is now France, as far as the Meuse, the Saône and the Rhone, with the addition of the Spanish March as far as the Ebro. The first years of his reign up to the death of Lothair I. (855) were comparatively peaceful, and during them was continued the system of “confraternal government” of the sons of Louis the Pious, who had various meetings with one another, at Coblenz (848), at Meersen (851), and at Attigny (854). In 858 Louis the German, summoned by the disaffected nobles, invaded the kingdom of Charles, who fled to Burgundy, and was only saved by the help of the bishops, and by the fidelity of the family of the Welfs, who were related to Judith. In 860 he in his turn tried to seize the kingdom of his nephew, Charles of Provence, but met with a repulse. On the death of Lothair II. in 869 he tried to seize his dominions, but by the treaty of Mersen (870) was compelled to share them with Louis the German. Besides this, Charles had to struggle against the incessant rebellions in Aquitaine, against the Bretons, whose revolt was led by their chief Nomenoé and Erispoé, and who inflicted on the king the defeats of Ballon (845) and Juvardeil (851), and especially against the Normans, who devastated the country in the north of Gaul, the valleys of the Seine and Loire, and even up to the borders of Aquitaine. Charles was several times compelled to purchase their retreat at a heavy price. He has been accused of being incapable of resisting them, but we must take into account the unwillingness of the nobles, who continually refused to join the royal army; moreover, the Frankish army does not seem to have been sufficiently accustomed to war to make any headway against the pirates. At any rate, Charles led various expeditions against the invaders, and tried to put a barrier in their way by having fortified bridges built over all the rivers. In 875, after the death of the emperor Louis II., Charles the Bald, supported by Pope John VIII., descended into Italy, receiving the royal crown at Pavia and the imperial crown at Rome (29th December). But Louis the German, who was also a candidate for the succession of Louis II., revenged himself for Charles’s success by invading and devastating his dominions. Charles was recalled to Gaul, and after the death of Louis the German (28th August 876), in his turn made an attempt to seize his kingdom, but at Andernach met with a shameful defeat (8th October 876). In the meantime, John VIII., who was menaced by the Saracens, was continually urging him to come to Italy, and Charles, after having taken at Quierzy the necessary measures for safeguarding the government of his dominions in his absence, again crossed the Alps, but this expedition had been received with small enthusiasm by the nobles, and even by Boso, Charles’s brother-in-law, who had been entrusted by him with the government of Lombardy, and they refused to come with their men to join the imperial army. At the same time Carloman, son of Louis the German, entered northern Italy. Charles, ill and in great distress, started on his way back to Gaul, and died while crossing the pass of the Mont Cenis on the 5th or 6th of October 877. He was succeeded by his son Louis the Stammerer, the child of Ermentrude, daughter of a count of Orleans, whom he had married in 842, and who had died in 869. In 870 he had married Richilde, who was descended from a noble family of Lorraine, but none of the children whom he had by her played a part of any importance. Charles seems to have been a prince of education and letters, a friend of the church, and conscious of the support he could find in the episcopate against his unruly nobles, for he chose his councillors for preference from among the higher clergy, as in the case of Guenelon of Sens, who betrayed him, or of Hincmar of Reims. But his character and his reign have been judged very variously. The general tendency seems to have been to accept too easily the accounts of the chroniclers of the east Frankish kingdom, which are favourable to Louis the German, and to accuse Charles of cowardice and bad faith. He seems on the contrary not to have lacked activity or decision.
Authorities.—The most important authority for the history of Charles’s reign is represented by the Annales Bertiniani, which were the work of Prudentius, bishop of Troyes, up to 861, then up to 882 of the celebrated Hincmar, archbishop of Reims. This prince’s charters are to be found published in the collections of the Académie des Inscriptions, by M. M. Prou. The most complete history of the reign is found in E. Dümmler, Geschichte des ostfränkischen Reiches (3 vols., Leipzig, 1887–1888). See also J. Calmette, La Diplomatie carolingienne du traité de Verdun à la mort de Charles le Chauve (Paris, 1901), and F. Lot, “Une Année du règne de Charles le Chauve,” in Le Moyen-Âge, (1902) pp. 393-438.
CHARLES III., the Fat[1] (832–888), Roman emperor and king
of the West Franks, was the youngest of the three sons of Louis
the German, and received from his father the kingdom of Swabia
(Alamannia). After the death of his two brothers in succession,
Carloman (881) and Louis the Young (882), he inherited the whole
of his father’s dominions. In 880 he had helped his two cousins
in the west Frankish realm, Louis III. and Carloman, in their
struggle with the usurper Boso of Provence, but abandoned
them during the campaign in order to be crowned emperor at
Rome by Pope John VIII. (February 881). On his return he led
an expedition against the Norsemen of Friesland, who were
entrenched in their camp at Elsloo, but instead of engaging with
them he preferred to make terms and paid them tribute. In 884 the
death of Carloman brought into his possession the west Frankish
realm, and in 885 he got rid of his rival Hugh of Alsace, an
illegitimate son of Lothair II., taking him prisoner by treachery
and putting out his eyes. However, in spite of his six expeditions
into Italy, he did not succeed in pacifying the country, nor in
delivering it from the Saracens. He was equally unfortunate in
Gaul and in Germany against the Norsemen, who in 886–887
besieged Paris. The emperor appeared before the city with a
large army (October 886), but contented himself by treating with
them, buying the retreat of the invaders at the price of a heavy
ransom, and his permission for them to ravage Burgundy without
his interfering. On his return to Alamannia, however, the general
discontent showed itself openly and a conspiracy was formed
against him. He was first forced to dismiss his favourite, the
chancellor Liutward, bishop of Vercelli. The dissolution of his
marriage with the pious empress Richarde, in spite of her innocence
as proved by the judicial examination, alienated his nobles
still more from him. He was deposed by an assembly which met
at Frankfort or at Tribur (November 887), and died in poverty
at Neidingen on the Danube (18th January 888).
See E. Dümmler, Geschichte des ostfränkischen Reiches vol. iii. (Leipzig 1888).
CHARLES IV. (1316–1378), Roman emperor and king of Bohemia, was the eldest son of John of Luxemburg, king of Bohemia, and Elizabeth, sister of Wenceslas III., the last Bohemian king of the Premyslides dynasty. He was born at Prague on the 14th of May 1316, and in 1323 went to the court of his uncle, Charles IV., king of France, and exchanged his baptismal name of Wenceslas for that of Charles. He remained for seven years in France, where he was well educated and learnt five languages; and there he married Blanche, sister of King Philip VI., the successor of Charles IV. In 1331 he gained some experience of warfare in Italy with his father; and on his return to Bohemia in 1333 he was made margrave of Moravia. Three years later he undertook the government of Tirol on behalf of his brother John Henry, and was soon actively concerned in a struggle for the possession of this county. In consequence of an alliance between his father and Pope Clement VI., the relentless enemy of the emperor Louis IV., Charles was chosen German king in opposition to Louis by some of the princes at Rense on the 11th of July 1346. As he had previously promised to be subservient to Clement he made extensive concessions to the pope in 1347. Confirming the papacy in the possession of wide territories, he promised to annul the acts of Louis against Clement, to take no part in Italian affairs, and to defend and protect the church. Meanwhile he had accompanied his father into France and had taken part in the battle of Crecy in August 1346, when John was killed and Charles escaped wounded from the field. As king of Bohemia he returned to Germany, and after being crowned German king at Bonn on the 26th of November 1346, prepared to attack Louis. Hostilities were interrupted by the death of the emperor in October 1347, and Günther, count of Schwarzburg, who was chosen king by the
- ↑ This surname has only been applied to Charles since the 13th century.
