Italian Monarchs Archives | Michael A. Hartmann

Pepin of Italy

Michael A. Hartmann — Thu, 25 Oct 2018 14:26:09 +0000

Pepin or Pippin (or Pepin Carloman, Pepinno, April 773 – 8 July 810), born Carloman, was the son of Charlemagne and King of the Lombards (781–810) under the authority of his father.
Pepin was the second son of Charlemagne by his then-wife Hildegard.[1] He was born Carloman, but was rechristened with the royal name Pepin (also the name of his older half-brother Pepin the Hunchback, and his grandfather Pepin the Short) when he was a young child.

He was made “king of Italy” after his father’s conquest of the Lombards, in 781, and crowned by Pope Hadrian I with the Iron Crown of Lombardy.

He was active as ruler of Lombardy and worked to expand the Frankish empire. In 791, he marched a Lombard army into the Drava valley and ravaged Pannonia, while his father marched along the Danube into Avar territory. Charlemagne left the campaigning to deal with a Saxon revolt in 792. Pepin and Duke Eric of Friuli continued, however, to assault the Avars’ ring-shaped strongholds. The great Ring of the Avars, their capital fortress, was taken twice. The booty was sent to Charlemagne in Aachen and redistributed to all his followers and even to foreign rulers, including King Offa of Mercia. A celebratory poem, De Pippini regis Victoria Avarica, was composed after Pepin forced the Avar khagan to submit in 796.[3] This poem was composed at Verona, Pepin’s capital after 799 and the centre of Carolingian Renaissance literature in Italy. The Versus de Verona (c. 800), an urban encomium of the city, likewise praises king Pepin.

The “Codex Gothanus” History of the Lombards hails Pepin’s campaign against Benevento and his liberation of Corsica “from the oppression of the Moors.”

His activities included a long, but unsuccessful siege of Venice in 810. The siege lasted six months and Pepin’s army was ravaged by the diseases of the local swamps and was forced to withdraw. A few months later Pepin died, on 8 July 810.

He had one or more mistresses, whose names are not known for certain, and whose ancestry is not given from any reliable source although one has been conjectured to have been called Bertha, and she is believed to be the daughter of William of Gellone, count of Toulouse. Pepin had one son and five daughters (they were: Adelaide, married Lambert I of Nantes; Atala; Gundrada; Bertha; and Tetrada), all of whom but the eldest were born between 800 and Pepin’s death. All except Adelaide and Tetrada died before their grandfather’s death in 814. Tetrada married Adelaide’s stepson, Lambert II of Nantes. Pepin’s son was Bernard. Pepin was expected to inherit a third of his father’s empire, but he predeceased him. The Lombard crown passed on to his illegitimate son Bernard, but the empire went to Pepin’s younger brother, Louis the Pious.

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Charlemagne

Michael A. Hartmann — Wed, 24 Oct 2018 03:08:45 +0000

Charlemagne (/ˈʃɑːrləmeɪn/) or Charles the Great (German: Karl der Große, Italian: Carlo Magno/Carlomagno; 2 April 742[1] – 28 January 814), numbered Charles I, was King of the Franks from 768, King of the Lombards from 774, and Holy Roman Emperor from 800. He united much of western and central Europe during the Early Middle Ages. He was the first recognised emperor to rule from western Europe since the fall of the Western Roman Empire three centuries earlier.[2] The expanded Frankish state that Charlemagne founded is called the Carolingian Empire. He was later canonized by Antipope Paschal III.

Charlemagne was the eldest son of Pepin the Short and Bertrada of Laon, born before their canonical marriage. He became king in 768 following his father’s death, initially as co-ruler with his brother Carloman I. Carloman’s sudden death in December 771 under unexplained circumstances left Charlemagne as the sole ruler of the Frankish Kingdom.[4] He continued his father’s policy towards the papacy and became its protector, removing the Lombards from power in northern Italy and leading an incursion into Muslim Spain. He campaigned against the Saxons to his east, Christianizing them upon penalty of death and leading to events such as the Massacre of Verden. He reached the height of his power in 800 when he was crowned “Emperor of the Romans” by Pope Leo III on Christmas Day at Rome’s Old St. Peter’s Basilica.

Charlemagne has been called the “Father of Europe” (Pater Europae),[c] as he united most of Western Europe for the first time since the classical era of the Roman Empire and united parts of Europe that had never been under Frankish rule. His rule spurred the Carolingian Renaissance, a period of energetic cultural and intellectual activity within the Western Church. All Holy Roman Emperors considered their kingdoms to be descendants of Charlemagne’s empire, as did the French and German monarchies. However, the Eastern Orthodox Church views Charlemagne more controversially, labelling as heterodox his support of the filioque and the Pope’s recognizing him as legitimate Roman Emperor rather than Irene of Athens of the Byzantine Empire. These and other machinations led to the eventual split of Rome and Constantinople in the Great Schism of 1054.[5][d]
Charlemagne died in 814, having ruled as emperor for 13 years. He was laid to rest in his imperial capital city of Aachen. He married at least four times and had three legitimate sons, but only his son Louis the Pious survived to succeed him.
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Bernard I

Michael A. Hartmann — Wed, 24 Oct 2018 01:03:51 +0000

Bernard (797, Vermandois, Picardy – 17 April 818, Milan, Lombardy) was the King of the Lombards from 810 to 818. He plotted against his uncle, Emperor Louis the Pious, when the latter’s Ordinatio Imperii made Bernard a vassal of his cousin Lothair. When his plot was discovered, Louis had him blinded, a procedure which killed him.

Life

Bernard was born in 797, the illegitimate son of King Pepin of Italy, himself the son of the Emperor Charlemagne. In 810, Pepin died from an illness contracted at the siege of Venice. Despite being illegitimate, his grandfather allowed Bernard to inherit Italy. [1] Bernard married a woman named Cunigunde, but the year of their marriage, and her origins are obscure. Some sources refer to her as “of Laon”. They had one son, Pepin, Count of Vermandois, who was born in 817.
In 817, Louis the Pious drew the Ordinatio Imperii, detailing the future of the Frankish Empire. Under this, the bulk of the Frankish territory went to Louis’ eldest son, Lothair; Bernard received no further territory, and although his Kingship of Italy was confirmed, he would be a vassal of Lothair, as he had been to Louis and to Charles.[2] Certain of his counselors, including Count Eggideo, and his chamberlain Reginhard persuaded Bernard that arrangement threatened his position. Other named were Reginhar, the last being the grandson of a Thuringian rebel against Charlemagne, and Hardrad. Anshelm, Bishop of Milan and Theodulf, Bishop of Orléans, were also accused of being involved: there is no evidence either to support or contradict this in the case of Theodulf, whilst the case for Anshelm is murkier.

Prior to this, Bernard’s relationship with his uncle appears to have been cooperative. Bernard’s main complaint was the notion of his being a vassal of Lothair. In practical terms, his actual position had not been altered at all by the terms of the decree, and he could safely have continued to rule under such a system. Nonetheless, “partly true” reports came to Louis the Pious that his nephew was planning to set up an ‘unlawful’ – i.e. independent – regime in Italy.

Louis the Pious reacted swiftly to the plot, marching south to Chalon. Bernard and his associates were taken by surprise; Bernard travelled to Chalon in an attempt to negotiate terms, but he and the ringleaders were forced to surrender to Louis, who had them taken to Aix-la-Chapelle where they were tried and condemned to death. Louis ‘mercifully’ commuted their sentences to blinding, which would neutralize Bernard as a threat without actually killing him; however, the process of blinding (carried out by means of pressing a red-hot stiletto to the eyeballs) proved so traumatic that Bernard died in agony two days after the procedure was carried out. At the same time, Louis also had his half-brothers Drogo, Hugh and Theoderic tonsured and confined to monasteries, to prevent other Carolingian offshoots challenging the main line. He also treated those guilty or suspected of conspiring with Bernard harshly: Theodulf of Orleans was imprisoned, and died soon afterwards; the lay conspirators were blinded, the clerics deposed and imprisoned; all lost lands and honours.A text called The Vision of the Poor woman of Laon criticizes Louis for Bernard’s death.

Legacy

His Kingdom of Italy was reabsorbed into the Frankish empire, and soon after bestowed upon Louis’ eldest son Lothair. In 822, Louis made a display of public penance at Attigny, where he confessed before all the court to having sinfully slain his nephew; he also welcomed his half-brothers back into his favour. These actions possibly stemmed from guilt over his part in Bernard’s death. It has been argued by some historians that his behaviour left him open to clerical domination, and reduced his prestige and respect amongst the Frankish nobility.[3] Others, however, point out that Bernard’s plot had been a serious threat to the stability of the kingdom, and the reaction no less a threat; Louis’ display of penance, then, “was a well-judged gesture to restore harmony and re-establish his authority.

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