James The Age of Charlemagne

1. Auflage 2017
ISBN: 978-1-5378-0915-1
Verlag: Jovian Press
Format: EPUB
Kopierschutz: 0 - No protection

E-Book, Englisch, 412 Seiten

One of the noblest possessions of the Roman Empire was the province of ancient Gaul. Much blood and treasure had been expended in its conquest; infinite wisdom, moderation, and vigour had been displayed in the means taken to attach it to the dominion of the Caesars; and the passing of several centuries had strongly cemented the union, and incorporated the conquered with their conquerors. Unwieldy bulk, enfeebling luxury, intestine divisions, and universal corruption soon, however, began to draw down the impending destruction upon the head of the imperial city. Attack after attack, invasion following invasion, left her still weaker under each succeeding monarch; province after province was wrested from her sway, till at length Odoacer, chief of the Scyrri, raised his standard in Italy; Romulus Augustulus yielded the empty symbols of an authority he did not possess; and the Roman Empire was no more...

Autoren/Hrsg.

James, George

Leseproben

FROM THE BIRTH OF CHARLEMAGNE TO HIS ACCESSION.

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AD 742 TO AD 768.

The precise birth-place of the greatest man of the middle ages is unknown; neither have any records come down to us of his education, nor any particulars of those early years which are generally ornamented by the imagination of after biographers, even when the subject of their writing has left his infancy in obscurity. Eginhard, who possessed the best means of knowledge, frankly avows that he was himself ignorant; and the manuscript of a contemporary author, whose propensity to anecdote gives a value to his details, which neither the style of his composition, nor the accuracy of his statements, could bestow, is defective in that part which might have afforded some information, however vague, regarding the youth of Charlemagne. The year of his birth, however, as ascertained by computation from other data, seems undoubtedly to have been AD 742, about seven years before his father, Pepin the Brief, assumed the name of King.

His mother was Bertha, daughter of Charibert, Count of Laon; and concerning her early union with Pepin, a thousand pleasant fables have supplied the place of all accurate information. Although one of the papal epistles to Charlemagne insinuates that Pepin at one time contemplated a separation from Bertha, for the purpose of marrying another woman, it is evident that she was loved and honored by her husband, from the fact of her having shared in the new and solemn spectacle by which Pepin attempted to consecrate, in the eyes of the people, his usurpation of the supreme authority.

To the forms usually observed on the accession of a new monarch of the Francs, Pepin added various ceremonies which had never before been used in Gaul. Amongst these, the most striking, from its novelty, was the unction which had been instituted for the kings of Israel, and which was readily performed for the Frankish usurper by the famous Boniface, Archbishop of Metz. In all the solemnities which dignified the elevation of her husband, Bertha was a partaker; and many have been the laborious struggles of historians to discover, or invent, various complex and political motives for so very natural an occurrence; but it would seem, that the simple desire of distinctly marking that his personal elevation to the royal station implied the elevation of his whole family, and the permanence of the kingly office in his race, was the sole view of the new sovereign of the Francs. The influence which she exercised over her husband, and the reverence which her children always displayed towards her, render it probable that to Bertha herself was entrusted the early education of Charlemagne. Still it is greatly to be regretted, that we do not possess any details of the tuition under which the mind of that prince put forth, between infancy and manhood, those grand and splendid qualities which, hidden in the darkness that overhangs his youth, shine out immediately on his accession to the throne, like the rising of a tropical day, which, we are told, bursts forth at once in its splendor, unannounced by the slow progress of the dawning twilight.

Nevertheless, although nothing is known of the minute particulars either of his domestic instruction or his early habits, there was a grander species of education to which he was subject, and of which we have better means of judging: I mean the education of circumstances. It is a common influence of troublous times, not alone to bring forward, but to form great intellect. The familiarity with scenes of danger and excitement—the early exercise of thought upon great and difficult subjects—the habit of supporting, encountering, and vanquishing, the very proximity of mighty schemes and mighty changes,—must necessarily give expansion, vigor, and activity, to every faculty of the mind, as much as robust exercises and habitual hardships strengthen and improve the body. In the midst of such uncertain and eventful times, and surrounded by such grand and animating circumstances, was passed the youth of Charlemagne, and though we cannot discover whether paternal or maternal care afforded the means of cultivating his intellect or directing his pursuits, to a mind naturally great and comprehensive, like his own, the world was a sufficient school—the events by which he was surrounded sufficient instructors.

The first act performed before his eyes was the consummation of all his ancestor’s ambitious glory, by the mighty daring of his own father: and this instance of the ease with which great deeds are achieved by great minds, was a practical lesson and a powerful incitement. The first act of his own life—a task which combined both dignity and beneficence—was to meet, as deputy for his father, the suppliant chief of the Roman church, and to conduct him with honor to the monarch’s presence. The event in which he thus took part, and which afterwards affected the current of his whole existence, originated in the unhappy state of Rome, which I have before slightly noticed, and in the continual and increasing pressure of the Lombards upon that unstable republic which had arisen in Italy, after its separation from the empire of the East. The second and third Gregory had in vain implored the personal succor of Charles Martel to defend the Roman territory from the hostile designs of their encroaching neighbors; and Zacharias, who had succeeded to the authority and difficulties of those two pontiffs, had equally petitioned Pepin for some more effectual aid than remonstrances addressed to the dull ear of ambition, and menaces which began to be despised.

Under Stephen, who followed Zacharias, and ascended the papal chair soon after the elevation of Pepin to the sovereign power, the danger of Rome became still more imminent; for Astolphus, the Lombard King, contemning alike the threats of an avenger who did not appear, and the exhortations of a priest who had no means of resistance, imposed an immense tribute on the citizens of Rome, and prepared to enforce the payment by arms. But by this time the popes or bishops of Rome had established a stronger claim upon the rulers of France than that which they had formerly possessed. The instability of Pepin’s title to the crown, had made him eager to add a fictitious authority to the mutable right of popular election; and, having, as we have before seen, joined to the voice of the people the sanction of the Pope, he divided between two, a debt which might have been dangerous or burdensome while in the hands of one. By this means, however, he gave to the Roman pontiffs a claim and a power; and Stephen now resolved to exert it in the exigency of his country.

In the moment of immediate danger, when Rome was threatened by hostile armies, and her fields swept by invading barbarians, the prelate, with a worthy boldness, set out from the ancient queen of empires, as a suppliant, determined to apply, first for justice and immunity at the court of Astolphus, the King of the Lombards, and, in case of rejection, then for protection and vengeance, at the hands of the new monarch of the Francs. Astolphus was deaf to all petitions, and despised all threats. Ravenna had fallen, and Rome he had determined to subdue. But the Pope pursued his way in haste; and, traversing the Alps, set his foot with joy on the territories of a friend and an ally. The French monarch was then returning from one of his victorious expeditions against the Saxons; and the messengers from Stephen met him on the banks of the Moselle.

The most common of all accusations against the human heart, and, I might add, against the human mind, is ingratitude. But in an uncivilized state of society, where rights are less protected, and mankind depend more on the voluntary reciprocation of individual benefits and assistance, than on fixed rules and a uniform government, the possession of such emotions as gratitude and generosity, would seem to be more necessarily considered as a virtue, and the want of them more decidedly as a crime, than in periods or in countries, where the exertions of each man is sufficient for his own support, and the law is competent to the protection of all.

Besides a feeling of obligation towards the Roman pontiffs, which the new sovereign did not hesitate a moment to acknowledge and obey, the call of the Pope was perfectly consonant to Pepin’s views and disposition, as a man, a king, and a warrior. To welcome the Bishop of Rome, therefore, the monarch instantly dispatched his eldest son Charles, then scarcely twelve years of age, and every honor was paid to the head of the Catholic Church that reverence or gratitude could inspire.

This is the first occasion on which we find Charlemagne mentioned in history; but the children of the Francs were trained in their very early years to robust and warlike exercises; and there is every reason to believe that great precocity, both of bodily and mental powers, fitted the prince for the office which was entrusted to him by his father.

From the distinction with which Pepin received the prelate, and from the bold and candid character of that monarch, little doubt can exist that he at once determined to protect the Roman state from the exacting monarch of the Lombards, by the effectual and conclusive interposition of arms. The King of the Francs, however, had still something to demand at the hands of the Pope; and the remonstrance of Astolphus, who pleaded hard by his envoys against the proposed interference, raised Pepin to the character of umpire and judge, enhanced the value of his mediation, and gave him a claim, not likely to be rejected, for some return on the part of Stephen. In regard to many of the particular circumstances of this...