THE CHRISTIAN REALMS 255by the regnal years of the Frankish kings. Although in practice the
ties between the county of Barcelona and the increasingly debilitated
French monarchy declined after the middle of the ninth century,
they were never formally broken and certainly until the extinction of
the Carolingian dynasty in the late tenth century most of the leading
lay and clerical magnates thought it worthwhile to have their charters
confirmed by their nominal royal overlords.^55 The long survival of
political loyalty to the Frankish monarchy on the Spanish march is in
striking contrast to the behaviour of other parts of the former
Carolingian Empire, as for example in Italy, Burgundy and Provence,
where independent royal dynasties had come to power by the end of
the ninth century. Even in the western Pyrenees the tiny kingdom of
Pam pion a had been created out of a Frankish march, and it was not
for lack of precedent that the family of Wifred did not transform
itself into a royal line. Nor had this anything to do with fear of retali-
ation or a dependence on Carolingian military aid, for, from early in
the reign of Charles 'the Bald' on, it seems clear that the march was
left to find its own protection and could not, as in 827, look for royal
assistance.
The reasons for this remarkable survival of loyalty to the French
crown are not easy to establish. It was more than a matter of senti-
ment on the part of the comital family, for the charters alone indi-
cate that their attitude was common to all major sectors of society on
the march. The notion of the Franks as the protectors of the region,
to whom its inhabitants could turn when in conflict with other pow-
ers in the peninsula was an old one with its roots in the Visigothic
period. Cultural and economic ties with Aquitaine and Provence were
also long-standing, if liable to fluctuation. But little of this had much
practical significance in the tenth and eleventh centuries. The char-
ters do suggest from their survival in surprising quantity despite the
vicissitudes of centuries, that written title to land was held to be of the
greatest importance and from the late eighth century onwards this
was guaranteed by numerous acts of royal confirmation. The Frank-
ish kings did have a role to play, however impotent they were in their
ability to enforce their authority, in providing the grounding in which
land tenure in the march was rooted. Although Catalonia was in
practice independent from the time of Wi fred 'the Hairy' onwards in
terms of the power and authority of its rulers, the comital dynasty, too
much stress on this can obscure and conceal the interesting relation-
ship that did exist between the inhabitants of the Hispanic march