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CHARLEMAGNE
Painting by Albrecht Dürer.
THE LIFE OF
CHARLEMAGNE
(CHARLES THE GREAT)
By THOMAS HODGKIN, D.C.L.
WITH NOTES
By HENRY KETCHAM
A. L. BURT COMPANY, ❦ ❦ ❦ ❦
❦ ❦ ❦ PUBLISHERS, NEW YORK
Copyright, 1902,
By E. A. BRAINERD.
iii
PREFACE.
In attempting to compress the history of the greatEmperor Charles within the narrow limits of thepresent volume, I have undertaken a difficult task,and I trust that my fellow-historians will consider,not how much has been omitted, but how much, orrather how little, it was possible to insert.
It may be thought that I might have gained spaceby proceeding at once to the beginning of Charles’sown reign instead of devoting more than eightypages to his predecessors, but this did not seem tome possible. The great Emperor was the last termof an ascending series—nobles, mayors of the palace,kings; and in order to understand the law of theseries it is absolutely necessary to study some of itsearlier members....
A few words as to our authorities. For the periodbefore the accession of Pippin our chief authorityis the chronicle which is known by the name ofFredegarius, very meagre, and written in barbarousLatin, but honest; then a still more miserable continuationof this work by an unknown scribe; andlastly, a much better performance, from a literarypoint of view, The Lives of the Bishops of Metz, byPaulus Diaconus.
ivFor the reigns of Pippin and of Charles the Greatwe have fairly satisfactory materials in the shape ofthe Annals, which now began to be kept at variousmonasteries; chief among them the Annales Laurissensesmajores, so-called from their connection, realor supposed, with the great monastery of Lorsch (inHesse-Darmstadt, about ten miles east of Worms).So extensive, however, is the knowledge of Stateaffairs possessed by this writer that it is the opinionof Professor Ranke, and of most modern inquirers,that he cannot have been a mere monk writing hischronicle in a convent, but that we have here in factthe chronicles of the Frankish kingdom. This viewis to some extent confirmed by the fact that thereis a fuller recension of them in a more literary form,which bears the name of Annales Finhardi, and thusprofesses to be the work of Charles’s friend andsecretary. The precious Vita Caroli, from the penof the same writer, is described in the followingpages.
The writers who in mo