Charlemagne, Father of Europe
Angela N. Goodwin
Dr. Tullock
March 3, 2017
HUMA1301-S15
Charlemagne, Father of Europe
Charlemagne, the Holy Roman Emperor of Medieval Europe, was perhaps the single most significant figure in the advancement of the united European peoples because he skillfully and patiently reinforced the power and influence of the Roman Catholic Church among pagan factions and brought civic order through education, judicial laws and central government reform in a time of schism within Eastern and Western religious power and a time of emergence from tribal and feudal control in the Dark Ages. Rising as a son of a former Mayor of the Palace, Charlemagne expanded his empire to all possible limits and successfully undermined Byzantine authority in the East while limiting Islamic growth in Moorish Spain and France. He soothed feudal Lords by supporting their privilege while concurrently bridling their control with newly imposed public laws and restructuring. He defended the Christian faith and promoted its growth, albeit sometimes rather violently, all the while subjugating the Popes into dependence upon his military and political prowess. Although the Emperor, it is said, could not write his own name, he established the framework for public education and sowed the seeds among academia for the return to classical thought and the coming Renaissance. Perhaps most noteworthy of his achievements which has yet to be seriously duplicated (I do not accept the mostly military rule of Napoleon and Hitler) is Charlemagne’s triumph of uniting the French, the Germans, the Italians, the Dutch, the Belgians, the Austrians, the Hungarians and sundry smaller cultures into one united Europe. As a monarch and head of the Carolingian dynasty, he was able to defy the historical pitfall of family power mongering among his antecedents (with the exception of his hunchback son who he quickly subdued and sent off to end his days as a lonely monk) by fairly and decisively planning for his demise and exit from sovereignty.
In his biography, Charlemagne, author Matthias Becher attempts to reveal the hidden man and to detail accomplishments and downfalls while synchronously detailing life and historical timelines of the early Medieval world. Becher, professor of Medieval History at the University of Bonn, not only describes Charlemagne’s conquests among the various Germanic tribes, fragmented Saxons, Lombards, Eastphalians, Westphalians, Bavarians and Avars, he highlights the Emperor’s genius decision to establish bishoprics throughout the land complete with solid stone churches and cathedrals. This religious framework, under the guise of unifying the Christian population actually instituted central order and growth of national settlements and provided an aqueduct through which trade, judicial control, education and civil law could flourish. Dr. Becher’s work is at odds with Charlemagne’s official biographer, Einhard, who penned Vita Karoli Magni some ten years after the emperor’s death and who was his friend and contemporary. Becher takes care to avoid praising and presenting a magnanimous Charlemagne who had an almost loving cult following after his death, especially in France and Germany. Matthias Becher, rather, presents a ruler who was strong-willed, sometimes narcissistic, power hungry notwithstanding his resolve, devotion and sincere desire for positive reform. This biographer attempts to show us a human Holy Roman Emperor.
Charlemagne by Matthias Becher illuminates the Dark Ages and the challenges faced by a unified, Christian Europe. Geographically, Europe lived under a feudal system and distinct European nations had yet to be solidified. Rather, mighty tribes and established “Kingdoms or Duchies” were constantly vying for territory. The Roman Catholic Church had a re-established See in the holy city of the Vatican (Rome, Italy) although seated power had split into Western and Eastern divisions (after Constantine) with real, philosophical and theological differences dividing believers. From 300-700 after C.E., the Byzantine Church in Constantinople retained authority over the choice of the Popes. It also dominated church decisions for a good millennium afterwards since Byzantium became the launching point of the Crusades in which so many European troops and wealth were poured. Judicial and civil law was a veritable hodge-podge of tribal, nationalistic and church law. More importantly, people living in what is now called Europe saw themselves as not obligated to any central authority and were ignorant of and supposedly not bound to obey a central sovereign ruler. Enforcement of any said laws threatened to divide a precariously united empire. Feudal Lords held the reins to local power and loyalty to them was primary because so many people’s security and livelihood depended on them. Either by choice or by coercion, Europe was now Christian. Organizing a church hierarchy and establishment that descended to the smallest hamlet with consistent order throughout the empire was a daunting task. Education in an era without printed books or the freedom for any but clergy to delve into scholarly texts was the needed impetus for Europeans to emerge from darkness into light. For trade, revenue and investment, fiscal uniformity with established measures and coinage would be required to allow growth and safety in the boundaries of this realm. Lastly, and evidently, one language would unify a splintered patchwork of culturally divided people. Add to this a uniformed style of writing (the Carolingian miniscule) which would facilitate communication between all peoples and, which would become the foundation for our alphabet today.