Lecture 25: From Roman Empire to Holy Roman Empire
• “Popes and Franks” may sound like ballpark food, but the phrase
sums up precisely the two power sources that worked to create the
catholic world of the Middle Ages.Political Context: 9th to 15th Centuries
• The second stage in the medieval
political context begins with
Charles the Great (Charlemagne,
742–814), the son of Pepin III,
who is one of the most significant
figures in the political and
religious history of the West.• Charles was anointed as king of
the Franks by Pope Stephen III in
754 and became sole heir of the
kingdom in 771. He immediately
engaged in a path of conquest and
consolidation under his authority.
o Between 771 and 799, he
conquered Lombardy, the
Saxons, Bavaria, the Avars,
Pannonia, and Italy.o In 778, he crossed the Pyrenees to conquer Spain, which was
in the hands of the Muslims, and was defeated at the Battle
of Roncevalles. Thirteen years later, in 801, he conquered
Barcelona and made it the center of the Spanish March (a
buffer zone separating the Muslim and Frankish kingdoms).• In view of these triumphs, Pope Leo III, on Christmas Day, 800,
in the city of Rome, crowned Charlemagne as emperor. It was an
extraordinary act, and its implication (that the Franks were the
approved continuation of the Roman heritage) was not appreciated
by the Byzantines. Eventually, the emperor of the West would claim
the formal title of Holy Roman Emperor.Charlemagne’s military triumphs
established his authority firmly
over the West; he was crowned
emperor in the year 800 by Pope
Leo III in Rome.© Hemera/Thinkstock.