LITMIR.BIZ

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emperor had little in common with that of Marcus Aurelius or Constantine. In the first place, the eastern emperors continued to reign in Constantinople for centuries, quite regardless of Charlemagne and his successors. In the second place, the German kings who wore the imperial crown after Charlemagne were generally too weak really to rule over Germany and northern Italy, to say nothing of the rest of western Europe. Nevertheless, the Western Empire, which in the twelfth century came to be called the Holy Roman Empire, endured for over a thousand years. It came to an end only in 1806, when the last of the emperors, wearied of his empty if venerable title, laid down the crown.

      The title of emperor a source of trouble to the German rulers.

      The assumption of the title of emperor was destined to make the German rulers a great deal of trouble. It constantly led them into futile efforts to maintain a supremacy over Italy, which lay without their natural boundaries. Then the circumstances under which Charlemagne was crowned made it possible for the popes to claim, later, that it was they who had transferred the imperial power from the old eastern line of emperors to the Carolingian house, and that this was a proof of their right to dispose of the crown as they pleased. The difficulties which arose necessitated many a weary journey to Rome for the emperors, and many unworthy conflicts between the temporal and spiritual heads of Christendom.

      Charlemagne's system of government.

      33. The task of governing his vast and heterogeneous dominions taxed even the highly gifted and untiring Charlemagne; it quite exceeded the capacity of his successors. The same difficulties continued to exist that had confronted Charles Martel and Pippin—above all a scanty royal revenue and over-powerful officials who were prone to neglect the interests and commands of their sovereign. Charlemagne's distinguished statesmanship is nowhere so clearly seen as in his measures for extending his control to the very confines of his realms.

      

      Charlemagne's farms.

      His income, like that of all mediæval rulers, came chiefly from his royal estates, as there was no system of general taxation such as had existed under the Roman Empire. He consequently took the greatest care that his numerous plantations should be well cultivated and that not even a turnip or an egg which was due him should be withheld. An elaborate set of regulations for his farms is preserved, which sheds much light upon the times.[47]

      Origin of titles of nobility.

      The officials upon whom the Frankish kings were forced to rely chiefly were the counts, the "hand and voice of the king" wherever he could not be in person. They were to maintain order, see that justice was done in their district, and raise troops when the king needed them. On the frontier were the counts of the march, or margraves (marquises), already mentioned. These titles, together with that of duke, still exist as titles of nobility in Europe, although they are no longer associated with governmental duties except where their holders have the right to sit in the upper house of parliament.

      The missi dominici.

      To keep the counts in order, Charlemagne appointed royal commissioners (the missi dominici), whom he dispatched to all parts of his realm to investigate and report to him how things were going in the districts assigned to them. They were sent in pairs, a bishop and a layman, so that they might act as a check on one another. Their circuits were changed each year so that they should have no chance to enter into conspiracy with the counts whom it was their special business to watch.[48]

      The revival of the Roman Empire in the West made no difference in Charlemagne's system of government, except that he required all his subjects above twelve years of age to take a new oath of fidelity to him as emperor. He held important assemblies of the nobles and prelates each spring or summer, where the interests of the Empire were considered. With the sanction of his advisers, he issued an extraordinary series of laws, called capitularies, a number of which have been preserved. With the bishops and abbots he discussed the needs of the Church, and above all the necessity of better schools for both the clergy and laity. The reforms which he sought to introduce give us an opportunity of learning the condition in which Europe found itself after four hundred years of disorder.

      The dark century before Charlemagne.

      34. Charlemagne was the first important king since Theodoric to pay any attention to book learning, which had fared badly enough since the death of Boethius, three centuries before. About 650 the supply of papyrus had been cut off, owing to the conquest of Egypt by the Arabs, and as paper had not yet been invented there was only the very expensive parchment to write upon. While this had the advantage of being more durable than papyrus, its cost discouraged the multiplication of copies of books. The eighth century, that immediately preceding Charlemagne's coronation, is declared by the learned Benedictine monks, in their great history of French literature, to have been the most ignorant, the darkest, and the most barbarous period ever seen, at least in France. The documents of the Merovingian period often indicate great ignorance and carelessness on the part of those who wrote them out.

      The elements of learning preserved by the Church.

      Yet, in spite of this dark picture, there was promise for the future. It was evident, even before Charlemagne's time, that the world was not to continue indefinitely in the path of ignorance. Latin could not be forgotten, for that was the language of the Church and all its official communications were in that tongue. The teachings of the Christian religion had to be gathered from the Bible and other books, and the church services formed a small literature by themselves. Consequently it was absolutely necessary that the Church should maintain some sort of education in order to perform its complicated services and conduct the extensive duties which devolved upon it. All the really efficient church officers, whatever their nationality, must have been able to read the Latin classics, if they were so inclined. Then there were the compilations of ancient knowledge already mentioned,[49] which, incredibly crude and scanty as they were, kept up the memory of the past. They at least perpetuated the names of the various branches of knowledge and contained, for example, enough about arithmetic and astronomy to help the isolated churchman to calculate each year the date of Easter.

      Two letters of Charlemagne's respecting the neglect of education among the clergy.

      Charlemagne was the first temporal ruler to realize the serious neglect of education, even among the clergy, and we have two interesting letters from him, written before he was made emperor, relating to this subject. In one to an important bishop, he says: "Letters have been written to us frequently in recent years from various monasteries, stating that the brethren who dwelt therein were offering up holy and pious supplications in our behalf. We observed that the sentiments in these letters were exemplary but that the form of expression was uncouth, because what true devotion faithfully dictated to the mind, the tongue, untrained by reason of neglect of study, was not able to express in a letter without mistakes. So it came about that we began to fear lest, perchance, as the skill in writing was less than it should be, the wisdom necessary to the understanding of the Holy Scriptures was also much less than was needful. We all know well that, although errors of speech are dangerous, errors of understanding are far more dangerous. Therefore, we exhort you not merely not to neglect the study of letters, but with a most humble mind, pleasing to God, earnestly to devote yourself to study, in order that you may be able the more easily and correctly to penetrate the mysteries of the Holy Scriptures."

      

      In the other letter he says: "We have striven with watchful zeal to advance the cause of learning which has been almost forgotten through the negligence of our ancestors; and by our own example, we invite all those who can, to master the studies of the liberal arts. In this spirit, God aiding us, we have already carefully corrected all the books of the Old and New Testaments, corrupted by the ignorance of the copyists."

       An Example of the Style of Writing used in the Books of Charlemagne's Time[50]

      

      It seemed to Charlemagne that it was the duty of the Church not only to

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