Page:Catholic Encyclopedia, volume 3.djvu/686

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CHARLEMAGNE


618


CHARLEMAGNE


the delight he found in being with his children, joining in their sports, particularly in his own favourite recreation of swimming, and finding his greatest relaxation in the society of his sons and daughters; the latter he refused to give in marriage, unfort unately for their moral character. (See F. Lorentz, " Karls des Grossen Privat und Hofleben" in "Hist. Taschen- buch ", 1832, III.) He died in his seventy-second year, after forty-seven yearsof reign, and was buried in the octagonal Byzantine-Romanesque church at Aachen, built by him and decorated with marble columns from Rome and Ravenna. In the year 1000 Otto III opened the imperial tomb and found (it is said) the great emperor as he had been buried, sitting on a marble throne, robed and crowned as in life, the book of the Gospels open on his knees. (See "Bulletin Monumental", 1867, III, S19-22.) In some parts of the empire popular affection placed him among the saints. For political purposes and to please Frederick Barbarossa he was canonized (1165) by the anti-pope Paschal III, but this act was never ratified by insertion of his feast in the Roman Breviary or by its extension to the Universal Church; his cultus, however, was permitted at Aachen [Acta SS., 28 Jan., 3d ed., II, 490-93, 303-7, 769; his office is in Canisius, " Antiq. Lect.", Ill (2), ed. Basnage, p. 205; Walch, "Hist, canonizat. Caroli Magni", Jena, 1750]. According to his friend and biographer, Einhard, Charles was of imposing stature, to which his bright eyes and long, flowing hair added more dignity. His neck was rather short, and his belly prominent, but the symmetry of his other members concealed these defects. His clear voice was not so sonorous as his gigantic frame would suggest. Except on his visits to Rome he wore the national dress of his Frankish peo- ple, linen shirt and drawers, a tunic held by a silken cord, and leggings; his thighs were wound round with thongs of leather; his feet were covered with laced shoes. He had good health to his sixty-eighth year, when fevers set in, and he began to limp with one foot. He was his own physician, we are told, and much dis- liked his medical advisers who wished him to eat boiled meat instead of roast. No contemporary por- trait of him has been preserved. A statuette in the Mus6e C'arnavalet at Paris is said to be very ancient.

For original materials, see P. L., XCLVII-C11I, and Bouocet, Recueil des historiens des Games (Paris, 1737 — ), II— IX. An official royal record, contemporary and general in character (7SS-S13). the Annals of Lorsch (Annales Laurie- senses majores) are of primary importance; after 829 valuable additions were made to it in the so-called Annates Einhardi. To these must be added other local annals, all found in Pertz, Man. derm. Hist.: Script., I. His prime minister Einhard has left us a sketch (Vita Caroli) full of valuable details writ- ten in close imitation of Suetonius. At the end of the ninth century the Poeta Saxo wrote a metrical life in five books and ili-- \Io\k of St. Gall (Monachus Sangallensis) a prose life in two books, quite anecdotal and illustrative of contem- porary life. The lives are best read in the Monumenta Caro- Jaffe [Bibl. Rer. Germ. (Berlin, 1S67), IV, 4S7-700]. His legislation (Capilularia. Leges) may be seen in the earlier edition of the Capitularia (q. v.) of Baluze and in the recent critical edition of BoltETirs and Kracse [Man. Germ. Hist.: Lews. II, Hanover, 1893-971. His letters, with those sent him by Alcuin, Einhard, and Leo III {Codex Carohnus) are also found in Jaffe, op. cit., I, 4S6. Numerous other import- ant public documents pertaining to his reign are found in the Mon. Germ. Hist.: Script. — Leges — Diplomata. The most complete account of his reign is that of Abel, continued and finished by B. Simson, Jahrbuchcr des frankischrn Rcichcs imtei Karl dem Grossen (Berlin, lslis ss ■ : in Waitz. Deutsche \', rfassunqsgeschiehte (Berlin. 2d ed., lsss) is found an exhaus- tive description of his political activity (legislative and con- stitutional'. Valuable material is found in the pages of the porary Liber Poniificalis, ed. Docjtesne (Paris, 1886- rols., It,., with rich historical and antiquarian notes. English wnrks on Charlemagne are frequently coloured by inti papal prejudice. Among the latest arc ("tils (London. h- MOHBERI (18881. Weils (1S98), Davis (WOO); see also Buchanan in Diet. ■<! Christ. Bioor., I, 4. r >5-6l. The best English account of the great emperor (not always impartial) is thai of IIi'J'okin in the seventh and eighth volumes of his Halt, and he, Innidei I ( ixford. 1899). BttvrE. The Holy Roman is scholarly, but ti"t always equitable < hie of the holarrv accounts of his reign is that of Dollingkh. Das Kaiserthum Karls des Grossen (Munich, 1865; tr. London, 1897) criticized in the Zeitschrift f. Kath. Theol. (1S93), XVII,


563-74. See also J. Janssens, Karl der Grosse (Frankfort, 1868); Vetault, Charlemagne, with introduction by Leon Gautter, notes by Barthelemy ( 2d ed., Tours, 1880) and Haureau, Charlemagne el sa cour (4th ed., Paris, 1880).

Among recent studies on ecclesiastical anil religious life in the reign of Charles the following are of interest; Merchier, Essai sur le goarernement de Veglise au temps de Charlemagne (St.-Quentin, 1887); Imbart de la Tour, De ecclesiis rusti- canis aetate Carolingicn (Bordeaux, 1891); Jerome, La ques- tion metropolitaine dans VEglise franque in Revue canemiqite (Paris, 1898); Dubois, De conciliis el theologicis disputaiion- ibus apud Francos Carolo Magna regnante (Alencon, 1902); Girt, Les Archives des eglises et monasteres de Vepoque Carolin- gienne (Paris, 1901).

Among studies on Church and State in the time of Charlemagne may be mentioned: Gosselin, The Power of the Pope during the Middle Ages. tr. M. Kelly, 2 vols. (Baltimore, London, 1853); Ketterer, Karl der Grosse und die Kirche iMunich, 1S98); Greenwood, Empire and Papacy in the Mid.lt, Ages (London, 1902); Hergenrother, Kathotische Kirche and christlieher Staat (Freiburg, 1872, Eng. tr„ London. 1876); Hofler, Kaiserthum unci Papsthum (Prague, 1862); Nieim ks, Gesch. des Verhallrtisses zu-isehen Kaiserthum und Papsttum im Mitlelalter, 2 vols., vol. I, 2d. ed., (Minister, 1877); Glasson, Les rapports du pouvoir spirituel et du pouvoir temporel au mm/en age (Paris, 1890); J. de la Serviere, Charlemagne et VEglise (Paris, 1904).

Thomas J. Shahan. E. Macpherson.

Charlemagne and Church Mr sic. — Charlemagne's interest in church music and solicitude for its propa- gation and adequate performance throughout his empire, have never been equalled by any civil ruler either before or since his time. Great as was his father Pepin's care for the song of the Church, Charles's activity was infinitely more intelligent and comprehensive. Aided by a technical knowledge of the subject, he appreciated the reasons why the Church attaches so much importance to music in her cult and the manner of its performance. He used all his authority to enforce the wishes of the Church which he had made his own. The key-note of his legislation on this subject, as on every other point regarding the liturgy, was conformity with Rome. To this end, tradition tells us, he not only took mem- bers of his own chapel to Rome with him, in order that they might learn at the fountain head, but begged Pope Adrian I, in 774, to let him have two of the papal singers. One of these papal chanters, Theodore, was sent to Metz, and the other, Benedict, to the sclwla cantorum at Soissons. According to Ekkehart IV, a chronicler of the tenth century of the monastery of St. Gall, the same pope sent two more singers to the Court of Charlemagne. One of these, Peter, reached Metz, but Romanus at first being detained at St. Gall by sickness, afterwards obtained permission from the emperor to remain there, and it is to the presence in St. Gall and elsewhere, of these monks from Rome, that we owe the manuscripts without which a return to the original form of the Gregorian chant would be impossible. The great Charles made strenuous though not wholly successful efforts to wean Milan and its environs from their Ambrosian Rite and melodies. In 7S9 he addressed a decree to the whole clergy of his empire, enjoining on every member to learn the Cunt us !;,. in nuts and to perform the office in conformity « ith the directions of his father (Pepin), who for the sake of uniformity with Rome in the whole (Western) Church, had abolished the Gallican chant. Through the synod held at Aachen in 803, the emperor com- manded anew the bishops and clerics to sing the office xirut psallii eedesia Romana, and ordered them to establish schola- cant on m in suitable places, while he himself provided fur the support of those already in existence that is. those in Metz. Paris, Soissons Orleans, Sens, Tours, Lyons, Cambrai, and Dijon in France, and those of Fuld-i, Reichenau, and Si. Gall. The sons of nobles of his empire and of his vassals were expected, by imperial command, to be instructed in grammar, music, and arithmetic, while the boys in the

public schools were taught music and how to sing, especially the Psalms. The emperor's agents and representatives were everywhere ordered to watch