The Charlemagne's Organized System

The family’s rise began with Charles Martel, Charlemagne’s grandfather. Charles was a leader in the military and a statesman who lead the Frankish warriors against the Muslims in the Battle of Tours. He founded the Carolingian Empire and sped up feudalism. This stopped the spread of Islam into Europe because Martel wanted Europe to remain Roman Catholic.

Einhard (c. 770-840) was a renowned monk, scholar, and writer of Frankish descent. Although regarded highly for many achievements, the most important contribution of his lifetime was the uncharacteristically secular Life of Charlemagne, which has since become a topic of great discussion and scrutiny. Many contemporary historians criticize Einhard’s biography about the mighty Frankish ruler on the basis that it seems to be biased towards painting a near perfect picture of Charlemagne’s reign as king and eventually emperor. There definitely seems to be a one sided view present, taking into consideration some of the opening statements Einhard prefaces his biography with: “Charles, that most excellent and deservedly most famous king,” and, “Here

After having read both versions of the life of Charlemagne there is no doubt that they differ greatly in the sense of style, audience, and emotion. By reading these two descriptions of Charlemagne's life we are able to decipher somewhat of the life he led as a shaper of early medieval European history. However, both of these versions possess the admiration of a noble man who they believe is worthy enough to be noted in history to some degree.

Known as The King of the Franks, Charlemagne inherited half of his father’s kingdom at his death in AD 768 and took over the other half at his brother’s death in AD 771. In keeping with the tradition of his predecessors, Charlemagne’s reign was characterized by three decades of military campaigns. During his reign, Charlemagne led campaigns against the Saxons, the Lombards, Spain and Bavaria. His empire extended from Saxony in the North to the Spanish March in the South and Italy in the West. Charlemagne was officially named as the first Roman Emperor by the Pope in late AD 800. He remained emperor until AD 814.

While this was all going, vikings were raiding from the North. Their homeland in Scandinavia was cold and barren and they needed to supplement their food storage, so they would travel South along the maze of rivers and invade villages in Medieval Europe, adding to the poverty of the area. Art, much like education, also became an item that only religious institutions possessed. Art was deemed nonessential by most people in the area and was not made by most people. After a period of inorder, a new civilization emerged for a short period of time, the Carolingian Empire. Charlemagne, the second ruler of the empire, was the most ambitious ruler and the most well-known. His political changes that he made caused many cultural changes to be made. Charlemagne established control over what modern day France, Italy, and Germany would be today. He was a genius military leader and conquered a lot of land. However, at the end of his reign, the Treaty of Verdun was made, splitting the empire into three sections: a Western region, a ‘middle’ region, and the Eastern region thus dividing their cultures further. This would later have a more profound difference on their cultures as they develop separately from each other.

Charlemagne was one of the most successful rulers of his time period. How did he build and govern his empire the way he did? He used a combination of his personal charisma and intelligence, the feudal system, the Church, and war in order to create the greatest Empire since the time of the Romans. His dislike of corruption, and his power in battle all contributed to his success as Emperor.

Born in about 742, Charlemagne was the son of King Pepin III (known as Pepin the Short). Pepin and his brother together ruled the Franks, whose kingdom included parts of present-day France, Belgium, Germany, and the Netherlands. Upon Pepin 's death in 768, Charlemagne and his brother Carloman inherited the kingdom. When Carloman died three years later, Charlemagne became the sole ruler.

The life of Charlemagne is one of historical and utter greatness. He ruled in a time of turmoil and disorder during middle ages in Europe. The successes of his past lineage prepared and propelled him to take on the tremendous task of expanding, governing and reforming the Frankish Empire. Charlemagne incredible accomplishment during his sovereignty. For he not only invented an efficient way to govern his people call feudalism, he also created a way to keep the loyalty to his empire through inspectors. He led countless conquests against the various adversaries that once opposed the Holy Roman Empire, which expanded his empire across the greater half of Europe. With his grand conquests a solidification between the Catholic Church and the State began to take hold. Charlemagne being a keen individual saw great opportunity within the partnership with the Church especially ones of the monasteries. Using them to usher in the Carolingian renaissance. The crowning of Charlemagne as Holy Roman Emperor fashioned a turning point that would forever change the path of Europe. Within years after his death, though, Charlemagne once boundless empire wasted away. Charlemagne’s reign indeed greatly influenced the course of Europe in ways he had only hoped it would. But as history often shows for every one event there are often several incantations and interpretations. Charlemagne reign is definitely not an exception to the rule, his tale is presented in two biographies; the first version is titled ‘Life of Charlemagne’ which was

Emperor Charlemagne was also an extremely devout Christian who showed his Christian upbringing throughout his life “with great piety and devotion.” The title of Augustus and Emperor were placed upon his by the current Pope after the king marched to Rome in front of an army to protect Pope Leo and restore the church to its place of power. Einhard maintains that Charlemagne was irritated by the Pope’s actions, only taking on the names, rights, and responsibilities about a year

Charlemagne, was a man influenced in learning and education, in fact William the Conqueror made alterations to the English language dictionary. He incorporated various words from other languages such as French. Yet, stronger in education, Charlemagne was surrounded by scholars from different areas and he opened a palace school where he recruited the best teachers. Adding to this, both conquerors, incorporated religion in their skills of conquering. This means, faith was an important element on how they ruled and their actions. However, Charlemagne and William indeed were very different. In fact, Charlemagne’s rule was maintained by the strength of his personality, meaning a unified royal authority came first. While William the Conqueror was desperate on winning more lands and was brutal on battles, Charlemagne focused his reign on education and

During the years of St. Augustine, the Roman Empire fell in the west. It was being replaced by regional barbarian kingdoms, and was entering what some historians call the dark ages. It was a traditional, authoritative empire, with vast free-trade and a centralized government. It transformed into a Europe of economic localism, and filled with a minority of educated people. It was now a Christian Europe. A very important person during this new Europe was the Frankish king Charlemagne. His rule was known throughout the world, and Pope Leo III crowned Charlemagne the "Emperor of the Romans." On top of this title, he still held all of his other titles. Charlemagne made tons of contributions during this time in Europe. He had

The dark ages, a time period spanning from 500 AD until 1500 AD, is commonly perceived as the worst time in history, solely because of its name. When asked “What is the dark ages generally known for?” many people respond with the black plague or great famines. The main reason for this title is in fact due to a lack of written records and documents lost to history. In reality, the dark ages were not really that dark because a humanitarian king shaped European ideals, religion kept culture alive, and many historical and scientific progressions occurred.

The subject of this report is the book Becoming Charlemagne: Europe, Baghdad, and the Empires of A.D. 800. While reading this book, it seemed as if the author was quite biased towards Charlemagne, and he wanted him to look better than he really was. Also this book was written as if it were a novel, so it did not come across as a nonfiction book, even though the entire story was based on facts. The author’s main purpose of this book was to better Charlemagne’s image in history by, his portrayal of Charlemagne’s accomplishments, how well the author believes Charlemagne handled the problems that his empire faced, and the writing style that the author chose for this particular

Charlemagne gained strong rule by military conquest. He strived to finish every war with the desired result. The Carolingians were known for having troops spread out along large areas to ensure that they don’t lose land and can advance into new territories, and stay in power. According to the Einhard piece, Charlemagne finished wars with great energy and force, and one of these energy-filled wars was against the Saxons. The Saxons were devilish in nature and found no wrong in violating the laws of God and Man, which was upsetting to the Carolingians. This war involved the Franks as well in that they decided to undertake a full-scale war against the Saxons to finally put an end to the retaliation.

Charlemagne, also known as Charles the Great, was born around the 2nd of April 747 and died on the 28th of January 814. He was noted down in history as King of the Franks, a Germanic-speaking people who invaded western Rome residing in current day Germany, the King of the Lombards, Germanic people who resided in parts of the Italian peninsula, and finally was the first Holy Roman Emperor. Another name that has been bestowed upon Charlemagne was the title “Father of Europe”. Due to the Carolingian empire 's rule, Charlemagne was able to unite nearly all of western Europe. The last empire to do so was the Roman Empire and no other country would unite Europe until the eighteen hundred under Napoleon. Charlemagne’s father was named Pepin the Short, a name that deceives most on the battlefield due to his incredible and unmatched strength. Pepin the Short was the predecessor to Charlemagne as the king of the Franks. Pepin also helped set up the Carolingian dynasty but did not peak its power until the crowning of Charlemagne. Charlemagne’s successor was his son, Louis the Pious, who would be dissimilar from Charlemagne. In fact, for most of his reign, Louis the Pious would have to deal with many civil wars which foreshadowed the diminishing strength of the Carolingian empire. Charlemagne would serve as the prototype for most of the medieval western Europe for the next millennium until the founding of the new world.