Chapter IV: Charles Martel to Charlemagne (1)

[732-768 A.D.]

Though an effective check had been given to the progress of the Saracens’ arms, and they themselves had been deprived of that chief support of fanatic valour, the belief in their own invincibility, yet their power was by no means broken, nor was Charles in a condition to improve his victory. The Neustrians and Burgundians were far from being reconciled to the supremacy which the German Franks had acquired over themselves under the mighty Carlovingian mayors. Their jealousy of Charles Martel’s success and their hatred of his person, were so much stronger than their zeal in the cause of Christendom, that even while he was engaged in his desperate conflict with the Saracens, they were raising a rebellion in his rear. But the indefatigable warrior was not sleeping on the fresh laurels he had won. No sooner had he received intelligence of their treacherous designs, than he led his troops, fresh from the slaughter of the infidels, into the very heart of Burgundy, and inflicted a terrible retribution on his domestic foes. He then removed all whom he had reason to suspect from their posts of emolument and honour, and bestowed them upon men on whom he could depend in the hour of danger.

In the following year, 734 A.D., he made considerable progress in the subjugation and, what was even more difficult, the conversion of the Frisians, who hated Christianity the more because it was connected in their minds with a foreign yoke. The preaching of Boniface was powerfully seconded by the sword of Charles, who attacked them by land and sea, defeated their duke, Poppo, destroyed their heathen altars, and, like Alfred in the case of the Danes, gave them the alternative of Christianity or death.

[Sidenote: [735-737 A.D.]]

After the victory of Poitiers, Charles had entrusted the defence of the Pyrenean borders to Duke Eudes, whom he left in peaceable though dependent possession of his territories. Eudes had received a rough lesson from his former misfortunes, and passed the remainder of his life in friendly relations with his Frankish liege lord. At the death of Eudes, in 735 A.D., a dispute arose between his sons, Hunold and Hatto, respecting the succession; and it seems that in the course of their contest they had forgotten their common dependence upon Charles Martel. A feud of this nature at such a period, and in the immediate neighbourhood of the Saracens, was highly dangerous to Aquitaine and the whole Frankish Empire. Charles therefore lost no time in leading an army into the distracted province, to settle the disputes of the contending parties, and bring the population into a more complete state of subjection. Having advanced to the Garonne and taken the city of Bordeaux, he entered into negotiations with Hunold; and, “with his accustomed piety,[c]” conferred the duchy upon him, on condition of his renewing his father’s oath of fealty to himself and his two sons, whom he thus distinctly pointed out to the Franks as their hereditary rulers.

THE SARACENS AGAIN REPELLED

[Sidenote: [737-739 A.D.]]

In 737 A.D., the infidels were once more introduced into the south of Gaul by the treachery of Christians. A man of influence in Provence, called Maurontus, who probably aimed at an independent dukedom, formed a strong party among the Neustrian seigneurs against the detested German mayor. As the Arabian alliance was the only one which could sustain them in a conflict with Charles, they made no scruple of inviting Ibn Yusuf, the new viceroy of Septimania (Languedoc), into their country and giving him the city of Avignon as a pledge of their sincerity. The Saracens, instructed by their strange allies, passed into Burgundy, where the party opposed to Charles was strongest; having taken Vienne, they covered the country as far as Lyons with their wild and rapid cavalry, which everywhere left its traces of fire and blood.

The advance of the Saracens was so sudden, and their progress so rapid, that Charles Martel was not immediately prepared to meet them. He therefore despatched his brother Childebrand and his principal seigneurs, with such forces as were ready, to keep the enemy in check; determining himself to follow with a numerous and well-appointed army. When the advanced guard of the Franks arrived near Avignon, the Saracens retreated into that place, and prepared to stand a siege. On the arrival of Charles the town, which had resisted Childebrand, was taken by storm, and the Arabian garrison put to the sword. The Franks then crossed the Rhone, and marched through Septimania to Narbonne--a place of great importance to the Saracens, who had made it a magazine for their arms. It was defended at this time by Athima, viceroy of the caliph in Septimania, with a considerable force. The Saracens of Spain, fearing that the garrison might be insufficient to withstand the assault of the Franks (who had invested the town on every side), fitted out a fleet, and transported a body of troops to the mouth of the river Berre, near Narbonne, in hopes of raising the siege. This movement did not escape the quick eye of Charles; who, leaving his brother with a division of the besiegers, fell with the remainder on the newly landed force of the enemy, and routed them with dreadful slaughter. He failed, however, in his attempts upon Narbonne, which remained in the hands of the Saracens; while Bérziers, Agde, Megalone, and Nîmes, together with all the territory on the north side of the river Aude (subsequently known as Languedoc), were reunited to the Frankish Empire.

According to Paulus Diaconus,[f] Charles Martel was assisted on this occasion by Liutprand, king of the Lombards in Italy, with whom he had formed a close alliance and friendship. We have hardly sufficient grounds for believing that the Lombards took an active part in this war, but the mere expectation of their approach may have exercised some influence in bringing about the results above described.[126]

The activity of his enemies in the north again prevented Charles from pursuing his advantages against the Moslems, who might perhaps, had German Europe been united, have even then been driven back to the shores of Africa. In 737 we find the indefatigable warrior employed in repelling and avenging a fresh inroad of the Saxons, whom he defeated with great slaughter and drove along the river Lippe. In 739 he again appeared in Burgundy, where his presence had become necessary to stamp out the smouldering embers of the old conspiracy.

THE AFFAIRS OF ROME

[Sidenote: [739-740 A.D.]]

In the meantime a new theatre was preparing for the Franks, on which they were destined by Providence to play a very conspicuous and important part. The exertions and influence of Boniface, the great apostle of Germany, and the intimate religious union he had effected between the Frankish church and the bishops of Rome, were to produce for both parties still richer fruits than had yet appeared.

The reunion of the Lombards under one head had been naturally followed as we have previously seen, by a further extension of their borders at the expense of the Roman Empire; and this extension was the immediate cause of a collision between the kings of the Lombards and the successors of St. Peter, which gave rise to the most important and lasting results.

The evident intention of the bishops of Rome, to play off the Lombards and the Byzantine court against each other, and to make their own career the resultant of these two opposing forces, seemed, for some time, likely to be entirely frustrated.

Liutprand, justly irritated by the conduct of the Romans, to whom he had shown so much forbearance, had led his forces to the very gates of Rome, with the full intention of incorporating it with the rest of his Italian dominions; and thus, with all his foresight, Gregory had brought the rising structure of the papacy into the greatest danger, and appeared to be himself at the mercy of his enemies.

In this extremity the holy father bethought himself of the powerful nation which had for so many ages been the faithful ally of the Catholic church, and had lately been united in still closer bonds of reverence and amity to St. Peter’s chair. In 739 Pope Gregory III applied for aid against the Lombards “to his most excellent son, the sub-king Charles.”

That this application was made unwillingly, and with considerable misgivings about the consequences, may be inferred from the extremities to which Gregory submitted before he made it.

His hesitation was owing, no doubt, in part to his instinctive dread of giving the papal chair a too powerful protector, who might easily become a master; and partly to his knowledge of the sincere friendship which existed between his opponent Liutprand and his desired ally. Of all the circumstances which threatened to prevent the realisation of the papal dreams of temporal independence and spiritual domination, none were so greatly and so justly dreaded as an alliance between the Franks and Lombards; and we shall see that Gregory III and his successors spared no pains, and shrank from no means however questionable, to excite jealousy and hatred between the Franks and their Lombard kinsmen.

THE POPE CALLS TO CHARLES

[Sidenote: [740-741 A.D.]]

While the Romans were trembling within their hastily repaired walls, and awaiting the decisive assault of the Lombards, Charles Martel was resting from the fatigues of his late campaigns in Burgundy; and he was still in that country when the papal envoys reached him. They brought with them a piteous epistle from Gregory, in which he complains with bitterness of the persecutions of his enemies, who, he says, had robbed the very church of St. Peter (which stood without the walls) of its candlesticks; and taken away the pious offerings of the Frankish princes. Charles received the communication of the afflicted pontiff with the greatest reverence. The interests of the empire, and more especially of his own family, were too intimately connected with the existence and honour of the bishops of Rome, to allow of his feeling indifferent to what was passing in Italy; and there is no reason to doubt that he entertained the highest veneration for the head of the church. Yet this first embassy seems to have justified the fears rather than the hopes of Gregory. The incessant exertions which Charles’ enemies compelled him to make for the maintenance of his authority would long ago have destroyed a man of ordinary energy and endurance, and were beginning to tell even upon his iron frame. He was aware that the new order of things, of which he was the principal author, depended for its continuance and consolidation solely upon his presence and watchfulness. So far from being in a condition to lead his forces to a distant country, and to make enemies of brave and powerful friends, it was not long since he had sought the assistance of the Lombards themselves; and he knew not how soon he might stand in need of it again. He therefore contented himself with opening friendly negotiations with Liutprand, who excused himself to Charles, and agreed to spare the papal territory on condition that the Romans should cease to interfere between himself and his rebellious subjects. The exact terms of the agreement made between Gregory and Liutprand, by the mediation of Charles Martel, are of the less moment, as they were observed by neither party.

In 740 the Lombards again appeared in arms before the gates of Rome; and the pope was once more a suppliant at the Frankish court. In the letter which Charles Martel received on this occasion, Gregory bitterly complains that no effectual aid had been as yet afforded him; that more attention had been paid to the “lying” reports of the Lombard king than to his own statements, and he earnestly implores his “most Christian son” not to prefer the friendship of Liutprand to the love of the prince of the apostles. It is evident from the whole tenor of this second epistle, that the Frankish mayor had not altered his conduct towards the king of the Lombards, in consequence of Gregory’s charges and complaints; but had trusted rather to his own knowledge of his friend than to the invectives of the terrified and angry pope.

To give additional weight to his written remonstrances and entreaties, Gregory sent the bishop Anastasius and the presbyter Sergius to Charles Martel, charged with more secret and important instructions, which he scrupled to commit to writing. The nature of their communications may be gathered from the symbolical actions by which they were accompanied. The envoys brought with them the keys of St. Peter’s sepulchre, which they offered to Charles, on whom they were also empowered to confer the title and dignity of Roman patricius. By the former step--the offer of the keys (an honour never before conferred upon a Frankish ruler)--Gregory expressed his desire to constitute the powerful mayor protector of the holy see; and by conferring the rank of Roman patricius without, as seems probable, the sanction of the Greek emperor, he in effect withdrew his allegiance from the latter, and acknowledged Charles Martel as liege lord of the Roman duchy and people. It was in this light that the whole transaction was regarded at the time, for we read in the chronicle of Moissiac,[g] written in the beginning of the ninth century, that the letter of the pope was accompanied by “a decree of the Roman principes”; and that the Roman people, having thrown off the rule of the Greek emperor, desired to place themselves under the protection of the aforesaid prince, and his “invincible clemency.”

Charles Martel received the ambassadors with the distinguished honour due to the dignity of the sender, and the importance of their mission; and willingly accepted at their hands the significant offerings they brought. When they were prepared to return, he loaded them with costly presents, and ordered Grimo, the abbot of Corbey, and Sigebert, a monk of St. Denis, to accompany them to Rome, and bear his answer to Pope Gregory. Rome was once more delivered from destruction by the intervention of Charles, and his influence with Liutprand.

And thus were the last days of the great Frankish hero and Gregory III employed in marking out a line of policy respecting each other, and the great temporal and spiritual interests committed to them, which, being zealously followed up by their successors, led in the sequel to the most important and brilliant results. They both died nearly at the same time, in the same year, 741 A.D., in which the events above described took place. The restless activity of Charles Martel had prematurely worn him out. Conscious of the rapid decline of his powers, he began to set his house in order; and he had scarcely time to portion out his vast empire among his sons, and to make his peace with heaven in the church of the patron saint, when he was seized by a fever in his palace at Cariciacum (Quierzy) on the Oise; where he died on the 15th (or 21st)[127] of October, 741 A.D., at the early age of fifty. He was buried in the church of Denis.

Charles Martel may be reckoned in the number of those great men who have been deprived of more than half the glory due to them, “because they want the sacred poet.” Deeds which, in the full light of history, would have appeared sufficient to make a dozen warriors immortal, are despatched by the Frankish chroniclers in a few dry words. His greatness, indeed, shines forth even from their meagre notices; but we feel, as we read them, that had a Cæsar or a Livy unfolded his character and described his exploits,--instead of a poor pedantic monk like Fredegarius,[d] a rival might be found for the Cæsars, the Scipios, and the Hannibals.

CARLOMAN AND PEPIN THE SHORT

[Sidenote: [741-742 A.D.]]

Charles Martel left two sons, Carloman and Pepin, by his first wife, of whom nothing is known, and a third, Grifo, by the captive Bavarian princess Swanahild, who is sometimes called his second wife and sometimes his concubine. In the first partition of his dominions, which was made known before his death, he apportioned Austrasia, Swabia (Alamannia), and Thuringia, the German provinces, to his eldest son, Carloman; Neustria, Burgundy, and Provence, to Pepin, the chief inheritor of his glory. In this arrangement the son of Swanahild was wisely passed over; but the entreaties of his beautiful spouse induced Charles, at the very end of his life, to set apart a portion from each of the two kingdoms above mentioned for Grifo; an unfortunate step, which only brought destruction on him who received the fatal gift.

The mischievous effects of the new partition showed themselves immediately. The subjects of Grifo, among whom alone he could look for sympathy and support, were discontented at being arbitrarily separated from the rest of the empire; and the ill-feeling of the seigneurs and people in all parts of the country appears to have been enhanced by the prejudice existing against Swanahild, both as a foreigner and on account of the great influence she exercised over the heart of Charles. So strong, indeed, was the feeling of the Franks upon the subject, that we may fairly doubt whether Carloman and Pepin themselves, had they been so inclined, would have been able to secure to their brother the possession of the territory allotted to him.

Whatever sentiments the two eldest brothers previously entertained towards Grifo, they were soon rendered openly hostile by the flight of their sister Hiltrude to the court of Bavaria, and her unauthorised marriage with Otilo, the duke of that country. Swanahild and Grifo, who were naturally looked upon as the instigators of this unwelcome alliance, shut themselves up in the fortress of Laon; but being entirely without resources, they yielded up the place and themselves as soon as Carloman and Pepin appeared with an army before its walls. The favourite wife of the mighty Charles Martel was sent into a nunnery at Chelles, and Grifo was imprisoned in the castle of Neufchâteau, in the forest of Ardennes.

Having placed a Merovingian named Childeric on the throne,--which their father for some time before his death had left unoccupied,--the young princes marched an army towards Aquitaine; for Hunold the son of Eudes, the sworn vassal of Charles Martel, had manifested his rebellious intentions by throwing Lantfred, the Frankish ambassador, into prison. Crossing the Loire, they devastated Aquitania as far as Bourges; and were on the point of overrunning the whole country, when the intelligence of the still more serious rebellion of the Swabians compelled them suddenly to break off their campaign in the south, and return to the heart of their dominions. Preparations of unusual magnitude had been made for the war by the dukes of Swabia and Bavaria, who had invited the Saxon and Slavonian tribes to make common cause against the Franks. The sudden return of the Frankish army, however, frustrated their half-completed plans. In the autumn of the same year, Carloman crossed the Rhine, fell upon the Swabian duke Theobald before his Bavarian allies were ready to take the field, and compelled him to renew his oath of allegiance, and to give hostages for its observance.

[Sidenote: [742-745 A.D.]]

In the meantime, Otilo, duke of Bavaria, the husband of the fugitive princess Hiltrude, was doing all in his power to strengthen himself against the expected attack of the Franks, and was evidently acting in concert with Duke Hunold of Aquitaine. The defeat of the Swabians was a heavy blow to his hopes; but he had gone too far to recede, and having united a body of Saxons and Slavonian mercenaries with his own subjects, he took up a position on the farther side of the river Lech, and stockaded the banks to prevent the enemy from crossing. The Franks came up soon afterwards, but found the Bavarians so strongly entrenched, that they lay fifteen days on the opposite bank without attempting anything. After a diligent search, however, they discovered a ford by which they crossed the river during the night, and, falling on the unsuspecting enemy, put them to flight, and drove them with great slaughter across the river Inn.

(From a French print of 1832)]

The Frankish princes are said to have remained for fifty-two days in the enemies’ country; but their expedition partook more of the nature of a foray than a conquest, and left the Bavarians in nearly the same condition of semi-independence in which it had found them. The activity of the revolted tribes rendered it dangerous for Carloman and Pepin to lead their forces too far in any one direction. As Hunold had been saved by the revolt of the Swabians, so Otilo was now relieved from the presence of the Franks by diversions made in his favour in two other quarters; by the Saxons, who had fallen upon Thuringia; and by Hunold, who, emboldened by impunity and the absence of the Franks, had crossed the Loire and was devastating the land as far as Chartres. The Saxons claimed the first attention of the Frankish leaders, since the latter dared not march towards the south with so dangerous an enemy in their rear. Carloman is said to have defeated the Saxon army, which consisted in all probability of undisciplined marauders, in two great battles, and to have carried off one of their leaders, named Theodoric, into Austrasia. Pepin was, in the meantime, engaged with the Swabians under Theobald, whom he soon reduced to obedience. Having thus, for the time, secured their rear, the brother-warriors marched (in 745 A.D.), with united forces, against Hunold, who, conscious of his utter inability to resist their undivided power, laid down his arms without a contest, consented to give hostages, and to renew his brittle oaths of fealty. Disgusted with his ill success, he soon afterwards resigned the government in favour of his son Waifar, and retired to the monastery of St. Philibert, in the island of Rhé, on the coast of Aquitaine.

[Sidenote: [745-747 A.D.]]

Though it is not easy to discover in what respect the Swabians were more in fault in the war just mentioned than the other revolted nations, it is evident that they incurred the special resentment of their Frankish conquerors. All had broken their allegiance, and had sought to regain by force the independence of which they had been forcibly deprived. Yet while the Bavarians and Aquitanians were merely compelled to renew their engagements on honourable terms, the treatment of the Swabians has left an indelible blot on the character of Carloman.

This brave and once powerful people had retired, after their defeat by Pepin, into the fastnesses of the Alps, but were soon compelled to make their submission, and to resume their former allegiance. In 746, however, they appear to have meditated a new revolt, and were accused of having incited the Bavarians to try once more the fortune of war. Rendered furious by the seemingly interminable nature of the contest, Carloman appears to have thought himself justified in repaying faithlessness by treachery of a far more heinous nature; and this is the only shadow of an excuse which can be offered for his conduct. Having led his army to Cannstadt in 746, he ordered Theobald, the Swabian duke, to join him with all his forces, in obedience to the military ban. Theobald obeyed without suspicion, supposing that he should be employed, in conjunction with the rest of Carloman’s forces, against some common enemy. “And there,” says the chronicler of Metz,[c] “a great prodigy took place, that one army seized and bound another without any of the perils of war!” No sooner had the two armies met together in an apparently friendly manner, than Carloman ordered his Franks to surround the Alamanni (Swabians), and to disarm and bind them. He then instituted an inquiry respecting the aid afforded the Bavarians; and, having seized those chiefs who had assisted Otilo “against the invincible princes, Carloman and Pepin, he mercifully corrected each according to his deserts.” Lanfried II received the vacant throne of Theobald, who, in all probability, was one of those who lost their lives by Carloman’s merciful correction.

PEPIN SOLE RULER

[Sidenote: [747-748 A.D.]]

In the following year, the connection between the Carlovingian family and the Roman church, which had grown continually closer, was still farther strengthened by the voluntary abdication of Carloman, and his admission into the monastic order. The reasons which induced this mighty prince and successful warrior to take so singular a step are quite unknown. Remorse for his recent treachery, disgust at the bloodshed he had caused and witnessed, the sense of inferiority to his brother Pepin, and doubts as to the continuance of fraternal harmony,--a natural tendency to religious contemplation increased by the influence of Boniface, whose earnest faith and spotless life could not but make a deep impression upon all who knew him,--these and other causes will occur to the mind of everyone as being, singly or in different combinations, adequate to the result. Yet we can but guess at motives which were unknown to the generations immediately succeeding him, and which he himself perhaps would have found it difficult to define.

With the full concurrence of his brother Pepin, whose appetite for worldly honours was by no means sated, Carloman set out for Rome[128] with a numerous retinue of the chief men in his kingdom, taking with him magnificent presents for the pope. He was received by Zacharias with great distinction; and by his advice Carloman vowed obedience to the rules of St. Benedict before Optatus, the abbot of Monte Cassino, and founded a monastery to St. Silvester on the classic heights of Mount Soracte. But he was far too much in earnest in his desire of solitude to find the neighbourhood of Rome a suitable or agreeable residence. The newly founded monastery was soon thronged with curious visitors, eager to behold the princely monk who had given up all to follow Christ. He therefore abandoned Mount Soracte, and, concealing as far as possible his name and rank, enrolled himself among the Benedictine monks of Monte Cassino.

As no stipulation had been made in favour of Carloman’s son Drogo, Pepin now became sole ruler of the whole Frankish Empire. It is a no less singular than pleasing fact that one of the very first uses which Pepin made of his undivided authority was to release his brother Grifo from his long imprisonment; singular, because it seems to imply that Carloman, whose susceptibility to religious influences cannot be doubted, was the only obstacle to this act of generosity and mercy. It is indeed open to us to suppose that Carloman foresaw more clearly than his brother the injurious consequences of Grifo’s restoration to freedom; for the policy of this step was certainly more questionable than its generosity. The liberated prince thought more of what was withheld than of what was granted, and had never ceased to consider himself entitled to an equal share of the dominions of his father. In 748, not long after his release, while Pepin was holding a council of the bishops and seigneurs at Düren, Grifo was forming a party among the younger men to support his pretensions to the throne. In company with some of these he fled to the Saxons, who were always ready to make common cause against the hated Franks. Pepin, well aware of the extremely inflammable materials by which his frontiers were surrounded, and dreading a renewal of the conflagration he had so lately quenched in blood, immediately took the field; marching through Thuringia, he attacked and defeated the Nordo-Squavi, a Saxon tribe who lived on the river Wipper, between the Bode and Saale. The Saxon leader Theodoric was taken prisoner for the third time, and a considerable number of the captives taken on this occasion were compelled to receive Christian baptism, according to the usual policy of that age.

After fruitless negotiations between the brothers, Grifo endeavoured to make a stand at the river Oker; failing in this, he fled to the Bavarians, among whom an enemy of Pepin was sure to find a welcome. After devastating the Saxon territory for forty days, and reimposing the tribute formerly exacted by Clotaire, Pepin directed his march towards Bavaria, in pursuit of his brother. Otilo, the former duke of this country, was now dead, and had been succeeded by his son Tassilo, who ruled under the influence of the Frankish princess Hiltrude. These inveterate enemies of Pepin were also joined by a mighty Bavarian chief, called Suitger, and the Swabian duke, Lanfried II. If we understand rightly a passage in the annals of Metz, Grifo succeeded in depriving Tassilo and his mother of the reins of government and making himself master of Bavaria. Grifo, Suitger, and Lanfried united their forces, but not venturing to await the attack of the Franks upon the Lech, as Otilo had done on a former occasion, they retreated at once behind the Inn, which had already proved so effectual a bulwark. Pepin, however, no longer embarrassed by a variety of enemies, determined to bring the matter to a final decision, and was already making preparations to cross the Inn, when the leaders of the allied army, convinced of the futility of braving the superior force of the Franks, voluntarily surrendered themselves prisoners of war. The leniency with which the Bavarians were treated seems to imply that favourable terms of surrender had been granted, at any rate, to them. Tassilo received back his duchy, for which he had to swear fealty to the Frankish ruler; while Alamannia was finally incorporated with the Frankish dominions. The fate of Lanfried II, the last of the Swabian dukes, is not known; but the character and general policy of Pepin are a guarantee that he was not treated with unnecessary harshness. Grifo was once more indebted to his brother for life and liberty, and not only received full pardon, but was endowed with twelve counties and the town of Le Mans--a fortune splendid enough to have satisfied the desires of anyone who had not dreamed too much of independence and royal authority.

The ill success which attended the efforts of Grifo,--whose claims but a few years before would have rallied thousands of malcontents round his standard,--and the rapid and easy suppression of the Swabian and Bavarian revolts, afford us evidence that the once bitter opposition of the seigneurs, both lay and clerical, to the establishment of the Carlovingian throne, was finally overcome; and that Pepin possessed a degree of settled authority which neither his father nor his grandfather had enjoyed.

SECULARISATION

[Sidenote: [748-751 A.D.]]

It was during the mayoralty of Pepin, and not, as is generally assumed, in that of Charles Martel, that the famous and important act of secularisation took place. The practice into which Charles Martel had been driven by his necessities, of bestowing ecclesiastical benefices on laymen who assumed the priesthood with purely secular views, was inconsistent with the peace and good order, and inimical to all the higher interests, of the Christian church. As an exceptional state of things, however, even rigid disciplinarians and pious churchmen like Boniface had thought it expedient to yield a tacit assent to the employment of church revenues for military purposes. But when, on the one hand, the consequences of these irregular and violent expedients had become, with the lapse of time, more clearly evident; and, on the other, a stricter discipline, and a more religious and ecclesiastical spirit had been diffused through the great body of the clergy by the labours of Boniface and his school, it became more and more repugnant to the feelings of all true friends of the church to see its highest offices filled by masquerading laymen, who had nothing of the priest about them but the name and dress. In this repugnance we have every reason to believe that both Carloman and Pepin largely shared; and yet, though not engaged in an internecine struggle like their father, they carried on expensive wars, and needed large supplies of land and money. It was not therefore to be expected that they should ease the church from all participation in the public burdens, especially at a time when it had absorbed a very large proportion of the national wealth. Under these circumstances, a compromise was effected by the influence of Boniface at the synod of Lestines. In this important council the assembled bishops consented, in consideration of the urgent necessities of the state, to make a voluntary surrender of a portion of the funds of the church; with the stipulation that the civil rulers should, on their part, abstain for the future from all arbitrary interference with its discipline and property.

The vast funds which the “secularisation” placed at the disposal of the Frankish princes contributed in no small degree to establish the Carlovingian throne; for it enabled them to carry out to its full extent the system of beneficial (or non-hereditary) grants, and to secure the services of the powerful seigneurs, who were bound to the sovereign not only by a sense of gratitude, but by the hope of future favours and the fear of deprivation.

THE ANOINTING OF PEPIN (751 A.D.)

[Sidenote: [751 A.D.]]

A change took place at the period at which we have now arrived, which, though easily and noiselessly made, and apparently but nominal, forms an important era in Frankish history. It costs us an effort to remember that Charles Martel, Carloman, and Pepin were not kings, but officers of another, who still bore the royal title, and occasionally and exclusively wore the crown and sat upon the throne. Carloman and Pepin, when they were heading great armies, receiving oaths of allegiance from conquered princes, and giving away duchies, were mayors of the palace of Childeric III, a Merovingian king. Even they had thought the time not yet come for calling themselves by their proper name, and had placed Childeric on the throne. The king’s name was a tower of strength, which they who had met and defeated every other enemy seemed to shrink from attacking.

The foundations of the Merovingian throne, indeed, had been thoroughly, perhaps systematically, sapped. The king-making mayors had set up monarchs and deposed them at their pleasure; they had even left the throne vacant for a time, as if to prove whether the nation was yet cured of its inveterate notion that none but a Merovingian could wear a Frankish crown. There was but one step more to the throne, and that step was taken at last when there was scarcely a man in the empire who had either the power or the wish to prevent it.

In 751 A.D. Pepin assumed the name of king, with the full consent of the nation and the sanction of the pope; and the last of the Merovingians was shorn of his royal locks, the emblems of his power, and sent to end his days in the monastery of St. Bertin, at Sithieu (St. Omer in Artois).

The immediate motive for the change is not apparent, and the remarkable absence of all impatience on the part of Pepin to assume the royal name seems to justify the notion that the _coup-de-grâce_ was given to the Merovingian dynasty by another hand than his. It might have been still deferred, but for the growing intimacy between the Carlovingians and the pope.

All that has been transmitted to us is the fact that, in 750 (or 751), an embassy, composed of Burchard, bishop of Würzberg, Fulrad, abbot of St. Denis, and Pepin’s own chaplain, appeared at Rome at the papal court, and laid the following question before Pope Zacharias for his decision: Whether it was expedient that one who was possessed of no authority in the land should continue to retain the name of king, or whether it should be transferred to him who really exercised the royal power.

It is not to be imagined for a moment that Zacharias was unprepared with his reply to this momentous question, which would certainly not have been proposed had there been any doubt respecting the answer. The pope replied that, he who really governed should also bear the royal name; and the embassy returned to Pepin with this message, or, as some writers take a pleasure in calling it, this “command.” A grand council of the nation was assembled at Soissons (Augusta Suessionum) in the same year, and the major-domus was unanimously elected sole king of the Franks, and soon afterwards anointed and crowned, with his wife Bertrada, by his old and faithful friend Boniface.

This solemn consecration by the use of holy oil, and other ceremonies, observed for the first time at the coronation of the Carlovingian king, were not without their important significance. The sentiment of legitimacy was very strongly seated in the hearts of the Frankish people. The dethroned family had exclusively supplied the nation with their rulers from all time; no one could trace their origin, or point to a Merovingian who was not either a king, or the kinsman of a king. It was far otherwise with Pepin. He was the first of his race who had not fought for the office of major-domus with competitors as noble as himself. It was little more than a century since his namesake of Landen had been dismissed from his office by the arbitrary will of Dagobert. The extraordinary fertility of the Carlovingian family in warriors and statesmen had hitherto enabled them to hold their own against all gainsayers. But if the new dynasty was to rest on something more certain and durable than the uninterrupted transmission of great bodily and mental powers in a single family, it was of vital importance to the Carlovingians to rear their throne upon foundations the depth of which was beyond the ken of vulgar eyes. Such a foundation could be nothing else than the sanction of heaven, and was to be sought in the Christian church, in the fiat of God’s representative on earth, who could set apart the Carlovingians as a chosen race, and bestow upon them a heavenly claim to the obedience of their countrymen.

We have already referred to the successful efforts of Boniface and his followers in the cause of Roman supremacy. The belief in the power of the bishops of Rome, as successors of St. Peter, to bind and to loose, to set up and to set down, had already taken root in the popular mind, and rendered the sanction of the popes as efficacious a legitimiser as the cloud of mystery and fable which enveloped the origin of the fallen Merovingians.

So gradually was this change of dynasty effected, so skilfully was the new throne founded on well-consolidated authority, warlike renown, good government, and religious faith, that as far as we can learn from history, not a single voice was raised against the aspiring mayor, when his warriors, _more majorum_, raised him on the shield, and bore him thrice through the joyful throng; and when Boniface anointed him with holy oil, as king of the Franks “by the grace of God,” not a single champion was found throughout that mighty empire, to draw his sword in the cause of the last monarch of the house of Clovis.

Pepin was not long allowed to enjoy his new dignity in peace, but was quickly called upon to exchange the amenities of the royal palace for the toils and dangers of the battle-field.

The Saxons had already recovered from, and were desirous of avenging, the chastisement inflicted upon them; and having rebelled “in their way,” [as Fredegarius[d] says] were now marching upon the Rhine. But Pepin, who had not ceased to be a general when he became a king, collected a large army, with which he crossed the Rhine, and entering the territory of the Saxons, wasted it with fire and sword, and carried back a large number of captives into his own dominions.

It was on his return from this campaign that he received the news of his brother Grifo’s death. This restless and unhappy prince--whom the indelible notion of his right to a throne rendered incapable of enjoying the noble fortune allotted to him by his brother--had fled to Waifar, duke of Gascony, in the hope of inducing him to take up arms. But Waifar was not in a condition to protect him; and when the ambassadors of Pepin demanded that he should be given up, Grifo was obliged to seek another asylum. The fugitive then directed his course to King Aistulf, foreseeing, probably, that Pepin would be drawn into the feud between the pope and the Lombards, the subjects of Aistulf, and therefore thinking that he might already regard the latter as the enemy of his brother. As he was passing the Alps, however, with a small retinue, he was set upon, in the valley of St. Jean de Maurienne, by Count Theudes of Vienne and the Transjuran Count Friedrich. Grifo was slain, but not until after a desperate struggle, in which both the counts above mentioned also lost their lives.

Pepin now retired to his royal residence at Dietenhoven (Thionville, Villa Theudonis), on the Moselle, and spent the few months of peace that followed the Saxon war in ordering the affairs of the church, which he effected chiefly through the instrumentality of ecclesiastical synods.[b]

We may now profitably revert briefly to the affairs of the Lombards whom we left just at the moment of Liutprand’s death in 744.[a]

LOMBARD AFFAIRS

[Sidenote: [744-751 A.D.]]

The influence of Charles Martel with his ally and friend Liutprand, and the reverence which the latter entertained for the popes in their spiritual character, had caused a temporary lull in the affairs of Italy. But Liutprand died about two years after the accession of Pepin, and was succeeded, first by his grandson Hildebrand, who reigned seven months, and then by Ratchis, duke of Friuli, under whom the Lombards renewed the war against Rome. In this emergency, Zacharias, who, like many other popes, trusted greatly and with good reason to his personal influence over the rude kings and warriors of the age, went himself to Perugia (Perusia) to beg a peace from Ratchis. The result was favourable to a degree beyond his highest expectations. The Lombard monarch not only recalled his troops--which were already besieging the towns of the Pentapolis--and granted a peace of forty years, but was so deeply affected by the dignified demeanour and eloquent exhortations of the holy father, that, like another Carloman, he renounced his earthly crown, and sought a refuge from the cares of government in the quiet cloisters of Monte Cassino.[b]

This is the story as told in the _Liber Pontificalis_,[i] but there are reasons for thinking that Ratchis lost the favour of his own Lombards by winning the smile of the pope, and that a revolution unseated him and he was fortunate enough to be immured in a convent instead of meeting the probable fate of his predecessor, Hildebrand, whose disappearance is unexplained. It is a strange fact that Ratchis went to the same convent where the ex-king Carloman lived.[a]

[Sidenote: [749-753 A.D.]]

Ratchis was succeeded in 749 by his brother Aistulf, a man by no means so sensible to spiritual influences, and remarkable for his energy and strength of purpose. In three years from his accession to the Lombard throne, he succeeded in driving out Eutychius, the last exarch of the Greek emperors, from the exarchate of Ravenna, and made himself master of the city. Having thus secured the possession of the southern portion of the Roman territory, he marched upon Rome itself; and when Pope Zacharias died, March 15th, 752, it must have been with the melancholy conviction that all his efforts to preserve the independence of Rome, and to further the lofty claims of the papacy, were about to prove fruitless. Once more was Hannibal at the gates; but, fortunately for the interest of the threatened city, the successor of Zacharias, Stephen II, was a man in every way equal to the situation. By a well-timed embassy and costly presents, he stayed the uplifted arm of the Lombard for the moment, and, as often happens in human affairs, by gaining time he gained everything.

After remaining quiet for a few months, Aistulf again resumed his threatening attitude towards the Romans, and demanded a palpable proof of their subjection to himself, in the shape of a poll-tax of a gold solidus per head. A fresh embassy from the pope, which the Lombard king received at Nepi (near Sutri, north of Rome), met with no success, and the holy abbots of St. Vincent and St. Benedict, who composed it, returned to their monasteries in despair. Nor was any greater effect produced by the arrival of Joannes, the imperial _Silentiarius_, who was sent by the Greek emperor from Constantinople. This pompous messenger brought letters for the pope and King Aistulf, in which the latter was called upon to desist from his present undertaking and to restore the whole of the territory of which he had unjustly robbed the Grecian Empire. The high-sounding language and haughty requirements of the Byzantines, unsupported as they were by any material power, could make no impression upon such a man as Aistulf, and he dismissed the imperial envoy with an unmeaning answer.

The danger of Rome had now reached its highest point, and no deliverance seemed nigh. “King Aistulf,” in the language of the papal biographer,[i] “was inflamed with rage, and, like a roaring lion, never ceased to utter the most dreadful threats against the Romans, declaring that he would slay them all with the sword, if they did not submit themselves to his rule.” An appeal which the pope had made to the Byzantine emperors for protection was entirely fruitless, and the Romans were utterly unequal to sustain unaided a contest with the warlike Lombards. It was in this extremity that Stephen determined to test once more the value of that close relation which it had been the object of so many popes to form with the Frankish people, and more especially with the Carlovingian family. He knew that it would be no easy matter to induce King Pepin or his Franks to undertake an expedition into Italy with a force sufficient for the object in view. He felt, too, that a mere letter from Pepin, such as Charles Martel had sent to his good friend Liutprand, would be of no avail to turn the ambitious Aistulf from his purpose. He therefore adopted the resolution of crossing the Alps, throwing himself at the feet of the Frankish monarch and thus giving him a convincing proof that the very existence of the papacy was at stake.

THE POPE VISITS PEPIN

[Sidenote: [753-754 A.D.]]

With this view the holy father, seeing that all his entreaties “for the fold which had been entrusted to him (Rome), and the lost sheep” (Istria and the exarchate of Ravenna), were fruitless, started from Rome on the 14th of October, 753, in company with the abbot Droctigang and Duke Autchar, whom Pepin had previously sent to Stephen with general promises of support. He was also followed by a considerable number of the Roman clergy and nobility. On his journey northwards he passed through the city of Pavia, where Aistulf then was; and though the latter had forbidden him to say a word about restoration of territory, he once more endeavoured, by rich presents and earnest entreaties, to induce the king to give up his conquests and forego his hostile purposes. He was warmly seconded by Pepin’s envoys, and another epistle from the Greek emperor; but the mind of the fierce Lombard remained unchanged. It is evident, indeed, that he would have prevented Stephen by force from continuing his journey but for the threats of the Frankish ambassadors. As it was he endeavoured to intimidate the pope in the presence of Droctigang into a denial of his wish to proceed to the court of Pepin; and only then dismissed him when he saw that Stephen would yield to nothing but actual violence.

(From a French print of 1830)]

Pepin was still at his palace at Dietenhofen, when the intelligence reached him that the pope, with a splendid retinue, had passed the Great St. Bernard, and was hastening, according to agreement, to the monastery of St. Maurice at Agaunum. It had been expected that the king himself would be there to receive the illustrious fugitive; but Stephen on his arrival found in his stead the abbot Fulrad and the duke Rothard, who received the holy father with every mark of joy and reverence, and conducted him to the palace of Ponthion, near Châlons, where he arrived on the 6th of January, 754. As a still further mark of veneration, the young prince Charles was sent forward to welcome Stephen at a distance of about seventy miles from Ponthion;[129] and Pepin himself is said to have gone out three miles on foot to meet him, and to have acted as his marshal, walking by the side of his palfrey. The extraordinary honours paid by Pepin to the aged exile proceeded partly, no doubt, from the reverence and sympathy which his character and circumstances called forth. But his conduct might also result from a wise regard to his own interests, and a desire of inspiring his subjects with a mysterious awe for the spiritual potentate at whose behest he had himself assumed the crown.

The decisive conference between Pepin and Stephen took place at Ponthion on the 16th of January. The pope appeared before the Frankish monarch in the garb and posture of a suppliant, and received a promise of protection, and the restoration of all the territory of which the Lombards deprived him.

[Sidenote: [754-755 A.D.]]

The winter, during which no military operations could be undertaken, was spent by Stephen at the monastery of St. Denis at Paris. The spectacle of the harmony and friendship subsisting between the Roman pontiff and King Pepin was calculated to produce a good effect on the Romance subjects of the latter; who, on account of his German origin and tendencies, was regarded with less attachment in Neustria and Burgundy than in his Austrasian dominions.

This effect was increased by Stephen’s celebrating in person that solemn act of consecration which he had already performed by proxy. At the second coronation of Pepin, which took place with great solemnity and pomp in the church of St. Denis on the 28th of July, 754, his queen, Bertrada, and her two sons, Charles and Carloman, were also anointed with the holy oil, and the two last were declared the rightful heirs of their father’s empire. That nothing might be wanting on the part of the church to set apart the Carlovingian family as the chosen of God, Stephen laid a solemn obligation on the Franks, that “throughout all future ages neither they nor their posterity should ever presume to appoint a king over themselves from any other family.”

The title of _Patricius Romanorum_, which had first been worn by Clovis, was bestowed by the pope upon the king and his sons. It is difficult to understand how this dignity could at this period be imparted to any one without the authority of the Byzantine emperor. Constantine (nicknamed Copronymus) may indeed have taken the opportunity of the pope’s journey to offer the patriciate to Pepin; but it is more consistent with the circumstances we have described to suppose that Stephen was acting irregularly and without authority in conferring a Roman title on the Frankish king; and that he intended at the same time to give a palpable proof of his independence of the emperor who had neglected to aid him, and to point out Pepin as his future ally and protector.

On the 1st of March, 755,[130] Pepin summoned his council of state at Bernacum (Braine), where the war against the Lombards was agreed to, provided no other means could be found to reinstate the pope. In the meantime ambassadors were despatched to Aistulf, with terms which show that the Franks were by no means eager for the expedition. King Pepin on this occasion styles himself “defender of the holy Roman church by divine appointment,” and demands that the territories and towns should be restored--not to the Byzantine emperor, to whom they at any rate nominally belonged, but “to the blessed St. Peter and the church and commonwealth of the Romans.”

It is at this crisis of affairs that Carloman, the brother of Pepin, once more appears upon the stage, and in a singular character, viz., as opponent of the pope. Aistulf, by what influence we are not informed, prevailed upon him to make a journey to the Frankish court, for the purpose of counteracting the effect of Stephen’s representations. He met of course with no success, and was sent by Pepin and Stephen into a monastery at Vienne, where he died in the same year.

PEPIN INVADES ITALY (755 A.D.)

[Sidenote: [755 A.D.]]