Charlemagne and the Fall of An Empire

Charlemagne is often credited with leading a renaissance in culture, arts, literature and religion during his rule over the Carolingian Empire that lasted until his death in 814. Charlemagne was a key figure who sought to bring unity to the different groups that made up the kingdom, but the Carolingian Empire would prove destined to failure not long after the ruler’s death. Scholars have argued that the systems and infrastructure put into place by Charlemagne contributed to the empire’s fall, not necessarily because those systems were weak, but because they required him as a leader in order to thrive. Though the Carolingian Empire experienced a cultural revitalization, it did not survive long following the death of Charlemagne for a variety of reasons, including failure to solve problems that arose during his reign, the use of a gavelkind system and threats from foreign invaders.

Charlemagne ruled until 814, and during that time, led a cultural revolution within the empire’s borders. He was a ruler who understood that his empire was built up by many different groups with different ethnicities, traditions and even languages, and attempted to unite them under the Carolingian Empire. Under Charlemagne, the army was made up of local men who were typically paid in land grants for their service, a system that would later prove to be a source of contention following his death as expansion to the empire became less frequent. Charlemagne used counts in order to serve as government representatives of authority at all local levels, a system that only worked when the counts were loyal and performed their tasks as Charlemagne envisioned, another potential source of fragility following his death. Charlemagne was particularly concerned with religious revival and the spread of the Christian worldview within the empire’s borders. According to scholar Richard Sullivan, Charlemagne focused on several key areas of religious reform: “strengthening the church’s hierarchical structure, clarifying the powers and responsibilities of the hierarchy, improving the intellectual and moral quality of the clergy…and rooting out paganism.” Beyond military and religious reforms, Charlemagne also brought about changes to Carolingian culture and literacy.

Many scholars argue that the warning signs of deterioration and potential collapse for the empire were in place during Charlemagne’s reign despite the improvements the ruler is said to have made to life in the Carolingian empire. A key part of the territory’s culture focused on land-based sources of income, and under Charlemagne, the military stopped conquering new lands, leading to fewer rewards being available to those who had become accustomed to such tributes. Sullivan writes that Charlemagne’s government was continually adding new tasks and responsibilities without proper manpower or materials to accomplish the jobs. That, he argues, led to discontent within the royal ranks because land and power were growing scarce, lending a sense of uneasiness and fragility to the system as a whole.

A second scholar also places much of the blame for the empire’s collapse at the feet of Charlemagne and his government bodies. Heinrich Fichtenau argues that, while Charlemagne’s work laid out a framework for future rulers, the Carolingian Empire failed because it was constructed too quickly and imposed on people who were not yet ready fully to accept it. Fichtenau writes, “it was bound to be a failure, because the people who lived in it and directed it were not fully mature, because they had not yet learnt to combine submission to law with liberty” (XV). Fichtenau primarily credits Charlemagne’s religious reforms with this collapse, noting that Charlemagne did away with the structures his people were accustomed to without allowing for enough time for the new religious reforms to create new ones. This ties back to his argument about the speed of Charlemagne’s reforms serving as a dagger to the empire’s future ability to thrive. Though there are some scholars who disagree with Fichtenau’s position (Sullivan writes that Charlemagne’s accomplishments make him worthy of the title of ‘Charles The Great’), it is difficult to ignore the potential effects that the lack of new land may have had on those in the empire who had grown accustomed to land-based rewards. It was a system that many were dependent upon, and led to a form of “land-hunger” when there was limited land available. This problem became more glaring during the civil wars that would arise following Charlemagne’s death.

While Charlemagne’s role in the collapse of the Carolingian Empire should be, and often is, debated, there is little doubt that the gavelkind system used to divvy up the land near the end of his reign ultimately proved to be a key cause of deterioration to the empire. Before he died, the empire’s lands were divided among several people, including King Louis the Pious and King Pepin, with Louis eventually assuming control of the entire empire after Charlemagne died in 814. The transition to Louis the Pious and his subsequent reign over the Carolingian lands were not smooth. Louis fell out of some favor when he sought to blind Bernard of Italy, whose assumption of the throne as the illegitimate son of King Pepin sparked an uprising, and Louis ended up killing Bernard instead. It was an act that led the people of the empire to view their emperor as weakened, adding a bit of instability to the empire that likely had not been as prevalent when Charlemagne ruled.

Louis’ plan to divide the empire equally among his three sons as kings and name his eldest as the successor to the crown initially appeared to work well for the Carolingian Empire, despite having its roots in the practice of partible inheritance. Though unknown at the time of the division, Louis would eventually meet and marry another woman, and have a son with her – his fourth. Louis’ attempts to re-divide the land to include his latest child did not please his first three sons, who balked at the idea of having the size of their land reduced to favor a half-brother, and sparked a civil war within the empire that was not resolved until the Treaty of Verdun in 843, which settled the land disputes in the Carolingian Empire among those quarreling.

While the details of what happened during the civil war are important, their roots are even more critical to understanding at least one factor that led to the ultimate collapse of the empire, which is gavelkind. Gavelkind is the practice of dividing the lands equally among a king’s heirs, rather than simply passing along the land and power to the eldest son, which is what happens in a primogeniture system. With the gavelkind system as it existed in the Carolingian Empire, each time land was passed down from king to son(s), it became smaller and smaller, with the territories of the empire becoming increasingly more fragmented. This problem was compounded by the reduction in conquering done by the military. A primogeniture system from the beginning would have allowed for fewer leaders (and perhaps a reduced likelihood of clashes among leaders who disagree) and more land, as the land would remain largely intact as it passed from first-born male to first-born male.

Finally, due much in part to the civil wars that had plagued the empire’s lands, the Carolingian Empire was ripe for attacks from invaders, and there was no shortage of such foreign enemies. During the Dark Ages, the Vikings and Magyars were primarily responsible for invading the empire. The Vikings, who were predominantly pagan (which Charlemagne had sought to eliminate from the empire), came from Scandinavia via the sea, while the Magyars, also pagans, came from parts of Asia. The Vikings mostly used their new invention, the longboat, in the ninth century to raid the Carolingian empire until they decide to settle in colonies. While Charlemagne had maintained a land-based army, the empire’s fighters had little skill in water, and the different territories were picked off on several different sides. The leaders at the time, including Charles the Fat, were unable to save the land from the Vikings, and, facing rebellion from his family, Charles fled, and the empire was left to be broken down into several pieces as it was no longer destined to be what it once was under Charlemagne.

Scholar Heinrich Fichtenau writes of the fall of the Carolingian Empire: “Already under Charles the Great there were very strong political and social tensions in the structure of the Frankish state...Although these disruptive forces did not become completely obvious until after Charles’ death, the decay of the Frankish monarchy must be attributed to them” (VIII). While Fichtenau’s position is debated heavily, there does appear to be some truth to his findings, though it is difficult to assign sole blame for the empire’s deterioration to Charlemagne. It is nearly impossible to overlook the practice of gavelkind as a major contributor to the fall of the Carolingian Empire, as the land was constantly being divided into smaller and smaller pieces with little new land being offered to the loyal. Coupled with Charlemagne’s death and a series of leaders who could not continue Charlemagne’s cultural renaissance and vision for the Carolingian Empire, the empire was no longer able to withstand the pressure of both internal (a rebellion) and external (the Vikings and Magyars) forces and succumbed before the end of the ninth century.

Works Cited

Fichtenau, Heinrich. The Carolingian Empire. Toronto: University of Toronto Press in association with the Mediaeval Academy of America, 1978. Print.

Sullivan, Richard E. “Charlemagne (Holy Roman emperor).” Encyclopedia Britannica Online. Encyclopedia Britannica, n.d. Web. 2. Dec. 2013. http://www.britannica.com/EBchecked/topic/106546/Charlemagne