13. Chapter 11: The Church Forms an Alliance, 751 - 800

CHAPTER 11 The Church Forms an Alliance, 751 - 800

1. The Lombards Drive the Popes into the Arms of the Franks In telling the story of the Latin Church in the West we now go back to the year 751, and pick up the thread of our narrative where we dropped it in Chapter 8.

Only fourteen years after Jus­tinian regained Italy from the Ostrogoths, the Po Valley in the northern part of Italy was again taken away from the Empire. This was in the year 568. The members of the German tribe that inflicted this new loss upon the Empire were called the Lombards (mean­ing "Longbeards"). That part of Italy is known even today as Lom­bardy. The rest of the Italian pen­insula continued at least nominally as part of the Empire. When the Lombards came into Italy they had already been con­verted from heathenism to the teachings of Arius; later they were to be won over to the orthodox Christianity of the Nicene Creed. Pope Gregory I, eager for their good will, bestowed a crown upon their king. It was called the Iron Crown, because into it had been put what was believed to be one of the nails of the cross. Here we have a striking illustration of the unlikely things people in those times were easily led to believe. The establishment of the Lom­bard Kingdom in northern Italy was going to have important re­sults. The history of the Church, and especially of the papacy, now became intertwined with the his­tory of the Lombards and the Franks. The presence of the Lombards in Italy was a constant threat to the popes. At no time were they cer­tain of their safety. The emperors in Constantinople were not in a position to protect the popes against the Lombards. They were far away, and they had their hands more than full defending them­selves and the Empire against the Arabs. Moreover, considerable friction had developed between the popes in Rome and the emperors in Constantinople. So the popes, when they were being hard pressed by the Lombards, in their hour of danger turned for help to the Franks. It was the Lombards who drove the popes into the protective arms of the Franks.

2. The Conversion of Clovis Proves to Have Further Significance

Something of the importance of the conversion in 496 of the Frank­ish king Clovis from heathenism to Christianity was revealed to us, when we saw the Franks save Eu­rope from Mohammedanism. But that did not exhaust the signif­icance of the conversion of Clovis and the Franks. We shall now see what further important re­sults for the history of the Church the conversion of Clovis had, through the alliance which the Church at this time formed with the Franks.

3. A King Asks Sanction of a Pope and Opens a Long Struggle

Clovis belonged to the Mero­vingian family of Frankish kings and was a strong and influential ruler. The later Merovingians were weak, do-nothing kings. Most of them were king only in name, while the actual ruling was done by an outstanding officer. Charles Martel, the hero of the battle of Tours, was not king of the Franks. He was the highest office-holder under one of these weak Mero­vingian kings; however, in reality he had the power of a king. The son of Charles Martel, Pip­pin the Short, obtained the same high office his father had held. But he was not satisfied with that. He deposed the last of the Merovin­gian kings, the feeble Childeric. He put him in a monastery and placed himself upon the throne. But he felt that for this act he should have the sanction, or approval, of the pope. Pope Zacharias readily gave his approval, saying that it was only right that he who held the power of king should also have the title. In 751 Pippin was anointed and crowned king.

What had taken place must at the time have seemed something very simple. After all, was it not perfectly natural for Pippin to ask the approval of one as important as the pope? But it was to have far-reaching consequences. From it was drawn the conclusion in later times that the pope had the right to take away and to give kingdoms. It was also a first step toward the re-establishment of the Empire in the West. Out of that grew the tremendous struggle be­tween the papacy and the Empire, which was to make up so large a part of the history of the Middle Ages.

CHARLEMAGNE IS CROWNED EMPEROR, A. D. 800
Schoenfeld Collection from Three Lions In a way it was the most impor­tant event in medieval history.

4. The Pope Becomes a Temporal Ruler

One good turn deserves another; so reasoned Pope Zacharias. He now asked Pippin that he in turn render him a service by helping him against the Lombards, who continued as a constant threat to his power and safety. To prepare the way for this act of favor, the pope first went to Pippin, and in 754 in the Church of St. Denis near Paris anointed and crowned him and his sons, Carlo-man and Charles, anew.

Pippin then marched with an army into Italy, fought and de­feated the Lombards, and com­pelled them to surrender part of their territory to the pope. In that way began the "States of the Church." The pope now held not only ecclesiastical office; he also had become a temporal ruler. The popes continued to hold temporal power until 1870, when the new Kingdom of Italy was established, and the "States of the Church" were made a part of it.

5. Charles Becomes Charlemagne

Upon the death of Pippin the Short in 768 his two sons, Carlo-man and Charles, succeeded him. Carloman died in 771. Then Charles ruled alone, and his real reign began. On Christmas day of the year 800 Charles was kneeling in the St. Peter’s Church in Rome. The pope stole up to him, and placed upon his head the imperial crown. By that act the pope made Charles emperor.

It appeared entirely appropriate that Charles should be made em­peror. Why? Because he stood for the same three things for which the Roman Empire had stood. Those three things were law and order, civilization or culture, and Chris­tianity.

CHARLEMAGNE EXAMINES THE PUPILS IN HIS PALACE SCHOOL AT AACHEN
Schoenfeld Collection from Three Lions

Those three things are the greatest things in the world. Law and order means peace, the safety of person and property, the assur­ance that your life and your pos­sessions will not be taken away from you. Civilization means knowledge, the refinement of the spirit, the enrichment and adorn­ment of gracious living. Christian­ity means the true religion. The age of Charles was a time of lawlessness. Murder and rob­bery were the order of the day. It was a time of barbarism, igno­rance, and rudeness. It was also a time when Christianity in western Europe was in a precarious condi­tion. The realm of Charlemagne, or Charles the Great, was a Chris­tian island in an ocean of heathen­ism and Mohammedanism. The man who on Christmas day of the year 800 was crowned em­peror succeeded in securing for the people of western Europe this in­valuable triple blessing of (1) law and order, (2) civilization, and (3) Christianity. That is why he de­serves the name Charlemagne.

6. Charlemagne Accomplishes Much by Hard Work Charlemagne had to fight for these things all his life.

He established security and or­der by making wise laws, and by seeing to it that the laws were en­forced.

He fostered civilization and learning by promoting schools throughout his wide domain. But the barbarians as conquerors of the civilized Romans looked down with proud disdain upon learning and culture as something effemi­nate. Charlemagne established a school in his own residence, the palace school. He set an example by becoming a pupil in that school. He tried to learn to write, but his mighty fist had wielded his hefty battle-axe for so long that his fingers never could learn to handle a pen.

Charlemagne was engaged in war nearly all his life. First he fought the Lombards. He made an end of their kingdom in 777 and set the Iron Crown of Lom­bardy upon his own head. Next he made a beginning of the work of liberating Spain from the Moham­medan Arabs. He pushed them back from the Pyrenees to the Ebro River.

Through the greater part of his reign Charlemagne also carried on war with the Saxons. They were a large and powerful Germanic tribe who occupied the northern part of Germany. Their country at that time was all forest and swamp. The Saxons were fierce, untamed, heathen warriors who had never yet felt the conqueror’s yoke, and it was only after many hard campaigns that Charlemagne was able to subdue them. He added their territory to his domain and forced them at the point of the sword to accept Christianity.

CHARLEMAGNE WITH HIS CIRCLE OF SCHOLARS AND CHURCHMEN
Schoenfeld Collection from Three Lions 7. There Are Three Great Empires at the Time of Charlemagne’s Death When Charlemagne died in 814, there were three great powers or empires in the world. The oldest, but also the weakest, was the East­ern Empire. It embraced the Bal­kans, Asia Minor, and southern Italy. The largest of the three was the Empire of the Mohammedan Arabs. It stretched from India through Persia, Syria, and Pales­tine in Asia, and over all northern Africa up to the Ebro River in Europe. The youngest and the strongest of the three was the Empire of Charlemagne. At his death it consisted of the northern half of Italy; the northeast corner of Spain; all of France, Belgium, and the Netherlands; and a large part of Germany and Austria. The realm of Charlemagne was truly imperial in size. Since the fall of Rome no such extensive territory had been under one govern­ment in western Europe. Charle­magne was easily the greatest ruler between Justinian and Charles V (ch. 24, sec. 13). He towers above the Middle Ages, and casts his shadow over all the me­dieval centuries.

Charlemagne’s favorite reading was The City of God by Augustine. He loved to think of his empire as the Kingdom of God upon earth. The Arab Empire was Moham­medan. The Eastern Empire was Christian but comparatively small and weak. Of the three empires that of Charlemagne certainly held the best and brightest promises for the future of the Church and mankind.

8. The Alliance between the Church and the Franks Has Very Important Consequences

Pippin, by giving some of the lands of the Lombards to the pope, laid the foundation of the "States of the Church." He made the pope a temporal ruler.

Charlemagne freed the popes forever from the fear of the Lom­bards; brought order out of the chaotic conditions of his time; be­gan the expulsion of the Moham­medans from western Europe ; brought the heathen Saxons with­in the pale of Christendom; and promoted learning and culture. The pope by crowning Charle­magne emperor restored the Em­pire in the West. By doing that he set the stage for the gigantic and momentous struggle between Em­pire and papacy. The alliance which the Church made with the Franks had borne rich and abundant fruit. All these results can be traced back to the conversion of Clovis.