RELATION OF THE CHURCH AND STATE UP TO THE DISSOLUTION OF THE
CAROLINGIAN EMPIRE
OUTLINE: I.--Church and state before Constantine. II.--Church
and state from Constantine to 476. III.--Period of the
Ostrogothic rule (476-532). IV.--Reunion of Italy with the
Eastern Empire. V.--Alliance between the Papacy and the
Franks. VI.--Restoration of the Empire in the West in 800.
VII.--Effect of the rise of national states on the Church.
VIII.--Sources.
By the theory of the Roman constitution, the Emperor was not only an
autocrat in all political matters, but was also the Pontifex Maximus of
religions[289:1]; consequently, all foreign religions must conform to
the constitution or else perish as illegal. The political philosophy of
early Christianity in reference to the Roman Empire was not very clearly
defined. Jesus taught charity and love, gave the Golden Rule as the law
of life, but apparently was indifferent as to civil government. He took
no part in political discussions; said "My kingdom is not of this
world"; disparaged worldly power and wealth, and advised the rich young
man: "Sell all thou hast and give it to the poor." He did recognise the
duty of tribute to the state, however, saying "Render unto Cæsar the
things that are Cæsar's," but did little more. The Apostles continued
the teachings of Jesus, emphasised equality and brotherhood; organised
the Church on a communistic, democratic basis; and were likewise
indifferent to wealth and property. They too, recognised the state and
its essential institutions. Slaves were told to obey their
masters.[290:1] Paul was very particular to explain the obligation of
Christians to the state and said: "Let every soul be subjected unto the
higher powers. For there is no power but of God."[290:2] He advised the
payment of taxes as a just requisition.[290:3] And he himself, when
arrested for disturbing the peace, appealed to Rome.[290:4] Peter
likewise advised Christians to obey "every ordinance of man for the
Lord's sake; whether it be to the king as supreme; or unto governors, as
unto them that are sent by him."[290:5]
The early Church Fathers made no additions to the political science of
Jesus and his Apostles. Apparently no questions of seriously conflicting
allegiance arose during the whole of the first century. As individuals
these early Christians no doubt performed all the duties and paid all
the contributions demanded by the Empire. From a strictly legal
standpoint, however, the Church was not incorporated among the
recognised cults, that is, it was not, like Judaism, a "religio licita."
Nevertheless, it was not disturbed for some years.[290:6] Things must
have gone along, for the most part, in a customary manner. Pliny's
letter to Trajan (about 111) describes the Christians in Bythinia as
law-abiding. With the rapid territorial and numerical increase of
Christianity, the state was forced to take cognisance of it and the
inevitable conflict occurred. The Christians refused to conform to Roman
worship and persecution resulted. Persecution in time produced, on the
part of many Christians, a refusal to perform the duties of civil and
military service, but it cannot be proved that such hostility was
universal. Indeed there is much evidence to show a general disposition
to compromise with imperial demands.[291:1]
With respect to the general duty of obeying the law of the Empire the
Fathers of the ante-Constantine period were quite unanimous in their
approval. In fact they boasted of their political loyalty and denied all
accusations to the contrary. Justin Martyr said that "wherever we are we
pay the taxes and the tribute imposed . . . as we were instructed to do
by Him," and "while we worship God alone in all other matters, we
cheerfully submit ourselves to you, confessing you to be the kings and
rulers of men." Irenæus asserted: "we ought to obey powers and earthly
authorities, inasmuch as they are constituted not by the devil, but
God." These passages, and many others, which are undoubtedly typical,
show that it was the persuasion of the Church that conformity was a
general obligation. That this fealty was appreciated is seen in the fact
that the Church, at least in the time of Emperor Alexander Severus
(222), was permitted to own lands, to erect churches, to elect officers
openly, and to send officials to court.[291:2] It was not, however,
until 312 that these rights were legalised. One must never lose sight
of the fact that it was both very easy and very natural for the clergy
and the people to accommodate themselves to the new order of things, and
to recognise in these new relationships a reproduction of the theocratic
constitution of God's subjects under the old covenant. Indeed it was
practically impossible for the masses who came to march under the cross
in those days to conceive of a Church without some relation to the
state. To-day to a modern man's eyes appears only the antagonism between
the Church and state.
There was a most striking contrast, from the standpoint of political
science, between the Roman and Christian religions. The Roman Emperor
identified religion with the state; Christianity separated God from
Cæsar. The Roman religion was restricted to earth; Christianity made the
world to come the most important part of life. The Roman religion was
only for Romans; Christianity was as wide as the world. Roman paganism
fell and the Roman Empire perished, but Roman Christianity, clothed in
their form, arose on their ruins to rule the world for more than a
thousand years.[292:1]
Constantine legalised Christianity, but thereby subjected it to the
state. He had no idea whatever of surrendering to it any of his
autocratic prerogatives. He became virtually the Pontifex Maximus[292:2]
of his new religion by controlling those who performed the sacred rites,
and by defining its faith, discipline, organisation, policy, and
privileges. He enacted legislation for Christianity just as his
predecessors had for paganism. The Church recognised its subjection to
the Emperor without a complaint and permitted him to appoint and depose
its officers, to call and dismiss synods and councils, like Arles (314)
and Nicæa (325), and almost to replace the Holy Ghost itself in
determining the proceedings.[293:1] This marked a revolution in the
relation of the Church to the Empire, for each made a conquest of the
other.
It has been customary for Church historians quite generally to
characterise the union of the Church and state under Constantine as an
unmitigated curse that gave birth to a multitude of evils in the Church
which led directly to the Reformation. That contention is one-sided and
unfair. Whether the Church and state be regarded as both divine, or both
human, or one human and the other divine, the historical fact remains
that their union was absolutely necessary and inevitable. When all the
forces and factors of the time are carefully and duly considered, it is
impossible to conceive of any other solution of the problem in the
fourth century.[293:2] That the union did paganise and materialise the
Church no one can deny,[293:3] but in compensation the Empire was
Christianised and spiritualised. The resultant was mediæval Christianity
and the ecclesiastical Empire. The Church, without the strength it
received from the state, could not have met the barbarians of the North,
the Mohammedans of the South, and the heretics within, and successfully
conquered the first, held the second in check, and subdued the third.
Much of what we enjoy to-day along the lines of culture, law, and
religion is due in great measure to that alliance. After the time of
Constantine the Church becomes such a vital and integral part of the
life of Europe that history for a thousand years must be viewed through
the eyes of the Church and estimated by her standards.
In the two centuries which intervened between the time of Constantine
and that of Justinian, imperial legislation directly affecting the
Church in all its institutions made rapid progress. The successors of
Constantine continued his policy. Imperial sanction was necessary for
the validity of every important act in connection with the Church.
Councils were called and dismissed in the name of the sovereign, and
their proceedings were not valid without his approval. At the Council of
Tyre (335), a portion of the bishops appealed to the Emperor's
commissioner to settle the dispute about the Arian question, but he
declared that the question must be submitted to his imperial master for
final decision since it was his province to legislate on all matters
concerning the Church.[294:1] Constantius vetoed a portion of the canons
of Remini (360).[294:2] The Emperors Theodosius II. and Valentinian III.
likewise rebuked the Council of Ephesus (431), and dictated its
procedure.[294:3] The Council of Chalcedon (451) was also told to hurry
up its work because the imperial commissioners present were needed in
state affairs.[294:4] During this period, however, it is possible to
detect pretensions on the part of the Bishop of Rome to the right to
call and preside over councils.[294:5] Here began the conflict over
ecclesiastical sovereignty which was to end in a complete victory for
the Roman Church.
The later Emperors similarly exercised the right to decide all disputed
points of doctrine, discipline, and elections. They nominated, or at
least confirmed, the most influential metropolitans and patriarchs. Thus
in 377, the Emperor's representative decided between two rival claimants
to the apostolic see of Antioch.[295:1] Again, the Roman prefect decided
between two rival claimants to the chair of St. Peter, Ursinus and
Damasus, in favour of the latter, and punished adherents of the
former.[295:2] When rival Popes appealed to Honorius, he appointed a
temporary Pope until he could examine into the case. Then he decided in
favour of Boniface I. and issued an edict to prevent the recurrence of
such a state of affairs.[295:3] The Emperor was the court of last appeal
in all ecclesiastical cases. This was recognised by a council of Rome
held by Ambrose in 378, which requested of Emperor Gratian that when a
Roman bishop was accused, he might always be tried by the imperial
council.[295:4] The best evidence, however, of the subordination of the
spiritual to the temporal authority in this period is found in the
legislation. The whole field of Church government and ecclesiastical
life and all the relations, duties, morals, and acts of the clergy are
covered in the civil laws of the time. Even heresy was put to flight by
imperial edict.[295:5]
During the period of Ostrogothic rule in Italy from 476 to 552, the
Roman Church made a few weak efforts to assert her independence. We
find, for instance, a Roman synod, held in 502, resolving that no layman
has a right to interfere in Church matters. But the Arian Ostrogothic
rulers declared that they had succeeded to the Roman Empire's power over
the Church. Indeed the Theodosian Code was practically incorporated in
the Visigothic Code in 506 by Alaric II. Consequently, Odoacer issued a
decree forbidding the alienation of Church property. Theodoric in 498
decided between two rival claimants to the Papacy, Symmachus and
Lawrence, giving the former the papal chair and the latter a
bishopric.[296:1] When a synod was called later to try Symmachus (501),
it was convened in Theodoric's name. Theodoric even appointed a
"visitor" to reform the abuses in the Church. He sent Pope John I. to
the eastern Emperor on an embassy, and on his return, dissatisfied with
his work, threw him into prison, where he died. Athalaric instructed
Pope John II. how to prevent simony in episcopal and papal
elections.[296:2]
Under Justinian the Great (527-565), who by conquest reunited Italy with
the eastern Empire in 552, the Popes and the Western Church were again
subjected to the eastern rule. Like the Patriarch of Constantinople the
Pope was now the nominee of the Emperor and could be removed at the
pleasure of the prince. Sylverius, made Pope by the Arian Goth
Theodatus, was therefore deposed and exiled by the Emperor's successful
general, Belisarius, and a new Pope was chosen. Vigillus, a favourite of
the Empress, installed as Pope by Belisarius (537), was peremptorily
summoned to Constantinople to answer for his conduct. There a synod was
called, and he was excommunicated. His successor, Pelagius I., was
apparently appointed directly by the Emperor. Justinian, like
Constantine, exercised the right to legislate for every phase of Church
life.[297:1] His theory was that "human and divine authority," that is
civic and ecclesiastical law, "combining in one and the same act,"
formed "one true and perfect law for all."[297:2] He meant to exercise a
spiritual power very much like the temporal power he wielded. Hence he
insisted that the election of a Pope in Rome by the clergy, senate, and
people should not be valid until confirmed by him. This practically
reduced the Pope of Rome to the position of eastern bishops. The
organisation of the Church was guarded and regulated.[297:3] The
property of the Church was protected. The jurisdiction of the clergy was
clearly defined and minutely regulated as an extension of civil power.
In all cases the Emperor was the court of final decision.
This arbitrary interference with the affairs of the Western Church by
the imperial authority at Constantinople brought the papal hierarchy to
the brink of ruin. The clergy were alarmed at this invasion of the
sacred canons of the Council of Chalcedon, and the unity of the Western
Church, which had been so strong for several centuries, was seriously
threatened. The clergy of Gaul "silently withdrew from, or boldly
renounced their communion with Rome; the Illyrian episcopacy prepared to
follow their example"; and Africa became defiant.[298:1] Even the
Italian provinces like Venetia and Liguria became disaffected. Pope
Pelagius I., indebted to the Emperor for his office, was forced to beg
the intervention of the secular arm to compel the ecclesiastical rebels
to continue true to their allegiance to the See of Peter. Sorrowful
indeed was this spectacle to those who could recall the palmy days of
Leo the Great, Felix, Gelasius, and Hormisdas, who had imposed their
will on all ecclesiastics, had planted the banner of Roman supremacy in
every corner of Christendom, and had even imposed their laws on princes.
But it must be remembered that the theory on which Roman leadership
rested had not been assailed, and was soon to reassert itself.
In the election of a Pope in 577, the Roman clergy resumed their
independence and ventured to consecrate and to inaugurate a successor
without even waiting for imperial license. Hence Pelagius II. was the
first independently elected Pontiff since the Byzantine conquest of
Italy. He reasserted the universal primacy of the Bishop of Rome in a
bold tone, and declared that anything done without papal authority was
null and void.[298:2] Meanwhile the disaffection in the West had given
way to pronounced loyalty to Rome.
Even Pope Gregory the Great did not question the supremacy of the
temporal power. He acknowledged the Emperor as his "earthly master" and
said that God had given the ruler dominion even over the
priesthood.[299:1] When Emperor Maurice renewed an old edict prohibiting
monasteries from receiving soldiers as monks (593), Gregory timidly
objected, but quieted his conscience by saying: "What am I but a worm
and dust thus to speak to my masters? . . . I have done what was my duty
in every particular; I have obeyed the Emperor and have not hushed in
silence what I felt to be due to God."[299:2] He attempted, however to
carry out the spirit of the law.[299:3] But Gregory the Great was
willing to compromise the substantial prerogatives of his office. As the
subject of the Emperor, he could yield a point. As Pope he stood as firm
as a rock, yet was too wise to provoke a disruption which could bring
nothing but injury to the unity and power of the Church.
Popes, like patriarchs, were required to keep an "agent" at the eastern
court. The Emperors continued to insist on the right to confirm all
papal elections, and, of course, this practically put the election into
their hands, as is shown by the elevation of so many "agents" to the
papal throne, viz., Vigillus, Pelagius I., Gregory the Great, Sabinian,
etc. The Popes, on their installation, were expected to pay tribute to
the eastern Emperor.[299:4] Even in questions of doctrine, the Emperor
might enforce his will by exiling an obstinate Pope, as in the case of
Martin I. (655).
During the period from 552 to 800, the papal power was growing stronger
all the time, and only awaited a favourable opportunity to issue a
declaration of independence. The Italians hated both the Greeks and
Lombards as foreign masters. Between the two stood the Pope as the only
representative of Italian nationality and the sole champion of Italian
independence. The Papacy was in theory democratic, and celibacy made a
dynasty impossible. The occasion for a declaration of independence was
the Iconoclastic Controversy; the leaders were Gregory II. and Gregory
III., who formally excommunicated Emperor Leo and his hierarchy; and the
new ally to make the independence good was the family of Pepin in Gaul
and Germany. After 772, the papal documents do not bear the name of the
eastern Emperor.[300:1]
The seventh and eighth centuries in European history reveal the elements
of religious and political life in a state of incessant and violent
fermentation. Sudden changes took place in the relative position of
nations. The old Empire was disintegrating and new kingdoms were
appearing. During this period of political transformation, the Church
was the only system that persisted in the old channel that it had
created for itself. The Papacy, though not yet an acknowledged kingdom
in the world, still stood among the political powers as a self-existent
organisation, exercising an influence over princes and subjects. The
governments were isolated, divided, anarchical. In the Church alone was
there unity, order, method, organisation, and supreme purpose. There
alone was found facility of communication and cordial interchange of
views. The Popes of Rome kept up a constant intercourse with all nations
from Asia to the Atlantic and constituted the one recognised unifying
force in Europe standing for the highest ideals of the age along all
lines.
Up to this period the See of Rome had gone far toward establishing an
ecclesiastical monarchy. Every principle of an unlimited religious
autocracy had been asserted and to a considerable extent established.
The outward machinery for this spiritual absolutism had been created and
partially put in motion. But many obstacles to the smooth working of the
system were still encountered. Chief among these impediments was the
strong arm of the eastern Empire. Until the fetters of political
dependence were broken, the Papacy could never accomplish its great
mission.
Hitherto the Church of Rome had assumed a political headship on many
occasions, but it was the result of some accidental emergency and soon
disappeared. Nevertheless the experience gained in this exercise of
secular authority created an ambition on the part of the Roman Pontiffs
for political independence, furnished precedents for future claims, and
led the Italians to believe that the head of the Church could give them
efficient government in temporal affairs as well as spiritual. The great
problem before the successors of St. Peter at this time was how to
manage the ecclesiastical ascendency already gained over the Western
Church, so as to render it serviceable in securing that political
self-existence so essential not only to maintain the ground already won
but also to realise their high hopes in other directions. At this
juncture a combination of external causes, unparalleled in the world's
history, came in to favour the emancipation of the Papacy from the last
feeble bonds of a nominal dependency and to permit of the assumption of
temporal sovereignty virtually if not in recognised title. This meant
the realisation of the mediæval Church.
Emperor Leo's attempt to abolish the worship of images in Christendom
provoked a rebellion in Italy headed by the Pope. Luitprand, seeing his
opportunity as King of the Lombards, fell on the exarchate as the
champion of images and on Rome as the supposed ally of the Emperor. The
Pope, perilously placed between a heretic and an invader, appealed for
help to a Catholic chief across the Alps who had just saved Christendom
by defeating the Mohammedans on the field of Poitiers. Gregory III.
excommunicated the eastern Emperor and begged Charles Martel to hasten
to the succour of the Holy Church. Here the Roman Pontiff leads a
political revolt against his legitimate sovereign and appeals to a
foreign power to make the revolt successful. The Bishop of Rome has
stepped into the position of a temporal prince with the political future
of Italy in his hands.
The alliance of the Papacy with the Franks marks a new epoch not only in
Church history, but in the history of western Europe. These Franks
settled in northern France about 250, and began to Germanise the Celtic
and Romanic races and institutions found there. But the current of Roman
civilisation was so strong that the Franks were swept into it before
they realised it. Under Clovis, they were converted directly to Roman
Christianity.[302:1] With the aid of the Roman Christians, he was able
to conquer the Arian princes of the western Goths, Burgundians, and
Bavarians. He and his successors gave the Church much property,
acquiesced in the papal claims, and helped to extend the papal power
throughout the West, though they ruled the bishops and clergy as their
vassals.[303:1] Clovis, himself, convoked synods and enacted Church
laws. Later rulers followed these precedents.[303:2] Thus the way was
prepared for a successful alliance between the Frankish ruler and the
Papacy.[303:3]
The house of Pepin was to play an important part in this new
arrangement. In 622, Pepin of Laudon, a zealous champion of
Christianity, was made mayor of the palace in Austrasia. Pepin of
Herstal, grandson of the first Pepin, became in 688 a mayor of the
palace for all France (d. 714). He succeeded in making the office
hereditary in his family. A series of infant kings[303:4] made the mayor
virtually king. Pepin viewed the Church as a powerful ally, and fostered
missionaries. Under him, twenty bishoprics were founded, and the Church
secured large territorial possessions.[303:5]
Charles Martel, after a contest of four years, succeeded to his father's
office in 718. He ruled France with the hand of a master, Christianised
the Frisians on the north by force, aided Boniface, the apostle of the
Germans, defeated the Saracens at the battle of Tours (732), and drove
them back into Spain.[303:6] On the death of Theodoric IV. (737),
Charles ruled the Franks directly without setting up another puppet
king. Pope Gregory III. in 739 sent him the keys of St. Peter's grave,
with the offer of the sovereignty of Rome and Italy in return for aid
against the Lombards.[303:7] This proffered alliance was refused, but
Charles offered to mediate between the Pope and the Lombards.[304:1] He
dealt with Church endowments as with any other part of the royal domain.
He gave to his liege Milo the archbishoprics of Rheims and Treves, and
to his nephew Hugh the archbishoprics of Rouen, Paris, and Bayeau with
several abbeys. When he died in 741, "he divided his kingdom between his
sons"--a proof that not only the office of mayor of the palace, but also
that of king, had become practically hereditary in his family; yet
Charles Martel had never assumed the title of king.
The actual alliance of the Pope with the Franks was consummated with
Pepin the Short. The occasion for the compact was the Iconoclastic
Controversy in the East, and the change of dynasty in the West. Pepin
the Short accepted what Charles Martel had refused. He ruled Neustria,
while Carloman, his brother, ruled Austrasia (741-747). When Carloman
became a monk (747), Pepin was left as the sole ruler of all France, but
still under a phantom Merovingian king. In 751, with the consent of the
Franks in their annual assembly, two churchmen were sent to Rome to ask
Pope Zacharias, acting in the capacity of an international arbiter,
whether the real king ought not to take the name of king. The Pope
answered in the affirmative, and thus authorised the usurpation.[304:2]
Thus a new prerogative of the Holy See came into active existence. The
next year the assembly of Soissons elected Pepin and his wife King and
Queen of France. Childeric III., the Merovingian weakling, was shorn of
both his royal hair and his royal crown, and shut up in a monastery.
Boniface in all probability then anointed the head appointed by the
Pope to wear the French crown.[305:1]
Through this alliance, the Pope expected to make the declaration of
independence from the eastern Empire good, to increase and extend papal
power in the West, to establish a precedent for deposing and enthroning
kings--a significant thing for the future,--and to gain material help
against the Arian Lombards who were threatening Rome.[305:2] In 753,
Pope Stephen II., who succeeded Zacharias (752), fled to France from the
Lombards to implore aid from Pepin against them. In sack-cloth and
ashes, he threw himself at the King's feet and would not rise until his
petition was granted.[305:3] The Pope himself now solemnly anointed
Pepin and his family with royal power, at St. Denis, and made him and
his two sons patricians of Rome.[305:4] After that Pepin called himself
"by the grace of God, King of the Franks."
Pepin repaid the Pope by making two excursions into Italy against the
Lombards. He took an army to Italy in 754, defeated the Pope's enemies,
and compelled them to sign a treaty respecting the rights and territory
of the Roman See, but the Franks had scarcely recrossed the Alps before
the promises were broken. Pepin, therefore, entered Italy a second time
(755), called thither by the famous letter purporting to be from St.
Peter himself.[306:1] The Lombard power was effectually broken. The
towns and lands of the exarchate and Romagna, claimed by both the
Lombards and the eastern Emperor, were given to the Pope.[306:2] This is
the famous "Donation of Pepin" by which his envoy laid the conquest of
twenty-two cities at the shrine of St. Peter, and thus began the
temporal power of the Pope.[306:3] The act of donation is lost.[306:4]
The Pope had owned tracts of land all over the Empire before, but now he
becomes through this gift a temporal sovereign over a large part of
Italy known as the "Patrimony of St. Peter," or the "States of the
Church," which continued until 1870, when it was absorbed into the new
kingdom of Italy. This act changed the whole later history of the
Papacy[306:5] and provoked a long controversy with the secular powers of
Europe. Pepin continued to labour to build up the Church in France by
restoring confiscated Church property,[306:6] by undertaking needed
reforms in discipline and organisation,[306:7] and by giving material
assistance and valuable relics to many religious foundations.
This alliance between the most powerful representative of the Germanic
world and the leader of Roman Christendom in the West was one of the
most eventful coalitions in the history of Europe.[307:1] It was the
event upon which all mediæval history turned. It created a new political
organisation in western Europe with the Pope and German Emperor at the
head. For centuries, it affected every institution in western Europe.
After Pepin, each new Pope sent a delegation with the key and flag of
Rome and the key of St. Peter's tomb to the Frankish rulers for
confirmation of the election and to give the king the oath of
allegiance. Thus, the strongest western king assumed the same
prerogative over the Church which the eastern Emperor had exercised.
Pepin's policy was followed by Charles the Great, the German Emperors,
the Austrian Emperors, Napoleon the Great, and Napoleon III.
The next important step in the relations between Church and state was
the restoration of the Roman Empire in the West in 800 by Charles the
Great,[307:2] the son of Pepin. Charles was born in 742, and received
the education of a warrior. At the age of twelve, he was anointed king,
with his father and brother, by Pope Stephen II. (754). As a boy, he
participated in military expeditions and gained considerable renown for
his ability, his independence, and his prowess. When his father died in
768, he ruled jointly with his brother Carloman, whom he apparently
hated very bitterly, and with whom he quarrelled continually, until 771,
when Carloman died and Charles assumed his rule as King of all the
Franks.
The first problem which engaged his attention was to strengthen and
extend his kingdom. This he accomplished by almost incessant military
expeditions, of which he made fifty-three. His domain was extended
north, east, and south. The Bretons were subdued on the north; the
Saxons on the east were conquered after cruelly murdering 4000
prisoners, laying waste their land with fire and sword, and
transplanting 10,000 families elsewhere in Germany and in Gaul.[308:1]
The Slavs beyond the Saxons,[308:2] the Bavarians in the south-east, the
Saracens and Basques in the south,[308:3] the Avars in Pannonia,[308:4]
and the Lombards in Italy, were all subjugated. The result of this
military activity was that Charles ruled over France, nearly all of
Italy, a large part of Germany, Holland and Belgium, and a corner of
Spain. Then by shrewd marriage alliances, he cemented these conquests.
He married his dukes and counts to the princesses of powerful lords and
kings, and he personally took as his wife, in turn, a Lombard, a
Swabian, an east Frankish, an Alemannian princess, and even proposed
marriage to the eastern Empress. He assumed the crown of Lombardy in
773. All parts of this vast realm were held together by a complete
system of royal laws regulating the whole life of his people even in the
minutest details.[308:5]
Charles, as "Patrician of Rome," was no less active in religious lines.
He inherited the alliance with the Papacy and continued it. He protected
the Church against the Saracens in Spain, the pagans to the north and
east, the Arian Lombards in Italy, and the eastern Emperors. After
freeing the Papacy from the Lombards in 774, 781, and 799, he renewed
the "Donation of Pepin" and made some valuable additions.[309:1] He
viewed the Pope, however, as merely the chief bishop in his realm. In
796 Pope Leo III. sent him the key and flag of Rome and the key of St.
Peter's tomb as tokens of submission; and three years later the same
Pope fled to Charles for safety and succour. He reformed and reorganised
the Church in his kingdom and made himself its real head. He carried on
the missionary labours of Boniface by converting the Saxons at the
sword's point, and by forcing Christianity upon the Avars. He preached
to the whole hierarchy, held Church councils, and even admonished the
Pope. He refused to champion the Pope's cause in the Iconoclastic
Controversy, but took a sane middle ground with a leaning toward
iconoclasm. In a council at Frankfort, he presided, and had the council
legislate on discipline and even on dogma (794).[309:2]
The career of Charles as Emperor of the Roman Empire in the West
(800-814) must now be considered.[309:3]
Many causes seemed to be operating to open up this new field for his
masterly ability. A woman, having put out the eyes of her son, was
ruling in the East, contrary to the Roman constitution. Charles had
carved out an Empire with his sword and was undisputed master of the
West. He was the recognised Emperor in power, if not in name. He had
become the defender of the Church and the protector of the Pope. To
assume the imperial crown was not nearly so radical or unnatural an
act, then, as it might seem. In 799, when Pope Leo III. fled from the
Roman mob to Charles at Paderborn, Charles gave him royal entertainment,
promised aid, notified his Frankish diet of his intentions (Aug., 800),
crossed the Alps with an army, and entered Rome in joyous triumph (Nov.,
800).[310:1] There he held a solemn synod in St. Peter's to investigate
the causes of the riot which had driven the Pope out, and also the
charges made against him. The Pontiff was freed of all guilt.[310:2]
The reward for Charles's friendly protection soon came. On Christmas
eve, 800, while he was kneeling in prayer before the altar of St. Peter,
the Church being crowded with the clergy, soldiers, and common people,
the Pope suddenly put a golden crown upon the king's head, while the
Romans shouted: "To Charles Augustus, crowned by God, great and pacific
Emperor of the Romans, life and victory." The Pope then adored him as
Emperor Augustus by bowing the knee as his first subject. The drama was
concluded by anointing Charles and his son Pepin with the sacred
oil.[310:3]
Whether or not this was a surprise to Charles is a disputed question. He
pretended to be greatly surprised, even angered, at the Pope's trick,
and declared that he would not have gone to Church had he known of
it.[310:4] There seems to be little doubt about its being premeditated
by the Pope. The probability is that no surprise was ever more carefully
prearranged on both sides. It is easy to imagine the possibility of its
being planned out at Paderborn over the wine cups and venison stews. It
was very clearly a fine piece of acting on the part of both the Pope and
the king. Certainly every act of the two men for some time previous
pointed directly and unmistakably to that result.[311:1] If we can
believe Charles's own repeated assertions, the exact time and manner may
have been unknown to him, but for years, perhaps as early as 785,
Charles had spoken of the possibility. Alcuin, the great confidant of
Charles in educational and religious matters, knew of the plan before
800. It had naturally often been suggested to the king by his own
officers and nobles and most likely urged by the Popes themselves.[311:2]
In fact the history of both the Frankish dynasty and the Papacy for some
years had been steadily tending to this result as a climax.
The coronation itself was significant for many reasons. Constitutionally
it made the Pope and Charles traitors to the eastern Emperor. Charles
apparently realised this, and, again being a widower, proposed marrying
Irene, the eastern Empress, in order to unite the two parts of the
Empire and thus avoid trouble.[311:3] But so frequently had the Pope and
the Romans broken their allegiance to the East, that this act was not
generally viewed as a rebellion. Furthermore, they assumed that they
stood upon the lofty ground of right in making the transfer. Henceforth,
in the western lists of Emperors, Charles was made to follow Constantine
VI. as the sixty-eighth successor of the first Roman Cæsar.[311:4] In
812, the eastern Emperor was induced to recognise his western brother's
imperial title. The old Roman Empire was now restored in the West on a
Germanic rather than a Roman basis, a fact which revealed the new and
decisive Germanic element in the West. Both the Emperor and the Pope
were benefited beyond measurement by the change, and it is difficult to
say which the more. A Frankish ruler and his family had become the
successors of the Cæsars. The Pope assumed that he had created the
Emperor and henceforth insisted upon the necessity of papal consecration
to the validity of imperial power.[312:1] The Pope had received a
powerful defender and a master who laboured unceasingly to build up the
Church. The foundation was laid for the two rival theories of the
relation of Church and state, viz., the papal theory and the imperial
theory. Henceforth, both Pope and Emperor have a new meaning and a
different career. A new chapter in mediæval history and in European
civilisation was introduced. Christmas 800 "was the most important day
for the next thousand years of the world's history."[312:2]
The results of the rule of Charles as Emperor (800-814) will now be
considered:
1. _Religious._ As Emperor, Charles regarded himself, like the early
Cæsars, as the head of the Church. Hence he spent the winter of 800-801
in settling religious affairs in Italy. He insisted on rigid obedience
in the hierarchy and the subjection of all ecclesiastical authority to
the imperial will. "The Church had to obey him, not he the Church." The
Pope was his chief bishop in his capital city, but always treated with
filial respect and consideration. The bishops were his sworn vassals,
like counts. The appellate power of Rome was never once used during his
rule. He held the appointment of the higher clergy in his own hands,
though after 803, he permitted the appearance of a popular
election.[313:1] He issued edicts on Church matters with as much
authority as in purely secular affairs. In fact, in his laws the
political and religious are so blended that they can hardly be
separated.[313:2] His conception of the relation of the Church and state
has played a vital part in the history of Europe down to the present
time. That relationship was stated by Charles in these words: "It is my
bounden duty, by the help of the divine compassion, everywhere to defend
outwardly by arms the Holy Church of Christ against every attack of the
heathen and every devastation caused by unbelievers, and inwardly to
defend it by the recognition of the general faith. But it is your duty,
Holy Father, to raise your hands to God, as Moses did, and to support my
military services by your prayers."[313:3] It is very evident that in
his mind the old Roman idea of the relation of Church and Empire was
dominant. The connection of Church and state, which Constantine founded,
he established on a firmer basis. The initiative and decision of all
ecclesiastical cases were in his hands.[313:4] He called Church councils
and presided over them just as he summoned his privy council. The
council of Arles (813) sent him its canons to be changed and ratified
at will.[314:1] Discipline, faith, and doctrine all came within his
jurisdiction. He even put _filioque_ into the Nicene Creed against the
Pope's remonstrances (809).[314:2] In short, he organised, systematised,
and controlled the Church in all its branches as a necessary part of his
theocracy.[314:3] He ruled as a David, or a Josiah rather than an
Augustus or a Constantine. Churchmen of ability held seats in the civil
assemblies and were given important political positions. The Church was
forced to contribute soldiers and money to maintain the Empire,[314:4]
although the clergy themselves in 801 were forbidden to participate in
military life. At the same time, he gave the Church for the first time
the legal right to collect tithes, bestowed rich gifts, and endowed
monasteries, splendid churches and cathedrals. No wonder a satirical
priest complained that the power of Peter was confined to heaven, while
the Church militant was the property of the king of the Franks.
The Pope and clergy gladly acquiesced in the usurpation of Charles as
they did in that of Constantine and even gave him the papal title of
"Bishop of Bishops" and "David." The grateful Pope Adrian in a council
of fifty-three bishops gave him the right to name successors for the
Holy See.[314:5] This was little more, however, than the transference to
Charles of a right exercised by all the eastern Emperors. Stephen IV.
decreed that no Pope could be elected save in the presence of imperial
delegates (815).[314:6] Pope Paschal III. had the great patron of the
Church canonised. Even the Patriarch of Jerusalem recognised him as the
head of Christendom and sent him the keys of the Holy Sepulchre on Mount
Calvary and the flag of the city.[315:1]
2. _Political._ Charles clearly differentiated between his office as
king and as Emperor. In recognition of his new dignity, he laid aside
his German royal costume, and donned the Roman imperial tunic, chlamys,
and sandals.[315:2] He ordered that "every man in his whole realm be he
clergyman or be he layman, shall renew to him as Emperor the vow of
fidelity previously taken to him as king," and that "those who have not
yet taken the former vow, shall now do likewise, even down to boys
twelve years of age" (802).[315:3] Rome was the capital of his Empire;
Aachen, of his German kingdom. He divided his Empire among his three
sons as kings, but the death of two of them left Louis both king and
Emperor.[315:4] The Empire which he carved out with the sword was now
unified and ruled by imperial law instead of tradition and custom. His
Empire embraced all western continental Europe except central and
southern Spain and southern Italy. It included Germans as well as
Romans, Slavs, Celts, and Greeks, and was held together by an imperial
army.[315:5] It united the Teutonic civilisation with the Romanic on a
Christian basis. It was divided into twenty-two archbishoprics.
Charles, as the new Constantine of the West, was the absolute sovereign
of this realm. His laws covered every detail in the whole life of his
people.[316:1] Bishops were forbidden to keep falcons; nuns must not
write love letters; the kind of altar pieces used in Churches was
specified; priests were not to wear shoes in divine services. A pure
life was ordered for monks. Instructions were given to farmers for
feeding hens and roosters; the kind of apples to be grown was
prescribed; wine-presses and not feet-presses were to be used. Even the
prices of food and of clothes were regulated by law--a fur coat, it was
decreed, should sell for thirty shillings, a cloth coat for ten
shillings.[316:2] The Empire was divided into districts and marks, ruled
over by imperial "missi" and counts, who executed their master's
will.[316:3] Yet notwithstanding these magnificent and successful
efforts to thwart the Teutonic tendencies to localisation, each tribe
was permitted to retain its own laws, its hereditary chiefs, and its
free popular assemblies of freemen.
Charles never recognised the validity of the papal theory of the right
of the Pope to crown and depose kings by virtue of his own coronation in
800. When he associated his son Louis with him in rule (813), Louis
entered the Church with the king's crown already upon his head. Charles
then ordered him to take the royal crown off and put on an imperial
crown which lay on the Church altar. Neither the Pope's presence nor his
sanction was asked. After Charles's death, however, the Pope carried the
crown of Constantine to Germany and coronated Louis with it (816), and,
before that time, his biographer does not call him Emperor.[317:1]
3. _Educational._ The reign of Charles the Great stands out as the sun
between the intellectual night that preceded and the daylight that
followed his rule.[317:2] He employed the Church as the best means for
furthering the education of his Empire. The clergy and monks became the
teachers and writers; the monasteries and churches were used as the
seats of learning--the schoolrooms and schoolhouses. He issued important
educational laws which practically created a very crude public school
system and required all boys to have a general elementary education. His
purpose was to make good Christians and good subjects.[317:3] The centre
of his whole educational system was his famous "Court School," the very
heart of Christian culture in Europe. In it, called from every section,
were the leading scholars, divines, poets and historians of Europe. In
addition to helping to educate the young princes of the country, they
engaged in important literary activities. They compiled a German
grammar, collected old German songs and minstrels, corrected the Latin
Bible, wrote the Caroline books, collected manuscripts, revived the
classics, and studied the Church Fathers.[317:4]
A careful analysis of the character of Charles the Great shows that he
was a sincere Christian and faithful churchgoer, a great almsgiver and
very kind to the poor, and a man who devoted his life to the upbuilding
of a Christian civilisation.[318:1] Yet he was guilty of deeds which a
higher conception of Christian morals condemns as un-Christian. He
sacrificed thousands of lives to his passions and ambitions; for thirty
years he waged a war of extermination against the Saxons and murdered
more than 4000 prisoners in cold blood. Like Mohammed, he made his
motto, submission to Christianity or death. Christians of that day, for
the most part, pronounced his policy right, although some of the
greatest, like Alcuin, denounced it. He had nine wives and concubines,
and, like Henry VIII. of England, had little conscience in disposing of
them. He was not highly cultured, yet he spoke Latin with ease and knew
some Greek. When an old man, he learned to write and deserves great
credit for the manner in which he encouraged education. He cultivated
the society of the most cultured men in Europe and from them imbibed
much. At meals he had read the heroic deeds of his ancestors, or some
work of the Church Fathers like Augustine's _City of God_. As a warrior
and statesman, only Alexander the Great, Julius Cæsar, and Constantine
before his day can be compared with him. He was the first and greatest
of all the German Emperors. Since his time, only Otto the Great, Peter
the Great, Frederick the Great, and Napoleon the Great, have any claim
to rank as his peers. The Moses of the Middle Ages, he left an indelible
stamp of his genius on Germany and France, continues to be the only
common hero of both of these great nations, and through them modified
the whole western world.[318:2]
Eight years before his death, Charles the Great made his three sons
kings.[319:1] This act would have proved fatal to the Empire. Charles
must have known from the writings of Gregory of Tours, the dangers of
such an arrangement. The division made among his sons was unnatural,
because it lacked unity in race and territory, but the death of Charles
and Pepin, the eldest and second sons, prevented imperial suicide.
Charles the Great then solemnly crowned the surviving son, Louis, as
Emperor in 813. Louis the Pious (814-840) sought to preserve both the
Carolingian practice of division and the integrity of the Empire. At
Aachen, in 817, to prevent the Empire's being "broken by man lest
thereby a scandal, to the Holy Church might arise," Louis made his
eldest son, Lothair, co-Emperor, and, with the consent of the people,
crowned him.[319:2] The younger sons were made kings but _sub seniore
fratre_. Their territorial districts were clearly defined and elaborate
instructions were given about their various relations.[319:3] In 819,
Louis married again and soon a fourth son, Charles the Bald, appeared to
complicate matters (823). Louis then made a new division of the Empire
in order to provide for the new claimant.[319:4] A long list of
territorial changes, and disgraceful, ruinous, internecine wars
resulted.
Louis the Pious died in 840, and was succeeded by Lothair as sole
Emperor. His brothers, Louis and Charles (Pepin was now dead), rebelled
against him and forced him to restrict his possessions to Italy and a
narrow strip running from Italy to the North Sea (843). But Lothair,
tired of the cares of this life retired to a monastery in 855 after
dividing his imperial territory among his three sons.
As a result of the Carolingian policy of division, the Empire so
skilfully constructed by Charles the Great, was almost destroyed.
Division of rule meant division of resources. The successors of Charles
the Great were men of inferior ability. His son, Louis the Pious, was a
weak, easily influenced ruler and completely under the thumbs of the
clergy. He made some noble efforts to reform the court, but only aroused
the enmity of the aristocracy. Lothair, Louis II., and Charles the Bald
were Emperors of as short-sighted a policy and of as little ability.
Civil wars were almost incessant; nobles held in subjection by the great
Charles reasserted their independence; the Northmen,[320:1] Slavs,
Hungarians[320:2] and Saracens began to make disastrous inroads;
imperial laws were disregarded; and by the end of the ninth century, the
Empire of Charles the Great was little more than an empty title hardly
worth fighting for.[320:3]
Another significant result of the decline of the Carolingian Empire was
the rise of modern states. By the treaty of Verdun in 843,[320:4] Louis
the German (d. 876) was given Germany east of the Rhine; Charles the
Bald (d. 877) received what is approximately France of to-day; and
Lothair as Emperor (d. 855) was left Italy and a narrow strip to the
North Sea with the two capitals in it. To confirm the treaty of Verdun,
Louis and Charles with their followers, took the famous Strassburg
oaths.[321:1] Louis and the French army took the oath in Latin; Charles
and the Germans took it in German; and this is the first recognition in
Europe of differences of race and language as a basis for political
action.[321:2] The treaty of Meersen[321:3] in 870 completed the
separation of Italy, Germany, and France by dividing the "strip of
trouble" given to Lothair in 843. Here was the beginning of mediæval and
modern France, Germany, and Italy. The Carolingian Empire virtually
ended with Charles the Fat (888). Disintegration soon divided Europe
among a multitude of petty feudal sovereigns with warring policies and
interests.[321:4]
Ecclesiastically, the Papacy was immediately strengthened. The supremacy
of the state over the Church, which Charles the Great established and
which Louis the Pious had inherited, but did not use to much
advantage,[321:5] was removed. This release from secular control
furnished an excellent occasion and opportunity for the rapid growth of
the papal theory which culminated in the lofty claim of Pope Nicholas I.
to independence of imperial control and supremacy over it. Again and
again the Pope was called upon to act as arbitrator in the disputes and
wars. The power of bishops and metropolitans was likewise increased and
for a similar reason, but the general decline in civilisation carried
the Church inevitably with it. The anarchy and confusion which resulted,
formed an excellent cover for the promulgation of the Pseudo-Isidorian
Decretals. Ultimately the Papacy was weakened by the decline of the
Empire and the rise of national states, because there was a tendency to
create national churches and to set up kings who questioned the Pope's
claim to political supremacy. Indirectly it led to the Protestant
Revolution.
SOURCES
A.--PRIMARY:
1.--_New Testament._
2.--_New Testament Apocrypha._
3.--The Church Fathers. See Chap. X.
4.--Henderson, _Historical Documents of the Middle Ages_. Bohn.
Lib.
5.--Univ of Penn., _Translations and Reprints_, iv., No. 1, 2;
v., 4, 5.
6.--Eginhard, _Life of Charles the Great_. Tr. by S. E. Turner.
N. Y., 1880.
7.--Robinson, _Readings in European History_, vol. i.
8.--Thatcher and McNeal, _Source Book for Mediæval History_.
9.--Ogg, _Source Book of Mediæval History_.
10.--_Theodosian Code._
11.--_Justinian Code._
Bibliographical Note:--Nearly all the important sources for a
study of this subject are in Latin. Among them are,
Mansi, _Sacrorum Conciliorum_; Jaffé, _Regesta
Pontificum_; _Corpus Juris Canonici_; _Corpus Juris
Civilis_; Pertz, _Monumenta Historica Germania_; Niebuhr,
_Corpus Byzantinæ_; Migne, _Patrologia_; Potthast,
_Bibliotheca Historica Medii Ævi_.
B.--SECONDARY:
I.--SPECIAL:
1.--Allies, T. W., _Church and State as Seen in the Formation
of Christendom_. Lond., 1882.
2.--Armitage, W., _Sketches of the Church and State in the
First Eight Centuries_. Lond., 1888.
3.--Bryce, _The Holy Roman Empire_. Var. eds.
4.--Bury, J. B., _The Later Roman Empire_. Edinb., 1889. 2
vols.
5.--Carr, A., _The Church and the Roman Empire_. Lond., 1887.
6.--Church, R. W., _Relations between Church and State_.
Lond., 1881. _Beginnings of the Middle Ages._ Lond.,
1895.
7.--Croke, A. D., _History of the Church under the Roman
Empire_ (to 476). Lond., 1873.
8.--Cutts, E. L., _Charlemagne and His Times_. Lond., 1878.
_Union of Church and State._ Lond., 1881.
9.--Emerton, E., _Introduction to the Middle Ages_. Bost.,
1888. _Mediæval Europe._ Bost., 1894.
10.--Fisher, H. A. L., _The Mediæval Empire_.
11.--Geffcken, H., _Church and State_. Lond., 1877. 2 vols.
12.--Gibbon, E., _Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire_. Var.
eds.
13.--Gierke, O., _Political Theories of the Middle Ages_.
Lond., 1900.
14.--Greenwood, A. D., _Empire and Papacy in the Middle Ages_.
Lond., 1896.
15.--Greenwood, T., _Cathedra Petri_. Lond., 1859-72. 5 vols.
16.--Gregorovius, F. A., _Rome in the Middle Ages_. Lond.,
1900.
17.--Gosselin, J. E. A., _Power of the Pope During the Middle
Ages_. Lond., 1853.
18.--Hardy, E. G., _Christianity and the Roman Government_.
Lond., 1893.
19.--Hodgkin, T., _Italy and Her Invaders_. Oxf., 1892-9.
_Charles the Great._ Lond., 1896. _Theodosius._ Oxf.,
1889. _Theodoric._ N. Y., 1891.
20.--Hussey, R., _Rise of the Papal Power_. Lond., 1863.
21.--Hergenröther, J. A. G., _The Catholic Church and the
Christian State_. Lond., 1876. 2 vols.
22.--James, G. P. R., _History of Charlemagne_. Lond., 1832.
23.--Lea, H. C., _Studies in Church History_. Phil., 1869.
24.--Mann, H. K., _The Lives of the Popes in the Early Middle
Ages_. Lond., 1905.
25.--Manning, H. E., _The Temporal Power of the Vicar of Jesus
Christ_. Lond., 1862.
26.--Mombert, J. I., _History of Charles the Great_. N. Y.,
1888.
27.--Oman, C. W. C., _The Dark Ages_ (476-918). Lond., 1893.
28.--Pressensé, E. de, _History of Church and State_. Lond.,
1869.
29.--Tozer, H. F., _The Church and the Eastern Empire_. Lond.,
1888.
30.--Wells, C. L., _The Age of Charlemagne_. N. Y., 1897.
31.--Workman, H. B., _Church of the West in the Middle Ages_.
Lond., 1898.
II.--GENERAL:
Alzog, ii., 92-104, 184. Butler, ch. 30, 31, 55, 56, 57.
Chantrel, pd. 3, ch. 1. Cheetham, ch. 9. Crooks, ch. 24, 33.
Döllinger, i., ch. 1, sec. 9-10; ii., ch. 5, sec. 1; iii., ch.
4, sec. 1. Dunning, 131-160. Fisher, 161, 168, 244. Gieseler,
i., 191-204, 419; ii., 71, 119, 153, 220, 237. Gilmartin, i.,
ch. 31-32. Guericke, i., sec. 69; Guizot, i., ch. 7-12.
Hardwick, ch. 6, sec. 2. Hase, 134-146, 171-173. Hurst, i.,
161-180, 325-341, 410, 427, 473-495. Jennings, i., ch. 6, 8.
Kurtz, i., 235-247, 483-488. Leavitt, ch. 1-12. Mahan, bk. 4,
ch. 13. Milman, ii., 4, 130, 429; iii., 1-109. Moeller, ii.,
1-2, 84-93, 99-108. Mosheim, bk. 3, pt. 2, ch. 2, sec. 7-13.
Neander, iii., 1-112, 174-195; v., 117-132, 144. Robertson,
i., 294-297, 486, 517; ii., 122-149. Robinson, ch. 4, 6, 7, 8.
Schaff, ii., 90; iii., 203-264.
FOOTNOTES:
[289:1] Justinian, _Inst._, i., ii., 6.
[290:1] Eph. vi., 5; Col. iii., 22; Tit. ii., 9; 1 Pet. ii., 18.
[290:2] Rom. xiii., 1-7; _cf._ Heb. xiii., 17; 1 Pet. ii., 13.
[290:3] Rom. xiii., 6-7.
[290:4] See Tertullian, _Lib. ad Scap._, for a later recognition of the
divine right theory.
[290:5] 1 Peter ii., 13, 14.
[290:6] Tertullian, _Apol._, c. 5 and 26.
[291:1] Tertullian, _Apol._, c. 34; c. 42; _De Corona Milit._, c. 11;
_De Idololatria_, c. 17. See Milman, bk. ii., ch. 7.
[291:2] Milman, ii., 231; Gibbon, ch. 16.
[292:1] Ranke, _Hist. of the Popes_.
[292:2] The title was used down to the time of Gratian in 380.
[293:1] Lea, _Stud. in Ch. Hist._, 15.
[293:2] See Schaff, iii., § 13.
[293:3] _Ibid._, § 22, 23.
[294:1] Harduin, i., 543; Lea, _Stud. in Ch. Hist._, 13 _ff._
[294:2] Cod. Theod., lib. xvi, tit. ii., 1, 15.
[294:3] Harduin, i., 1538.
[294:4] _Ib._, ii., 559.
[294:5] Lea, _Stud. in Ch. Hist._, 15.
[295:1] Theodoret, v., 3.
[295:2] Socrates, iv., 29.
[295:3] Goldast, _Const. Imp._, iii., 587; Harduin, i., 1238.
[295:4] Harduin, i., 842.
[295:5] The laws relating to the Church passed between the time of
Constantine and the promulgation of the Theodosian Code in 438 are
mostly contained in the sixteenth book of that code. The laws passed
between 438 and 534 are found in the Justinian Code which was published
in revised form in that year. See Lea, _Stud. in Ch. Hist._, 16.
[296:1] Goldast, iii., 95, 615.
[296:2] Cassiodorus, _Varior._, ix., 15.
[297:1] These laws are found in the Justinian Code and in the Novellæ,
and cover the period from 534 to 565. Excellent translation by Moyle,
Oxf. 1889.
[297:2] Novellæ, 42.
[297:3] The 134th Novella is a small code in itself.
[298:1] Greenwood, _Cathedra Petri_, ii., 163.
[298:2] Baronius, _Ann._, 587, § 5.
[299:1] Bk. ii., letters 62, 65.
[299:2] Bk. iii., letter 65. Comp. bk. v., letter 40. Greenwood,
_Cathedra Petri_, ii., 233.
[299:3] Bk. vi., letter 2.
[299:4] Anastasius, _Biblioth._, No. 81.
[300:1] Lea, _Stud. in Ch. Hist._, 31.
[302:1] See Ch. XII.
[303:1] Hardwick, _Hist. Christ. Ch. in M. A._, 54.
[303:2] Lea, _Stud. in Ch. Hist._, 84-87.
[303:3] Richter, 36.
[303:4] Robinson, _Readings_, i., 120.
[303:5] Bede, v., 10; Migne, vols. 86-88.
[303:6] Waitz, iii., 23, note 3.
[303:7] _Cf._ Thatcher and McNeal, No. 43.
[304:1] Richter, i., 200.
[304:2] Robinson, _Readings_, i., 120; Ogg, _Source Book_, § 14; Pertz,
i., 136.
[305:1] Ogg, _Source Book_, § 14; Thatcher and McNeal, No. 6.
[305:2] Robinson, _Readings_, i., 122.
[305:3] Pertz, i., 293; Thatcher and McNeal, No. 44.
[305:4] _Ib._, No. 6; Robinson, _Readings_, i., 122; Migne, lxxi., 911.
The title of "patrician" was introduced by Constantine. It was the name
of a rank, not of an office, and was next to that of Emperor and consul.
Hence it was usually conferred upon governors of the first class, and
even upon barbarian chiefs whom the Emperor might wish to win. Thus,
Odoacer, Theodoric, and Clovis had all received the title from the
eastern court. Later it was even given to Mohammedan princes. It was
very significant now that the Pope assumed the imperial right to confer
it, because it was plainly an illegal usurpation. It made Pepin
practically the viceroy of Italy and the protector of the Papacy. (See
Smith and Cheetham.)
[306:1] Migne, lxxxix., 1004; see Robinson, _Readings_, i., 122;
Greenwood, _Cathedra Petri_, iii., 388.
[306:2] Muratori, iii., 96; Migne, cxxviii., 1098.
[306:3] Thatcher and McNeal, No. 45. (Baronius, _Ann._, 755; Migne,
cxxviii., 1099.) See Wiltsch, _Geog. and Statistics of the Ch._, i.,
264.
[306:4] Gibbon, ch. 59.
[306:5] See "Donation of Constantine" in Henderson, 319.
[306:6] Waitz, iii., 364.
[306:7] Pertz, _Leg._, i., 24; Mansi, xii.; Migne, xcvi., 1501.
[307:1] Adams, _Mediæval Civilisation_, 127.
[307:2] The best account of Charles the Great in English is Mombert's.
[308:1] Robinson, _Readings_, i., 129; Ogg, _Source Book_, § 16, 17. See
Mombert, ch. 3, 4.
[308:2] Mombert, ch. 11.
[308:3] _Ibid._, ch. 5.
[308:4] _Ibid._, ch. 7.
[308:5] See Waitz. Ogg, _Source Book_, § 18, 19.
[309:1] Thatcher and McNeal, No. 46; Wiltsch, _Geog. and Statistics of
the Ch._, i., 265; Greenwood, _Cathedra Petri_, ii., 415.
[309:2] See Thatcher and McNeal, No. 47.
[309:3] Döllinger, _Empire of Charles the Great_.
[310:1] _Cf._ Thatcher and McNeal, No. 48.
[310:2] _Ibid._, No. 49. Robinson, _Readings_, i., 131.
[310:3] _Ibid._, i., 134. Thatcher and McNeal, No. 48; Ogg, _Source
Book_, § 20; Mombert, ch. 14.
[310:4] Eginhard, § 28.
[311:1] Muratori, ii., 312; Waitz, iii., 174, note.
[311:2] Döllinger, _Empire of Charles the Great_.
[311:3] See Thatcher and McNeal, No. 13, 14. Bryce, 61-62.
[311:4] Waitz, iii., 184, note.
[312:1] Ludwig II. was led to admit that right in 871. Thatcher and
McNeal, No. 51, 52.
[312:2] Döllinger, _Empire of Charles the Great_.
[313:1] Gratian, _Decret._, Dist. 63, Can. 22; Lea, _Stud. in Ch.
Hist._, 81, 89, 90.
[313:2] Lea, _Stud. in Ch. Hist._, 63.
[313:3] Thatcher and McNeal, No. 47.
[313:4] _Hincmari Inst. Reg._, ch. 34 and 35.
[314:1] Harduin, iv., 1006.
[314:2] Lea, _Stud. in Ch. Hist._, 64-65.
[314:3] Bryce, _Holy Rom. Emp._, 65.
[314:4] Ogg, _Source Book_, § 22; Robinson, _Readings_, i., 136.
[314:5] This is now regarded by some authorities as a forgery. Lea,
_Stud. in Ch. Hist._
[314:6] Lea, _Stud. in Ch. Hist._, 38; Gratian, _Decret._, Dist. 63,
Can. 28.
[315:1] _Ann. Laur._, 188.
[315:2] Milman, _Hist. of Lat. Christ._, ii., 459.
[315:3] Emerton, _Med. Europe_, 7; Robinson, _Readings_, i., 140.
[315:4] Charta Divisionis, 806.
[315:5] Robinson, _Readings_, i., 135-137.
[316:1] _Translations and Reprints?_ Henderson, 189.
[316:2] Lecky, ii., 259.
[316:3] Ogg, _Source Book_, § 21; Thatcher and McNeal, No. 9; Robinson,
_Readings_, i., 139.
[317:1] Eginhard, _Ann._, 813. Read the case of Louis and Lothair 817.
Lea, _Stud. in Ch. Hist._, 42.
[317:2] Ogg, _Source Book_, § 23; Thatcher and McNeal, No. 10, 11, 12.
[317:3] Robinson, _Readings_, i., 144, 145; _Transl. and Reprints_;
Mullinger, _Schools of Charles the Great_.
[317:4] Mombert, ch. 10.
[318:1] Ogg, _Source Book_, § 15; Thatcher and McNeal, No. 7; Mombert,
ch. 6.
[318:2] See Eginhard for the best pen picture of the personal appearance
and habits of this wonderful man. Robinson, _Readings_, i., 126.
[319:1] Louis, the youngest, had Aquitaine, Gascony, Septimania,
Provence, and a part of Burgundy. Pepin, the second son, had Italy,
Bavaria, Almania, and a part of the Alpine country. Charles, the eldest,
received all the rest--old France, Thuringia, Saxony, and Frisia.
[319:2] Henderson, 201.
[319:3] Emerton, 18, 19.
[319:4] Thatcher and McNeal, No. 50.
[320:1] Ogg, _Source Book_, § 27; Thatcher and McNeal, No. 15, 20;
Robinson, _Readings_, i., 150-155, 157, 163.
[320:2] Thatcher and McNeal, No. 21.
[320:3] Ogg, _Source Book_, § 26, 28; Robinson, _Readings_, i., 158.
[320:4] Thatcher and McNeal, No. 17, 18; Ogg, _Source Book_, § 25.
[321:1] Thatcher and McNeal, No. 16; Ogg, _Source Book_, § 24; Robinson,
_Readings_, i., 433.
[321:2] Emerton, _Med. Europe_, 26-28.
[321:3] Thatcher and McNeal, No. 19.
[321:4] Thatcher and McNeal, No. 22, 23, 24, 25.
[321:5] He did insist, however, upon his dominion over Rome and over the
Pope as his vassal. Pope Stephen IV. at once caused the Romans to swear
fealty to the Emperor and ordained that the consecration of the Pope
must take place in the presence of the imperial ambassadors. His son
Lothair was crowned Emperor in Rome and repeatedly repaired thither to
protect the Holy See. Another son, Louis, was also anointed king by Pope
Sergius in Rome. This act strengthened the papal claim to control
elections to secular power. In 871 Louis II. acknowledged his divine
right to imperial rule to be derived from papal sanction. Another step
was taken when the council of Aix-la-Chapelle deposed Emperor Lothair
(842).