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Greatness Contested and Confirmed: The Raw Materials of the Charlemagne Legend

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The Legend of Charlemagne in the Middle Ages

Part of the book series: The New Middle Ages ((TNMA))

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Abstract

Shortly after Charlemagne died (28 January 814), an anonymous monk of Bobbio lamented the emperor’s passing.1 A few stanzas convey a sense of the poem:

From lands where the sun rises to western shores,

People are now crying and wailing.

Alas for miserable me.

The Franks, the Romans, all Christians,

Are stung with mourning and great worry.

Alas for miserable me.

The young and old, glorious nobles

And matrons, all lament the loss of their Caesar.

Alas for miserable me.

Francia has endured awful wounds [before],

But never has suffered such a great sorrow as now.

Alas for miserable me.

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Notes

  1. Ed. Ernst Dümmler, MGH PLAC 1 (Berlin, 1881), pp. 435–6. English trans. in Carolingian Civilization: A Reader, ed. Paul Edward Dutton, 2nd ed. (Peterborough, Ontario: Broadview Press, 2004), pp. 157–9.

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  3. Robert Morrissey, Charlemagne and France: A Thousand Years of Mythology, trans. Catherine Tihanyi (Notre Dame, IN: University of Notre Dame Press, 2003).

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  4. Astronomer, Vita Hludowici, ed. Ernst Tremp, MGH SRG (Hannover, 1995), p. 348.

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  5. On this criticism generally, see Paul Edward Dutton, The Politics of Dreaming in the Carolingian Empire (Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 1994), esp. pp. 50–80.

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  6. Annales regni Francorum, ed. Friedrich Kurze, MGH SRG (Hannover, 1895), pp. 140–1;

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  7. Thegan, Gesta Hludowici Imperatoris, ed. Ernst Tremp, MGH SRG (Hannover, 1995), pp. 192–4.

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  8. In Honorem Hludowici Christianissimi Caesaris Augusti, ed. Edmond Faral (Paris: Champion, 1932), 11. 824–47.

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  10. David A. Traill, Walahfrid Strabo’s Visio Wettini: Text, Translation, and Commentary (Frankfurt: Peter Lang, 1974). Hermann Knittel essentially reproduces Dümmler’s MGH edition, takes into account some of Traill’s emendations, and provides a German translation with a useful introduction and notes: Walahfrid Strabo Visio Wettini: Die Vision Wetti’s (Sigmaringen: J. Thorbecke, 1986). Walahfrid lacks a modern monograph.

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  11. For a selection of excellent aperçus ranging across philological and historical issues see: Max Manitius, Geschichte der lateinischen Literatur des Mittelalters, vol. 1 (Münich: Beck, 1911), pp. 302–24;

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  22. The text has occasioned rather limited discussion: Wilhelm Levison, “Die Politik in den Jenseitsvisionen des frühern Mittelalters,” in Aus Rheinischer und fränkischer Frühzeit (Düsseldorf: L. Schwann, 1948), pp. 237–9; De Gaiffier, “Lapéché,” 262; Kamphausen, Traum und Vision, 141–2; Dutton, Politics of Dreaming, 67–75; Collins, “Charlemagne and His Critics,” 196–202.

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  23. On the dream visions and politics generally, see Dutton, Politics of Dreaming. On the historical context of this vision see Jörg Jarnut, “Kaiser Ludwig der Fromme und König Bernhard von Italien,” Studi Medievali, 3rd ser., 30 (1989): 637–48.

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  24. Matthias Tischler, Einharts Vita Karoli: Studien zur Entstehung, Überlieferung und Rezeption, vol. 1 (Hannover: Monumenta Germaniae Historica, 2001), p. 202 argues that the text’s emphasis on the unfortunate aftermath of Bernard’s revolt may well date the text close in time to 818 that would not preclude a role for Heito in shaping the text as we have it.

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  25. Wilhelm Wattenbach, “Aus Petersburger Handschriften,” Anzeiger für Kunde der deutschen Vorzeit 22 (1875): 72–4 (edition, 73–4). In addition to the St. Petersburg MS edited here (which also contains the better known Visio Baronti), the text also appears in CLM 14,364 and in St. Gall 573, after the Visio Pauperculae. On the text see: Levison, “Jenseits Visionen,” 235; de Gaiffier, “La péché,” 260–2; Dutton, Politics of Dreaming, 61–3.

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  31. Tischler, Eiuharts Vita Karoli is now definitive on the manuscripts. Although the best textual witnesses argue for Einhart as the proper form of his name, I retain the traditional Einhard. On Einhard himself see Paul Edward Dutton, Charlemagne’s Courtier: The Complete Einhard (Peterborough, Ontario: Broadview Press, 1998), pp. xi–li;

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  37. Lupus, eno. 1, in Correspondance, ed. Léon Levillain (Paris: Les Belles Lettres, 1927), p. 6. See Tischler, Einharts Vita Karoli, 121–2 with the older literature. Dutton, Charlemagne’s Courtier, xviii thinks the letter cannot date before 830, although 829 seems possible.

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  39. Such was the judgment of Halphen in his “Einhard, historien de Charlemagne,” in Études critiques sue l’histoire de Charlemagne (Paris: F. Alcan, 1921), pp. 60–103.

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  1. Thomas F. X. Noble
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Matthew Gabriele Jace Stuckey

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© 2008 Matthew Gabriele and Jace Stuckey

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Noble, T.F.X. (2008). Greatness Contested and Confirmed: The Raw Materials of the Charlemagne Legend. In: Gabriele, M., Stuckey, J. (eds) The Legend of Charlemagne in the Middle Ages. The New Middle Ages. Palgrave Macmillan, New York. https://doi.org/10.1057/9780230615441_1

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