THE COMING OF THE FRANKS (726-768)
We now come to the separation of the Latin world from the Greek world in
both political and ecclesiastical affairs, and to the reconstruction of
Europe by the alliance of the Franks and the Papacy. The plot continues
to be very simple. The Empire, pressed by dangerous enemies, tried once
more to gain political strength by ecclesiastical legislation; the
effect of this legislation on the Imperial provinces in Italy was to
cause rebellion. The Papacy broke the ties that bound it to the Empire;
then, finding itself defenceless before the Lombards, made an alliance
with the Franks, who invaded Italy and overthrew the Lombards.
In order to elaborate this plot, we must begin with the great Asiatic
movement of the seventh century; for this movement acted as a cause of
causes to split the Latins from the Greeks, to exalt the Papacy, and to
form the Holy Roman Empire. In one of the tribes of Arabia, without
heralding, appeared a man, who at the age of forty became a religious
prophet, and by the force of genius constructed one of the great
religions of the world. Mohammed's religion worked on the ardent Arabian
temperament like magic, and engendered a fierce passion for conquest and
proselytizing. Tribes cohered, became both a sect and a nation, and
swept like wildfire over the west of Asia and the north of Africa.
Mohammed died in 632, but his successors, the Caliphs, carried on his
work; under the inspiration of the slogan, "Before you is Paradise,
behind you the devil and the fire of hell," they advanced from conquest
to conquest. Cities and provinces were torn from the Empire. Damascus,
Syria, Jerusalem, Mesopotamia, Armenia, Egypt, Rhodes fell in rapid
succession; next Africa, bit by bit. Persia was beaten to her knees.
Sicily was raided. Twice Constantinople had to fight for life.
Naturally Byzantine statesmen felt that some radical step must be taken,
or all the remnants of the Empire would be reduced to slavery. A
vigorous Emperor, Leo the Isaurian (717-741), took the radical step. It
was necessarily religious, for, in Constantinople, political action
always took a religious complexion. Leo issued a decree forbidding the
use of images in churches and in Christian worship (726). Those in place
he ordered broken. He acted no doubt from high motives, thinking to
ennoble religion and to arouse patriotism; but his people disagreed with
him. In the East riots and civil war broke out. These were suppressed,
but discontent and persistent opposition remained. In Italy also the
excitement was intense. The country had already been irritated by severe
taxation, and when the decree of iconoclasm was published, the
image-loving Italians rose in a body. The Pope, as most hurt in
conscience by the decree, and in pocket by the taxation, was the natural
head of resistance. The Exarch attempted to arrest him, but both Latins
and Lombards rallied to his defence. In some places open revolt broke
out, and a plot was started to set up another Emperor in place of the
wicked iconoclast who polluted the Imperial throne. But the Pope,
Gregory II (715-731), was a prudent man, and was not ready to take a
step which would deprive Rome of its single defence from the Lombards.
He opposed the rebellious plan, but in the matter of maintaining the
images he stood like a rock. His successor, Gregory III (731-741), went
farther, and took decisive action. He convoked a synod, which expelled
every image-breaker from the Church (731). This was tantamount to a
direct excommunication of the Emperor, and a declaration of papal
independence. The Emperor was powerless to compel obedience. Thus began
the great split between the Papacy and the Byzantine Empire, between
western and eastern Europe, between the Latin Church and the Greek. Some
of the western provinces, Calabria, Sicily, and Illyria, which were
practically Greek, remained faithful to the Empire and shared its
fortunes for several hundred years more. Ecclesiastically they were
removed from the jurisdiction of the Popes to that of the Patriarchs of
Constantinople.
This breach between the Papacy and the Empire led inevitably to an
alliance between the Papacy and the Franks, which is of such great
historical consequence that it must be recounted in some detail. While
the Empire and the Papacy were quarrelling over ecclesiastical matters,
western Europe had been changing. The Frankish kingdom had been
established in what is now Belgium, Holland, and large parts of France
and Germany, and was the one great Christian power in Europe. Therefore,
when the Papacy had cut loose from the Empire and saw itself defenceless
against the Lombards, it had no alternative but to seek help from the
Franks. There were also two special reasons for friendship between the
Franks and the Papacy. First, the Franks, alone of Barbarians, had been
converted to Catholic Christianity. Secondly, in their endeavours to
enlarge their eastern borders, the Franks had been greatly assisted by
the missionaries, who--in the normal course, missionaries, merchants,
soldiers--had prepared the way for Frankish conquest, and had
strengthened the Frankish power when established. These missionaries
were absolutely devoted to the Roman See; they spread papal loyalty
wherever they went, and wrought a strong bond of union between the
Frankish kingdom and the Papacy. This union of sympathy and interest was
an excellent basis for a political union; and the time soon came for
such a development.
When the iconoclastic revolts occurred in Italy, and the Popes broke
with the Empire, the Lombard kings thought that their opportunity to
conquer all Italy had come. But instead of making one bold campaign
against Rome and the South, they merely laid hands on a few border
cities. The Popes turned with frantic appeals for help to the only power
that could help them, the Franks. Every time the Lombard king made a
hostile move, the Pope cried aloud for aid. For some time the Franks
deemed that the balance of political considerations was against
intervention and refused to take part in Italian affairs. Charles
Martel, mayor of the palace and ruler of the Franks in all but name,
stood firm on the policy of non-interference; but his son and successor,
Pippin the Short, took a different view. Pippin judged that the time had
come to depose the royal Merovingian family and to exalt his own, the
Carlovingian, in its stead. As the Merovingians had reigned for two
hundred and fifty years, the step was revolutionary, and Pippin wished
to strengthen his position by the support of the Papacy. He sent
messengers to the Pope, Zacharias, to ask advice; and the Pope,
according to the chronicler, "in the exercise of his apostolical
authority replied to their question, that it seemed to him better and
more expedient that the man who held power in the kingdom should be
called king and be king, rather than he who falsely bore that name.
Therefore the Pope commanded the king and the people of the Franks, that
Pippin, who was using royal power, should be called king and should be
settled on the throne." The last Merovingian, therefore, was tonsured
and stowed away in a monastery, and Pippin became king of the Franks
(751). Without accepting the monkish chronicler's statement, that the
Pope commanded Pippin to be king, there can be little doubt that the
papal sanction was of very real value to Pippin, and that Pippin let it
appear that he was acting rather in conformity with the Pope's will than
with his own.
Thus the Pope laid Pippin under a great obligation; it now remained for
Pippin to discharge that obligation. It was not long before the time
came.
The Lombard king felt that his opportunity was slipping by, and acted
with some vigour. He captured Ravenna and threatened Rome. The Pope
hurried across the Alps. He anointed and crowned Pippin; he likewise
anointed and blessed his son Charles (Charlemagne), and forbade the
Franks under pain of excommunication ever to choose their king from any
other family. These three great favours, the transfer of the royal
title, the coronation rite, and the perpetual confirmation of the
Carlovingian sovereignty, called for a great return. Pippin promised
that the Adriatic provinces, taken by the Lombards from the Byzantines,
should be ceded by the Lombards to the Pope. This promise Pippin
fulfilled. He crossed the Alps, defeated the Lombard king, and forced
him to cede the Exarchate of Ravenna and the five cities below it on the
coast, to the Pope, who thereby became an actual sovereign. Thus Pippin
discharged his obligation to the Papacy.
This beginning of the Papal monarchy is so important that the theoretic
origin may as well be mentioned here. There was a legend, universally
believed, that an early Pope, Silvester (314-335) healed the Emperor
Constantine of leprosy, and that the Emperor, in gratitude, made a great
grant of territory to the Pope. The fact appears to have been that
Constantine, although not cured of the leprosy, did give to Silvester
the Lateran palace and a plot of ground around it. This little donation
grew in legend like a grain of mustard seed, and served the purpose of
the Roman clergy. No good Roman would have been content with a title
derived from the Lombards or the Franks. In Roman eyes these Barbarians
never had any title to Italian territory; they could give none. The only
possible source of legal title was the Empire. In the gift by
Constantine to Silvester papal adherents had a foundation of fact. That
was enough. It is quite unnecessary to imagine false dealing. People in
those days believed that what they wished true was true. This legend was
accepted and embodied in concrete form in a document known as the
_Donation of Constantine_, which is so important in explaining the
attitude of the Papacy throughout the Middle Ages, that it may be
quoted:--
"In the name of the holy and undivided Trinity, Father, Son, and Holy
Ghost, the Emperor Caesar Flavius Constantine ... to the most holy and
blessed Father of Fathers, Silvester, bishop of Rome and Pope, and to
all his successors in the seat of St. Peter to the end of the world...."
Here comes, interspersed with snatches of Christian dogma, a rambling
narrative of his leprosy, of the advice of his physicians to bathe in a
font on the Capitol filled with the warm blood of babies; how he
refused, how Peter and Paul appeared in a dream and sent him to
Silvester, how he then abjured paganism, accepted the creed, was
baptized and healed, and how he then recognized that heathen gods were
demons and that Peter and his successors had all power on earth and in
heaven. After this long preamble comes the grant:
"We, together with all our Satraps and the whole Senate, Nobles and
People ... have thought it desirable that even as St. Peter is on earth
the appointed Vicar of God, so also the Pontiffs his viceregents should
receive from us and from our Empire, power and principality greater than
belongs to us ... and to the extent of our earthly Imperial power we
decree that the Sacrosanct Church of Rome shall be honoured and
venerated, and that higher than our terrestrial throne shall the most
sacred seat of St. Peter be gloriously exalted.
"Let him who for the time shall be pontiff over the holy Church of Rome
... be sovereign of all the priests in the whole world; and by his
judgment let all things which pertain to the worship of God or the faith
of Christians be regulated.... _We hand over and relinquish our palace,
the city of Rome, and all the provinces, places, and cities of Italy and
the western regions, to the most blessed Pontiff and universal Pope,
Silvester_; and we ordain by our pragmatic constitution that they shall
be governed by him and his successors, and we grant that they shall
remain under the authority of the holy Roman Church."[5]
The date of this document and many statements in it are anachronisms and
errors. It was composed about the time of Pippin's _Donation_, probably
by somebody connected with the papal chancery, and may be considered to
be a pious forgery representing the facts as the writer deemed they were
or else should be. It was officially referred to for the first time in
777, but did not receive its full celebrity until the eleventh century,
when the relations of the Papacy and the Holy Roman Empire became the
centre of European history.
FOOTNOTES:
[5] _Italy and her Invaders_, T. Hodgkin, vol. vii, pp. 149-151; _Select
Historical Documents of the Middle Ages_, Ernest F. Henderson, pp.
319-329.