Chapter I - Frankish Imperialism I: The Merovingian Kingdoms
The new situation in the West after the disappearance of the Western Roman Empire around 476 is described. Germanic tribes established kingdoms on all the territory of the former empire.
In Vol. XV, Chapter II, it was described how the Byzantine Emperor Justinian I (527-565) made an attempt to reconquer the Germanic West. Only Italy, North Africa, and the extreme south-west of Spain were added to the Byzantine Empire, while a great part of Italy went lost to the Langobards in and after 568.
The Frankish tribes lived in the north of France, in Belgium and in the southern Netherlands. One of these tribes was that of Salian Franks that lived in the north-west of France, around Tournai (Doornik). Their kings are called the Merovingians. Their first powerful king was Clovis (481-511). He was baptized, together with most of his people around 496, which gave his tribe an ascendancy over all other Germanic tribes, which were Arian. Clovis was a great conqueror; he occupied almost all of France and a part of western Germany on both sides of the Rhine, onto the Neckar.
After his death his realm was, according to the Frankish custom, divided among his four sons. Two of these sons conquered Burgundy (the south-east of France) between them. The later Merovingians often quarrelled and even waged war against one another. Sometimes great and bloody battles were fought. The main parts of the Merovingian realm were Neustria (north-west France) and Austrasia (north-east France and the western part of Germany); they were fiercely opposed to each other, the beginning of the Franco-German hostility. Sometimes there was one common ruler, but never for long. The last Merovingian kings are called the rois fainėants, the ineffective kings.
These last Merovingian kings had a kind of prime minister, the mayor of the palace; in the later seventh and the eighth century they were the real rulers; their office even became hereditary. After 687 there was only one mayor of the palace for the whole Frankish realm. They were of the Carolingian House. A very powerful man was Charles Martel (719-741), who defeated the invading Arabs in 741. His son Pepin III the Short deposed the last Merovingian in 751.
(length of this chapter + notes = 26 pp.)
Chapter II - Frankish Imperialism II: The Carolingian Empire
Pepin the Short was mayor first (741-751) and king later (751-786). The north of Italy was in the hands of the Germanic Arian tribe of the Langobards or Lombards. Since they continuously threatened Rome, Pope Stephen II appealed to Pepin for help. The king came with an army and defeated the Lombards; he then presented the so-called Exarchate of Ravenna (the region from Ravenna to Rome, which was Byzantine territory) to the Pope. This was the beginning of the Papal States and the temporal power of the Popes.
In 768 Pepin the Short was succeeded by his two sons Charles – Charlemagne – and Carloman, who died in 771; this made Charlemagne sole king of the Franks. In 772 the Lombards again attacked Rome; Pope Hadrian I asked Charlemagne to help him. This led to the second Frankish invasion of Lombardy. The Frankish king brought the Pope to Rome and then besieged the Lombard capital, which he captured. The conquered Lombardy was not annexed by the Franks, but became a personal union with the Kingdom of the Franks, since Charlemagne became King of Lombardy.
Bavaria had earlier nominally acknowledged Frankish suzerainty, but since Bavarian nationalism was strong, it behaved as an independent state under its Duke Tassilo III. This duke did not conceive of himself as a Frankish vassal. Charlemagne then sent his armies into Bavaria and forced the Duke to become a vassal indeed. Later Tassilo was deposed and Bavaria was annexed by the Franks.
Charlemagne also campaigned against the Arabs in Spain. His first attempt to make headway south of the Pyrenees dismally misfired in 778. A second attempt, made after 793, was more successful; Barcelona became Frankish. The conquered territory consisted of the region between the Ebro and the Pyrenees, the so-called `Spanish March’.
The last Germanic tribe in western Europe that was still independent were the Saxons; they were still pagans. Charlemagne’s war against them began in 772 and lasted some thirty years; it was fought with incredible fierceness and great cruelty. The Saxons under the ladership of Widukind offered tough resistance, and Charlemagne resorted to mass deportations. In 804 Saxony’s will to resistance was definitely broken; it became a part of the Frankish kingdom.
Charlemagne was the mightiest ruler in the western half of Europe now. On Christmas Day 800 Pope Leo III crowned him as emperor in the St.Peter’s in Rome. The Roman Empire was supposed to have been resurrected, and Charlemagne was seen as the successor of the Roman emperors. Imperial coronations henceforward had to take place in Rome and be performed by the Pope. Charlemagne died in 814 in his Pfalz in Aachen.
He was succeeded by his only son Lewis I the Pious (814-830), crowned as emperor in 817. The times of aggrandizemnt of the empire were over; Lewis’s reign was characterized by the troubles with his sons, which often led to open warfare. He stipulated that his empire would be divided after his death among his three sons, Lothar, who would be the emperor, Pepin I and Lewis the German. When Lewis’s first wife had died, he married the Bavarian princess Judith, who gave him a son, Charles (the Bald) in 823. At her instigation the emperor made a new regulation for the succession in which he reserved a place for the little son.
This new ordination led to a revolt of the sons against the father; Lewis had to rescind the later regulation, so that young Charles would have no part of the empire. Later troubles led to a still deeper humiliation of the emperor; in 833 he was formally deposed. The way he was treated led to a reversal of his fate; a wide-spread revolt led to his reinstatement as emperor in 835. Charles would even have a part of the inheritance. During Lewis’s last years the sons fought one another.
This fighting went on after Lewis’ s death in 840, until the contestants concluded a final agreement in 843 in the Treaty of Verdun. Charles got the western part of the Empire, mainly what is now France; Lewis the German got the eastern part, mainly what is now Germany; Lothar I was to be the emperor and would reign the middle kingdom, which comprised the Low Countries, Alsace and Lorraine, Burgundy and the Provence, and Lombardy. This Treaty is commonly seen as the historical origin of France and Germany. When Lothar I died in 855, the middle kingdom was divided again, namely, Lotharingia (after Lothar II), Burgundy-Provence, and Lombardy, whose king Lewis II became the fourth emperor.
There was often fighting between the later Carolingians; when one died, the others fought over his inheritance. In the Treaty of Meerssen in 870 the heritage of Lothar II was divided among Lewis the German and Charles the Bald, King of France. Lewis got the Low Countries and Alsace-Lorraine. After the death of the Emperor Lewis II an initiative of the Pope made Charles the Bald emperor. After his death in 877 the emperorship lost ever more of its importance; for longer periods there was not even an emperor. The empire was for the last time united during the reign of Charles the Fat (881-887), one of the German Carolingians. After his death the Carolingian began to crumble apart. The last German Carolingian died in 911; Germany then went its own way.
In France Carolingian rule lasted longer, although here too Carolingian were ever less certain of their cause. After the death of the very last Carolingian, Louis V, in 987, a new royal house, that of the Capet, came to the throne.
(length of this chapter + notes) = 121 pp.)
Chapter III - The Ottonian Empire
The last Carolingian king of Germany, Lewis III the Child, was succeeded by Conrad I (911-918), the Duke of Franconia, whose mother was a Carolingian. He did not make a great impression; after his death the dukes elected the Duke of Saxony, Henry I the Fowler (919-936) as their king. With him the Saxon House came to the throne (919-1024). German kings usually wanted to be strong rulers, but the dukes did not want strong rulers. Henry had to fight to consolidate his position. His prestige grew when he regained Lower Lotharingia, which had fallen into French hands; this bound the Low Countries for centuries to come to Germany.
After his father’s death Otto I the Great became king (936-973). He too had to fight for his position; he had problems especially with Bavarian particularism. Then there were problems with his son Liudolf, who feared for his position as the designated successor, when Otto had a son, also called Otto (II), from his second marriage.
In Italy anarchy prevailed. A late Carolingian, the ambitious Berengar II, ruled Lombardy as king; he had the widow of a former king, Adelheid, the head of the anti-Berengar party, imprisoned. She appealed for help to Otto; he came with an army, defeated Berengar, married Adelheid, and was crowned as King of Italy in 751. This meant that Germany and Italy were now bound to each other.
Germany was for long years harassed by the Hungarians, pagans, who made plundering raids to deep into Germany and even farther. Otto, with the first all-German army, defeated them on the Lechfeld near Augsburg in 955. This victory made him the most important and prestigious ruler of Europe. This inevitably led to his coronation as emperor in Rome in 963; he was now the successor of Charlemagne and through him of the Roman emperors.
Otto I found the Roman Church in a bad shape. The Popes of the tenth century were the stooges of Roman aristocratic factions and often unworthy men. The worst was John XII, who crowned Otto. The new emperor had him deposed not long after his coronation and looked to it that a better man was elected. He stipulated that no Pope might assume his office without his assent. This doubtless gave the Church worthier pontiffs, but it also gave the temporal rulers of Germany essential influence on the choice of Popes. This would lead to hard struggle with the Church.
After the death of Otto the Great his son Otto II succeeded him (973-983) (Liudolf had died earlier). He was married to a Byzantine princess, Theophano; he was already emperor, when he ascended to the throne. Just as his predecessors he had his problems with Bavarian particularism. There was also a French invasion of Germany, which brought the French even to Aachen. France was never a part of the German Empire and was always afraid of the German pretensions to supremacy.
The Italian policy was a constant in the German policy of the Middle Ages and after. German kings and emperors found that Italy should be one; they even hardly tolerated the existence of the Papal States. They needed Italy, because they needed Rome and they needed Rome, because they had to be crowned emperor there. South Italy were Byzantine territory then. In 982 Otto II began a war with the Byzantines; he invaded South Italy, met initially with success, but was then defeated by Saracen troops coming from Sicily. He made a narrow escape and had to abandon his plans to conquer South Italy. He died in Rome in 983.
He was succeeded by his half-Byzantine son Otto III (983-1002); he was still too young to rule, which brought the Ottonian dynasty into great danger, for there were many rivals. It was saved with difficulty. In 995 anarchy again reigned in Rome. Otto III went there, found two Popes contesting the see of St.Peter, deposed them both, and virtually nominated another one. Otto III conceived of himself as a Roman emperor, rather than as a German king; he adopted the style of the Byzantine court. This did not make him popular in his home country; he was too often away to Italy. Yet he was not very welcome in Rome either; the Romans did not love those German rulers. In 1001 he came to fight for the possession of the city, but was unable to take it. He died in Italy in 1002.
Since there was no offspring, the succession posed a problem. The Duke of Bavaria, Henry III, felt he had the best chances, since he was the greatgrandson of Henry I the Fowler; by cleverly manoeuvring he became king indeed as Henry II (1002-1024). The new king had to fight a short civil war against the Duke of Swabia.
In Rome the aristocratic factions were fighting again for the possession of the papacy. In 1014 Henry II arrived there, where he was crowned as emperor. The presence of German troops in the city led to bloody incidents with the Romans. Henry had the same grandiose imperial plans as his predecessors; he wanted to unite all Italy under his sceptre, which inevitably meant war with the Byzantines in South Italy. In 1021 he marched with a large army to Italy. Occupied some towns in the south, but had to return soon, since disease ravaged his German troops.
Henry II died on July, 13, 1024 in Bamberg; since he had no offspring, his death meant the end of the Saxon House.
(length of this chapter + notes = 75 pp.)
Vol. XVI has XLI + 262 pp. and contains a Preface, a Manual of the fields of interests in Vols. I-XV, seven maps, five genealogical tables, three chronological tables, a Bibliography and a General Index.
Published in 2001 by Gopher Publishers.
ISBN 90-76953-16-3