Charles the Bald
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• King allocated proceeds of war through a network of personalised, privatised relationships of dependence that replaced public agencies if control and exploitation – expand or die – with externa flows needed grant out bits of fisc, inherently weak and unstable and different from Roman world, 840-77 C the B doomed to faiure, lacked institutional means to extract wealth, no longer lead successful plundering raids, nor keep aristos happy with share outs.
• BUT range of things could be tapped in the economy – polyptychs – gradually rising population in the 9^th century seems workable
• Manorial system evidence of in C the B’s heartland – surpluses etc need to be sold, and thus need for market implied.
• Cash – prevalent, some labour enterprise from peasants, productivity and population grow implies economic growth., cash, markets and coinage.
• Charles the Bald taxed more than his L the P or C – King impinging on the economy in a new way, raise money for Viking defences, 877 tax in peasants favour – public exactions on economy at large, peasant economy able to sustain this.
• Charles exploited Church wealth in a scale greater that his predecessors needed – church prepared to put money where its mouth was – back state institutions best way of defending ecclesiastical interests.  Churches administrative structures extensive infrastructure that King could tap into to.
• Own communication network, utilised old Roman roads staging posts etc, granted 25 charters authorising markets – gain extra revenue, easier to tax – he taxed even the small traders in 860 at threat of Vikings – houses, all their stock valued and on that basis a rate was assessed and required.
• Coinage rates increase – 100 mints, millions of coins, not debased at previously 50% purity, but up to 90% - total output seems to have increased in the course of the reign – larger proportion of half pennies after 864.  Monasteries needed coinage – permits in 865 Bishop of Chalons sur Marne to set up a mint – short of coin peasants relied on monasteries spending- in issuing coinage large scale Charles meeting widely felt needs of the private interests.
• Benefits King as well, King of course owns large amounts of land and it benefits him to exact rents etc, extraction tools, benefits from the conversion of other currencies as Charles coins accepted throughout the realm – see very little foreign coinage in Francia – Scandinavia plenty of international coins, trade existed King made money
• 864 renovatio monetate – debasement and lack of confidence as main reasons – not for tribute paying as little tribute paying made between 866 and 876 and why mint pennies?  Certainly effective as coin finds show not debased.
• Circulation within and between Neustria, Burgundy and Francia – not so much in Aquitaine
• Recoinage massive realm wide form of taxation – peasants pay him more easily, recoinage, like the moneyer, gave the King a cut of the proceeds – evidence for high quality currency 864 to 877 suggest recoinage a success.
• Revalued currency remarkable demonstration of political will and effectively generated user confidence
• Do with money?  Father and grandfather large-scale construction projects – cash for Compiegne building programme.  Needed cash to pay warriors, even Vikings, for defensive wars as these did not appeal to Frankish nobles
• Novelty of Charles freedom of manoeuvre – much broader diffusion of entrepots – not just Charlemagne’s funnelling of trade through Dorestad – spent time in civitates – increased economic activity in this area.
• Impact of the Vikings – used great rivers to penetrate deep into Charles’ kingdoms – did Vikings “systematic destruction” or market-men – stimulants of social movement, releasers hoarded wealth, agents and prime moves of economic growth this period – “It was the best of times, it was the worst of times…”
• Peasant migration, as shown by Edict of Pitres ordered peasants who had fled the Vikings should not be oppressed by Counts in new kingdoms – where ands lost by churchmen as in Aqutaine – main beneficiaries seem to be the local aristocracy.
• Vikings not too much different to the Franks in economic terms – even when Franks living off land expensive – Vikings provided a market but also a threat.
• All the above points specific to north-east Francia – east of Rhine, in kingdom Louis the German – no mints much less evidence for markets and traders – why different West Francia – can it be Charles the Bald?  Causes of increased monetary use and commercial acitivt out of his control, he knew where and how wealth was being generated intent on exploiting that wealth systematically – renovitio monetae does not just happen – conceived off and then planned

CONTEXT OF POLITICS

·        Nilthard saw good relationships between Kings Charlemagne and Charles and nobility = good faith hallmark of nobility and displayed most clearly in fidelity to your King.  Horizontally, nobles shared values as well as status.

·        Individual interests of nobility: benefices should be distributed justly, also a collective interest – should rein in aggression of warriors, especially of young men, punish crime, court a place of peace, inhibit oppositin within the realm, fair in patronage to forestall defection

·        Hincmar depicts palace Government of the Palace– emphasises role of the entire family – compare treatment of women by Charlemagne and Charles the B, an apparatus efficiently designed and maintained – keep young nobility happy and loyal.

·        Assemblies held the realm together in two main ways – sociological vertical way, gaining consent of minores

·        C the B open with the minroes, listening to grievances – is this consensus politics – King uses assemblies, like regional distribution of people at court, to defuse trouble in the regions – rumblings of discontent, complaints, injustices were to be dealt with before they escalated into rebellion.

·        Modern secondary literature refers to aristocracy in in C the B’s reign as greedy, boorish, incapable of sharing higher aspirations of king or clergy, Michael Wallace-Hadrill “repulsively realistic. hairy nobleman” – blame on collapse Carolingian state on nobility, too peaceful at church and don’t fight –

·        Dhuoda, Nilthard and Hincmar saw Chalres as able and willing to control nobility – “Pop Gregory the Great – taming the wild unicorn.

·        How did the King administer? Regional differences, incorporating the aristocracy

·        Charles the Bald’s predecessors was to look after royal estates and royal incomes, second to lead vassi or benefice holders from within the county, third he exercised jurisdiction over pagenses – men of the poagus or county, county assemblies existed

·        Charlemagne complained of counts helping themselves with too frequent assemblies.  Missi continued under Charles the Bald

·        If Charles the Bald profited from increased resources generated by ninth century economy so did the power of the aristocracy – at expense of royal power?  Montesquieu says yes – Charles the Bald’s institutionalisation of hereditary countships in 877 as clinching the case. – tendency to do this before C the B – inherent in a social organisation where power and property in general inherited.  Did King have any choice in appointing a count or missu – kinsmen or an outsider – Charles did intevrne in politically and militarily important regions.

·        Dhondt – C the B remains the villain of the piece – archsquanderer of the fisc – allowed amassing of countships by great regional magnates – good point ancestors great houses 12^th century found among recipients Charles’ favour.  Breaks in the line however – Robert the Storng – two sons disinherited, yes form Capetians but only recover Neustrian honroes after C the B’s death – certainoy important individuals in C the B’s time, did not concert action with groups of kinsmen.

·        Mobilty kin group large – king can’t support them all, competing regna in differing regnum, no time to put down territorial roots.  Kongisnahe – King’s itinerary varied – footloose quality of potentes belies Dhondt’s tidy territorial model.

·        As with royal predecessors dispositions of honroes and patronage, above or outside regional aristoc or with powerful local families – crucial instruments of royal power in the regions.

·        Contingents arranged by the church formed large part of Carolingian army – Hincmar proud to have done this.

·        Archbishops, abbots exerting large amount of local power – Rheims, Rouen, Sens Bourges – Archbishops assume function of “greater countships” – could King appoint in these positions> - YES.

·        Charlemagne limited benfices to counts to stop too much power – greedy eye but such mediatisation not occur until after C the B’s death.

·        Charles the Bald not totally adverse to violence – leaves a trail of destruction in marches wake. 

·        Episcopal sees were filled by royal appointment – C the B did this effectively throughout his reign – lay abbacies deployed by Charles with a new frequency – regular abbot ran the community’s liturgical work and day-to-day upkeep from the inside – outside lay aristocratic managed lands, divisions – King secures political and military service without loss of fisc, also strictly a life-tenant so not hereditary problems  - contribute significantly to maintenance of royal poweer – Se. Denis 867 Charles himself abbot.

·        Prime concern I that of the aristocratic elite

·        Church had an institutional existence – “the frail aqudecut” across which late Roman administrative practice, with its geographical divisions into provinces and dioceses passed to early medieval successor states – Charlemagne and Louis the Pious and counsellors had strengthened the authority of archbishops, promoted regular meetings of councils – continued with C the B

·        Pseudo Isidorean  - great collection canonical law – only could have occurred in western part of the empire = western part Charlemagne’s empire particular comination of conditions, persisting Roman administrative and legal practices, well-organised provincial churches, long christianised local elites – favours storng corporate awareness and activity on part of church men – own corporate self-consciousness and distinctive goals – Charles the Bald did not simply exploit the church within his kingdom, he had to work with not against the ecclesiastical grain – he himself educated by church men, shared ideals and aims.

·        Charles the Bald, in West Francia more than anywhere else, responded to Papacy’s pleas for help, and also aggressively o where he saw as Papal interference

·        Ramshackle – state still existed in 9^th century capable of being operated by a skilful king

·        Court society – not where nobility bought to heel, elite world where shared poltical convention – political conflict contained, and consensus reformed and re-enacted – personal relationships counted for great deal more than structures – Konigsnahe – fallen had little hope for unless he could find an alternative royal patron.

·        Conflict between royal kin – rivalry virtually inescapable – Charlemagne lucky as his own brother died early 771 – owns sins one rebelled incarcerated others fiven own kingdom

Other Notes in this Category

1. Ancient Cities
2. Carolignian Period
3. Charles the Bald
4. Chronology of Byzantium and Persia
5. Dynasty of Theodosius I and Barbarians in the West
6. French and British Agriculture
7. Islamic Conquests up to 700 a.d. - Islamic Strenghts / Roman Weaknesses?
8. Islamic Conquests up to 700 a.d. - Islamic Strenghts / Roman Weaknesses?
9. MOHAMMED, CHARLEMAGEN AND THE ORIGINS OF EUROPE
10. New Centres of Power in the 8th and Ninth Century
11. Peace and War - Rome and Persia - 5-7th Centuries
12. Practice Questions
13. The Age of Attila
14. The Decline of the Ancient World
15. The Mediterranean and the Dilemma of the Roman Empire in Late antiquity
16. Warfare
17. Was successful Kingship in Merovingian Gaul simply a matter of being an effective and lucky war leader?
18. Why did the western empire fall when the east survived?

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