charlemagne

Charles the great

Charles the great

(French: Charlemagne, German: karldergro ß e, English: Charles the great; April 2, 742-january 28, 814), or

charlemagne

(man means the great emperor). King of the Carolingian kingdom of Frank (768-814, January 28), founder of Charlemagne Empire and founder of the German Holy Roman Empire.

In 768, after the death of his father pipin, Charlemagne and his younger brother Kallman were crowned kings respectively to divide the kingdom of Frank. After the death of Karlman in 771, Charlemagne merged the whole territory of Frank. In 774, in the name of aiding Pope Hadrian, Charlemagne sent troops to destroy the Lombardy Kingdom and expanded his influence to the north and central Italy. From 772 to 804, he launched many wars against Saxons, conquered Bavaria, defeated Slavs and awals, and made Charlemagne Empire reach the Baltic Sea in the north and the western region of Eastern Europe in the Adriatic Sea in the south. In 800, he was crowned "emperor of the Romans" by Pope Leo III. In 806, Charlemagne made a will to divide the Empire equally among his three sons, Charlie, pipin and Louis the devout. In 814, Charlemagne died in Aachen at the age of 72.

Charlemagne made outstanding achievements in administration, justice, military system and economic production, and vigorously developed cultural and educational undertakings. It was he who introduced European civilization and shifted the cultural center from the Mediterranean Greece to the Rhine River in Europe. He was regarded by later generations as one of the most important rulers in European history and enjoyed the honor of "pater europae".

(photo in overview: Albrecht Durer painted Charlemagne in 1511)

Life of the characters

Family history and succession

In 741, Charlemagne was born in helstar, Belgium. His father was pipin III, the palace Minister of the Frankish Kingdom. The victory of the battle of tours in 732 shattered the plan of the Arab Empire to conquer France. In 751, Pippin declared himself king of frank, ended the rule of the merovian Dynasty, and established a new dynasty, now called the Carolingian Dynasty, which was named after Charlemagne's grandfather, Charles Martel.

On September 24, 768, Pippin the dwarf died in Saint Denis. On his deathbed, according to the tradition of the merovian Dynasty, he divided the land of the Frankish Kingdom equally between his two sons: Charlemagne got ostracia and neostria and the north of Aquitaine, and his brother karoman got the south of Aquitaine, Burgundy, Provence and septimantia. In October, Charlemagne and Kallman were crowned kings in nuoyon and suwatson respectively.

In the initial period of time, the brothers were still in harmony, but when the Aquitaine uprising occurred, Karlman refused to help Charlemagne suppress the uprising. Through similar events, the two people's contradictions gradually become more and more. But in 771, kaloman died suddenly. This accident made Charlemagne, 29, merge the whole territory and become the only monarch of the Frankish Kingdom.

Einhard, who wrote a biography of Charlemagne, described him as a burly man, nearly seven feet tall, with big, shiny eyes, a slightly longer nose, a ruddy face and a cheerful expression. Charlemagne's private life habits are not all good, but he abides by religious rituals and is very concerned about the missionary cause and school run by the church. Although he never learned to write, he knew Germanic and Latin, and could understand Greek, though not well. Charlemagne admired learned people and did a lot of work to encourage scholarly research.

Lombardy Conquest

When Charlemagne ascended the throne, the Frankish Kingdom mainly included modern France, Belgium and Switzerland, as well as many areas of the Netherlands and Germany today. With the further development of feudalism, the military and church nobles urgently demanded to expand to plunder land and labor. In this situation, Charlemagne's command of Frank's army began a large-scale campaign year after year.

After karoman's death, his widow and two sons have taken refuge in the Lombardy kingdom in northern Italy. In 773, desidrius, the last king of Lombard, sent troops to attack Hadrian I, the Pope who did not obey his orders, and arrived at the city of Rome. Charlemagne and his Lombardy wife tisederata divorce, no scruple, determined to send troops to Italy. In 774, Charlemagne led the army to cross the Alps and attack Lombardy kingdom in the name of aiding the pope after receiving the Holy See's call for help. He took the tactics of surprise attack, siege and forced landing, occupied all the territory of Lombardy, captured Desiderius, and became king of Lombardy. Carloman's widow and children fell into Charlemagne's hands and never showed up again.

On Easter day in 774, when the war was still going on, Charlemagne went to Rome to reiterate to the Pope his father Pippin's promise in 756 (see Pippin's contribution), that is, to dedicate central Italy to the Pope. He was awarded the title of "Roman elder" by the Pope. From then on, northern and central Italy was under Charlemagne's control.

In 776, with the support of Alexis, the Duke of Benevento in southern Italy, the son of desidrius launched a rebellion. Charlemagne invaded Italy again in 780, calmed the rebellion, made Benevento a vassal, and made his 5-year-old son pipin king of Italy.

In the west of the Frankish Kingdom, Charlemagne, after three wars, pacified the rebellion of the Aquitaine aristocrats, and in 778, he made his son Louis (the pious Louis) king of Aquitaine.

Eastern Expansion

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Charlemagne's largest military operation in his military career was the conquest of the Saxons.

Saxons lived between the lower Rhine River and the Elbe River. In the 8th century, they were in the disintegration stage of primitive commune and believed in primitive polytheism. From 772 to 804, Charlemagne launched several attacks in the name of spreading Christianity in order to bring Saxon into the territory of the Frankish Kingdom. The Saxons resisted the invasion and enslavement of the Franks tenaciously. The war lasted until 804, and the total number of attacks was no less than 18. Sometimes Charlemagne personally led the attack, and sometimes sent nobles to lead the attack. Although it paid a great price, it still failed to win all the games and gain a firm foothold in the area where the Saxons live.

With the war going on, the social structure and political power of Saxony were divided, and the weakened aristocrats surrendered to Charlemagne and regained their land as vassals. In 792, the Free Peasants in Saxony revolted against the annexation of land by the Franks and the Saxon nobles. In 803, Charlemagne held a meeting in Regensburg, which clearly defined Saxony as the border of Eastern Frank. In 804, the liberal uprising which lasted for more than ten years was completely suppressed, and Saxony was completely included in the territory of Charlemagne empire.

In the war, Charlemagne adopted cruel means of repression, massacred a large number of Saxons and forced them to migrate. For example, during the battle of Verdun in 782, Charlemagne executed 4500 Saxon hostages in one day, and later forced 10000 Saxon families to move to Gaul, Flanders and other places to prevent rebellion. However, he paid more attention to the use of the Christian Church as a means to consolidate the conquest. He built a large number of churches in Saxony, forced all Saxons to believe in Christianity, and stipulated that those who violated churches and priests, did not believe in Christianity, did not abide by religious rules, and retained pagan habits could be executed. Residents everywhere had to provide land, houses, labor and taxes for the church. It is estimated that as many as a quarter of Saxons have been killed in the course of these forced conversion movements.

Through conquest, Charlemagne carried out the feudal system of Western Europe to Saxony and central Europe.

While fighting the Saxons, Charlemagne also went to southern Germany and southwest France to consolidate his control over these areas. In 787, he sent troops to Bavaria on the South Bank of the Danube River, deposed the Duke of Bavaria, and divided Bavaria into several count districts, which were governed by the Earls appointed by him.

In order to ensure the security of the Empire and the eastern border area, Charlemagne fought against the Slavs living on the East Bank of the Elbe River and made some tribes submit.

From 788 to 796, Charles lived together with the awals living in Pannonia, the middle reaches of the Danube, and waged a large-scale war. The awar Khanate is a country established by the Rouran people, a nomadic tribe in Asia, who moved to Europe. In 791, Charlemagne was infuriated by the awals' support for the Bavarian uprising. He personally led the army to defeat the leader of the awals, Chakan, and fought from the erns River to the Rab river. In 796, the Frankish army led by pipin of Italy captured the invincible circular barrier surrounded by wooden palisades, and seized a large amount of wealth long plundered by the awals. The army of Qarhan and Qarhan disintegrated gradually. From 799 to 803, the awals launched an uprising against the rule of the Franks, but it failed. Charlemagne established the Pannonian mark ("mark" means "border region") in this area to strengthen control

Chinese PinYin : Cha Li Man