as the founder of a modern state, but rather as the reincarnator

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Valtellina rooted in the medieval wrangles between the Visconti dukes of Milan and the bishops of Chur. Not to be outdone, the French reckoned that Charlemagne had granted the Valtellina in perpetuity to the Abbey of St Denis. After 1620, the valley became the focus of Richelieu’s diplomacy with Venice

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village in the Eure-et-Loir, now suitably renamed in Proust’s honour ‘llliers-Combray’. Franco-German rivalry could be traced to the division of Charlemagne’s Empire; but its modern emanations were rooted in the Revolutionary Wars. Frenchmen remembered the two German powers, Prussia and Austria, as the invaders of

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. Roy Owen (London, 1972), 76. 17. Henri Pirenne, Mediaeval Cities: Their Origins and the Revival of Trade (Princeton, NJ, 1925), 27; also his Mahomet and Charlemagne (London, 1939). 18. Gibbon, Decline and Fall, ch. 23. 19. Historiae Ecclesiasticae Francorum, ii. 27, trans. J. H. Robinson in Readings in European History, i

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15th-century Provence. Louvre. Photo: © RMN. 16. ST AUGUSTINE. StAugustin etles patrons de Marchiennes (iith-cent.) miniature. Bibliothèque Municipale, Douai. Photo: Photo Giraudon. 17. ST CHARLEMAGNE. A. Dürer, Karl der Grosse (1512). Germanisches Nationalmuseum, Nuremberg. 18. ST MATTHEW. A full-page illumination on folio 25h of the Lindisfarne Gospels (late 7th

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(after an inscription in Athens, 4th century AD), (b) Late Byzantine Eagle, from the throne of Sophia Palaeologos, Grand Duchess of Moscow, c.1470. (c) Charlemagne’s Eagle, embroidered in silk on his cloak (9th century, after Frutiger). Centre: (d) The ‘Small Coat-of-Arms’ of the Russian Empire, 1914: crowned

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1944 Bohemia and Moravia XXXII SS-FPgD* 30 Januar 1945 Courland XXXIII WKD der SS*† (Ungarische No. 3) (disbanded) 1944 Hungarians XXXIII WGD der SS* Charlemagne (Französische No. 1) 1944 Lègion Volontaire Française XXXIV SS-FGD*† Landstorm Nederlands 1944 Dutch volunteers XXXV SS-GD† Polizei(No.2) 1944 (As SS-IV

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Chamberlain, Houston Stewart 817 Chamberlain, Neville 976, 987, 990, 995, 997 Channel Islands 1089 Chanson de Roland 255 Chaplin, Charles 958 Charity 778–9, 1029 Charlemagne, St 258, 298, 302–4, 305–6, 307, 326, 1207, 1239 Empire 298, 302, 1239 Charles I, Emperor of Austria 910, 921, 934 Charles

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Carolingians 298–309, 317, 1239, 1246 Christianity and 275–6 Merovingians 232, 234, 1246 Papacy and 284–90 under Clovis 232, 234, 276 (see also Charlemagne) Frazer, James 161–2 Frederick I, Barbarossa, Holy Roman Emperor 351 Frederick I, King of Denmark and Norway 553 Frederick II, Holy Roman Emperor 351

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Rome, AD 452 11. Eastern Orthodoxy 12. Western Monasticism 13. Constantine’s Donation 14. The Slavonic Liturgy 15. Catholic Pietism 16. St Augustine 17. St Charlemagne 18. St Matthew 19. St John the Baptist and Jerome 20. MatkaBoska 21. St John the Theologian 22. St Luke—Icon Painter 23. Bogorodica 24

The Narrow Corridor: States, Societies, and the Fate of Liberty

by Daron Acemoglu and James A. Robinson  · 23 Sep 2019  · 809pp  · 237,921 words

of the Carolingian dynasty that was created by Charles Martel in the early eighth century and greatly expanded by his grandson Charlemagne. By the time of his death in 814, Charlemagne had united into one state France, Belgium, the Netherlands, Germany, Switzerland, Austria, and northern Italy (see Map 8). Hincmar instructed Carloman

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how to rule over his kingdom by recounting how the kingdom had been run according to Adalhardus, a contemporary of Charlemagne and an eyewitness to how the state functioned then. Remarkably, this rule wasn’t going to involve the king exercising his unbridled wishes, but would

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and from both friends and enemies.” What Hincmar describes was the essence of the assembly politics of Germanic tribes, a remarkably participatory form of government. Charlemagne, and later Carloman, had to play by the rules of these assemblies, consult the wishes of a diverse cross section of (male) society, and secure

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a degree of consensus for their major decisions. Obviously, the number of people who could appear at such an assembly was limited, but Charlemagne deployed messengers to relate the findings to lower-level meetings so that the whole kingdom was informed. This participation is the first blade of the

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and political institutions of the Franks. The significance of the way the Salic Law was formulated is evident once we get to the reign of Charlemagne, who reached the apogee of the Roman connection by crowning himself emperor in Rome on Christmas Day 800. All the same

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like a Roman emperor when it came to his relations with his people. The same assemblies, customs, and expectations that shackled Clovis’s reign constrained Charlemagne too. Two royal edicts issued at Regensburg in 789 indicate that agents of the state were misusing their power and the king received complaints from

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fully to rights.” Here missus refers to “sent men,” royal agents who linked the provinces with the central court. What about liberty? Though Clovis and Charlemagne led states that had entered into the corridor, one wouldn’t see many signs of flourishing liberty in their empires. These were turbulent times where

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feudal order that the Normans had adopted in France and William exported to England was a consequence of the fragmentation of the Frankish state after Charlemagne. The central state weakened in the face of the power of local lords, and a new state structure based on a series of hierarchical relationships

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no state building. During another epoch with different circumstances, with different contingencies at critical points and perhaps with less skillful political actors than Clovis and Charlemagne attempting to fuse them, even the two blades together might have failed to balance each other in the same way. But during the tumultuous fifth

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building in this case predates the military revolution. Switzerland was historically part of the Holy Roman Empire, the successor institution to the eastern part of Charlemagne’s Carolingian Empire. The empire still had an emperor, but it had fragmented into many small and relatively independent polities, and the emperor was actually

…

division that rocked Italy. The communes, you will recall, were nominally part of the Holy Roman Empire, the successor state to the eastern part of Charlemagne’s Carolingian Empire, which he had divided between his sons. Though the communes had gained their de facto independence, there were still those who supported

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Cerna y Cerna, Vicente, 299 Cetshwayo, King, 81 chaebol, 456 Chamars, 249–50 Champagne fairs, 128, 135–36 Chandragupta Maurya, 237–38 Chang Shang, 212 Charlemagne, 154, 155, 163, 170, 199, 269, 417 Charles I, King of England, 188 Charles II, King of England, 280 Charles of Anjou, King of Sicily

The Eternal City: A History of Rome

by Ferdinand Addis  · 6 Nov 2018

dream that had been born in Rome a century earlier: the imperial dream of Charles the Great, king of the Franks, known to history as Charlemagne. Of all the Germanic states that had emerged from the ruin of the Roman empire in the west, it was the kingdom of the Franks

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new religion, Islam. At the Battle of Tours, in AD 732, it was Franks who finally halted the Muslim advance into Europe – Franks led by Charlemagne’s grandfather, Charles ‘the Hammer’ Martel. Rome, up until those years, had remained under the precarious authority of the eastern emperors in Constantinople – ‘Roman emperors

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king. His son, Charles, was determined to be even greater. And so indeed he proved. By the time of his death in AD 814, Charles – Charlemagne – had established the largest dominion western Europe had seen since the fall of the Roman empire, a territory that encompassed most of modern France, Germany

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and Italy, stretching from the Elbe to the Pyrenees. With vast territory came vast ambition: Charlemagne had a vision, a dream of power that was not just the power of the mailed fist and the lance. He was not content merely

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to be a warlord. Frankia, in Charlemagne’s dream, was a new Israel. Charlemagne himself was David or Josiah, a holy monarch, set on high by the Lord to lead his people to a new state

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stations as the choirs of angels and saints in paradise took their places before God. A perfect kingdom should practise a perfect Christianity. ‘Exert yourselves,’ Charlemagne commanded his clerics in AD 789, ‘to bear the erring sheep back within the walls of the ecclesiastical fortress… lest the wolf who lies in

…

fragmentation. Christianity in Ireland, for example, isolated even before the empire fell, developed in a quite different way to Christianity in Frankia or Visigothic Spain.† Charlemagne, conqueror of many nations, found many incompatible Christianities practised by his subjects. To bring these into order – to build his perfect kingdom, in other words

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from Germany to Spain, some religious authority had to be found that would transcend the merely national. There was only one answer. Charlemagne turned to Rome. In AD 774, Charlemagne’s armies wrapped up the conquest of the Lombard kingdom of Italy. It was surprisingly straightforward; no army could stand against the

…

into border regions or marches, each with its own margrave, appointed by the king. With the Lombards pacified, an intense two-way traffic began between Charlemagne’s court at Aachen and the city of Rome. Heading north were clerics and scholars, even choirmasters to teach the Franks the latest Roman modes

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from the Lombards were now put firmly into papal possession. The pope could now count himself among the wealthiest magnates in Charlemagne’s kingdom. These gifts did not mean, however, that Charlemagne in any way acknowledged the pope as his superior, or even as an equal. Popes had been trying to establish

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this world is ruled: ‘the sacred authority of the priests and the royal power. Of these that of the priests is the more weighty.’ But Charlemagne was no believer in the separation of church and state, and far less would he have accepted the idea that the pope might be in

…

still at best, as one historian has put it, no more than Charlemagne’s ‘senior vice president for prayer’. Supreme authority, both temporal and spiritual, would always rest with Charlemagne himself. This was not a novel conception. On the contrary, Charlemagne had only to look east across the Adriatic Sea to find a

…

model: the Byzantine emperor. And indeed, if you thought about it – as Charlemagne doubtless did – there was something absurd about the contrast between that emperor, with his tiny rump state on the Bosphorus, and the king of the

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lands extended beyond the dreams of the ancient Caesars. This was easily put right. On Christmas Day, AD 800, in the Basilica of St Peter, Charlemagne announced to the world, as if there were any possibility of confusion, what sort of place he really regarded himself as having in God’s

…

holy scheme. There, before the assembled magnates of Frankia, Lombardy and Rome, the deacons and subdeacons, the bishops of suburbicarian sees arranged by rank, Charlemagne was crowned with gold and precious gems and the pope bowed down and prostrated himself before him, and all the grandees and the people together

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pope in the Lateran ninety-seven years later. Nonetheless, the currents of history flowed towards that grim spring day like water to a plughole, as Charlemagne’s dream of empire rushed to its own undoing. The problem was that in those days of the Early Middle Ages, it was hard, if

…

the Carolingians had enjoyed smooth successions from a strong king to a dominant son who was able quickly and effectively to eliminate any rivals. After Charlemagne, the pattern held for one generation more. Louis the Pious was crowned by his father as co-emperor at Aachen in AD 813, and succeeded

…

Charlemagne as sole ruler of the Frankish empire the year after. By the 830s AD, however, the empire was being pulled apart by Louis’s sons.

…

When Louis died in AD 840, Charlemagne’s great empire was divided between them, in shares corresponding very roughly to Germany, Italy and France. The grandsons and great-grandsons of

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Charlemagne were soon locked in an endless struggle for supremacy. To win the support of important magnates in their bids for power, they traded away the

…

popes in Rome were once again abandoned. Worse than abandoned. In a pool of post-imperial sharks, the papacy, fattened with estates and revenues by Charlemagne’s generosity, now found itself the plumpest fish. By the end of the ninth century, half the great magnates in Italy, descendants of

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Charlemagne’s Frankish lords, were queuing up to bite off chunks of papal territory for themselves. Pope Formosus, before he became a horror story, had been

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corpse was carried to its final resting place, the images of the saints on the walls are said to have bowed their heads in sorrow. Charlemagne’s empire was a shattered ruin. The papacy, which was meant to raise that empire up to God, had been debased by the ambitions of

…

, Marozia could have her son, Pope John XI, crown Hugh emperor. Hugh was, on his mother’s side, a very distant descendant of Charlemagne; perhaps Marozia hoped that Charlemagne’s imperial dream could be resurrected, with Marozia herself triumphant at the new emperor’s side. Things turned out quite otherwise: ‘At the

…

the little lights of people sheltering under the arches. All in all, the city could make a bleak impression. The English scholar Alcuin, visiting with Charlemagne, had been moved to verse: ‘Roma caput mundi, mundi decus, aurea Roma / nunc remanet tantum saeva ruina tibi’ – ‘Rome, the world’s capital, world’s

…

the north, after generations of political disorder, the lords of East Frankia and Germany had finally produced a leader fit to inherit the ambitions of Charlemagne. In AD 962 King Otto I ‘the Great’ of Germany arrived in Rome to be anointed emperor. At his side was his formidable wife Adelheid

…

, in his ecclesiastical guise as Pope John XII, had to bite down his pride and place the imperial crown on the German’s head. Like Charlemagne, Otto was building a holy empire, and he needed a co-operative bishop in Rome to help him do it. Octavian – a mere boy, and

…

and grandson, three ruling emperors. Their heartland was the duchy of Saxony, the flat land where the Weser and the Elbe meet the North Sea. Charlemagne long ago had brought Christianity to the Saxons with spear and sword, and over the centuries that followed the dukes of Saxony transmitted the Good

…

the other half-dozen great families of medieval Rome were never far behind. The empire, as Otto III inherited it, was a fragile creation. Under Charlemagne, the great territorial ranks – duke, count, margrave and so on – were positions handed out by the monarch himself to his loyal followers; by the time

…

at the Lateran was believed to be not the pagan Marcus Aurelius but the Christian Constantine. ¶ Octavian may also have been a distant descendant of Charlemagne through his mother Alda, daughter of Alberic’s old enemy, Hugh of Provence. # Otto III of Rome, Saxony and Italy, servant of the Apostles, by

…

by German manners, by the richness of the land, the splendour of the churches. They walked in the footsteps of Christian emperors, the successors to Charlemagne. In the forest south of Paderborn, they passed the place where Sigurd killed the dragon Fafnir with his magic sword, Gram. They remember the hardships

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given it the backing it needed to flourish there. In doing so, they had thought to emulate the founder of the renewed empire, the great Charlemagne. They, as much as anyone, wanted a church that was powerful, dignified and respectable. Such a church would reflect its glory on to the emperors

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position that it could start re-asserting control over the lands of the old papal principality – the central Italian territories granted to the pope by Charlemagne. City families, the Frangipani especially, started chipping away at the once impregnable holdings of the counts of Tusculum. Meanwhile, the pope led a Roman militia

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Italian peninsula, an imperial scribe at the court at Ravenna copied the old scroll, adding his signature. Three hundred years after that, the Frankish emperor Charlemagne set his cathedral schools to work preserving ancient documents. At the monastery of St Germanus, in Burgundy, a Benedictine scholar, Heiric of Auxerre, added his

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Celentano, Adriano 582 Cellini, Benvenuto 421–2, 423 Celsius 230 Celts see Gauls/Celts Cenci, Vicolo 533 Ceres, goddess 48 Ceri, Renzo da 419–20 Charlemagne 251, 254–9, 260, 266, 268, 271, 273, 304, 309 Charles (‘Bonnie Prince Charlie’) 460 Charles IV, Holy Roman Emperor 338 Charles ‘the Hammer’ Martel

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Top 10 Prague

by Schwinke, Theodore.

Buzz: The Nature and Necessity of Bees

by Thor Hanson  · 1 Jul 2018  · 317pp  · 79,633 words

Empty Planet: The Shock of Global Population Decline

by Darrell Bricker and John Ibbitson  · 5 Feb 2019  · 280pp  · 83,299 words

Superpower Interrupted: The Chinese History of the World

by Michael Schuman  · 8 Jun 2020

Lawrence in Arabia: War, Deceit, Imperial Folly and the Making of the Modern Middle East

by Scott Anderson  · 5 Aug 2013

Under a White Sky: The Nature of the Future

by Elizabeth Kolbert  · 15 Mar 2021  · 221pp  · 59,755 words

Lonely Planet Western Balkans

by Lonely Planet, Peter Dragicevich, Mark Baker, Stuart Butler, Anthony Ham, Jessica Lee, Vesna Maric, Kevin Raub and Brana Vladisavljevic  · 1 Oct 2019  · 990pp  · 250,044 words

The Passenger: Paris

by AA.VV.  · 26 Jun 2021  · 199pp  · 62,204 words

The Treason of the Intellectuals

by Julien Benda  · 14 Oct 2006  · 190pp  · 63,975 words