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Wynfrith (Winfrid)(Boniface) (c. 673-754) was an Anglo-Saxon from Wessex. He resigned his post as Abbot of the Nhutscelle monastery at Winchester in c. 716 and came only briefly to Frisia. Again he set forth in 718, but this time he traveled to Rome to secure Papal consecration as a missionary and a new name, Boniface. Returning to the fierce and inhospitable Frisians again in 719, he assisted Archbishop Willibrord in the demolition of pagan shrines and the building of churches until early in 721. Boniface moved on toward the southeast into Hesse and Thuringia to work among the less hostile pagans. He was so successful in Hesse that he was recalled to Rome in 722 and ordained missionary Bishop to the people east of the [Middle] Rhine River but without a parochia of his own. Then with the blessing of Charles Martel Boniface returned in 723 to the work in Hesse. It was on this occasion near Geismar that he chopped down the oak sacred to Donar and used it to build a small chapel dedicated to the Apostle Peter. He also founded a monastery at Fritzlar nearby and introduced the Anglo-Saxon revision of the Benedictine Rule.
In 725 he moved on south into that part of Thuringia known as East Franconia and laid the foundations for a bishopric at Würzburg where his disciple Burchard later became the first bishop. After establishing other Benedictine monasteries and nunneries, converting some from Celtic rule, and working among the people in East Franconia, Boniface received the pallium of the archbishop in 731 from Pope Gregory III. Now he could consecrate bishops to existing bishoprics. After he made a third trip to Rome in 737-738 he returned as Papal legate for Germany with the power of establishing bishoprics. Duke Odilo of Bavaria invited Boniface to organize the church there about 739. Boniface established a bishopric for northern Bavaria at Eichstat in 741, with churches established at Passau, Regensburg, Salzburg, Freising and Neuberg-Staffelsee. He established a bishopric for Hesse, near Frizlar, for northern Thuringia at Erfurt, and for east Franconia at Würzburg.
Charles Martel was, as we have noted, quite aware of the enormous wealth of the church and was not above appropriating it if the cause was pressing. So in the Merovingian manner he often disregarded canonical procedures in dealing with the church and showed no interest in encouraging churchmen to shape up. His sons and grandsons were a different sort. They possessed a great deal more respect for the church and its ideals than did their father. They supported a program of reform in the Frankish church and the obvious choice to ramrod the reform was the Anglo-Saxon missionary archbishop and papal legate, Boniface.
In Canon I of the "First Germanic Council" Carloman referred to Boniface as "he who was sent from St. Peter". This initial council in 742 was held someplace in the region known as Austrasia and was to be followed by councils each year. The council in 743 was also in Austrasia, the territory ruled by Carloman, but the council in 744 was at Soissons in the area ruled by Pepin. Subsequent meetings in 745 and 747 were general synods drawing broadly from all Frankish areas. The decrees of these councils became the law for both the church and the state. Attempts were made to upgrade the liturgies used in the churches across Frankland by importing the so-called Gregorian liturgies from Rome. This was apparently not particularly successful judging from the repetition of canons and decrees dealing with the use of the Roman liturgy and the customary Roman rite which was now to be used in the mass.
All clergy were to live according to canonical rules, that is, not bear arms nor hunt, not dress in secular fashion and not live in secular fashion, particularly not in any type of conjugal arrangement. Added prohibitions included not observing and/or teaching pagan customs or superstitious practices. All clergy were now to wear distinctive garb so that they could not continue to frequent places of ill repute under the guise of being laymen. The hierarchical structure of the church was to be more strictly followed. Lower clergy were to subject themselves to their bishop, and bishops were to subject themselves to the appropriate archbishop. Parochial and provincial synods were to be regularly held. Vacancies in the hierarchy were to be filled with canonically qualified, i.e. ordained men, not laymen. At the general synod of 747 the Frankish clergy ascribed to a formulated profession of faith, loyalty and submission to the Papacy which was transmitted to Pope Zachary (741-752).
Also at Pepin's suggestion Boniface upgraded the bishoprics of Rheims, Sens and Rouen to archiepiscopal level in 744. The same year he established a monastery at Fulda in Thuringia that would become a center of education and culture for that area. His Bavarian disciple, Strum, was its first abbot. Fulda was patterned after Monte Cassino in Italy, and in 751, at Boniface's request, Pope Zachary exempted it from local episcopal jurisdiction and placed it directly under Rome. Although Boniface planned to assume the archbishopric of Cologne in 745 he became instead a simple bishop at Mainz in 746 for unknown reasons.
After the death of Archbishop Willibrord of Utrecht Boniface felt compelled even as a weary old man in his 70's to return to the mission field in eastern Frisia in 754. In less than a year the pagan Frisians massacred him and fifty-two companions. He was buried at Fulda. During his life Boniface had influenced the direction of the Church in Frankland by influencing the Frankish leadership, particularly Charles Martel and Pepin his son. It is frequently said that Boniface was responsible for convincing Pepin to accept the title King of the Franks, and who anointed Pepin and his two sons, Carloman and Charles in 751. That, however, remains open to serious question.
Monastic missions east of the upper Rhine followed the conquest of those areas by the
Merovingian Frankish rulers. Pirmin, a personal friend of Charles Martel, established a
monastery on an island in Lake Constance, called Reichenau. It observed the Benedictine
rule, and became a center of evangelization for the people north of Constance. After 727
Pirmin founded or reorganized four other monasteries in the Black Forrest region, some of
which may have been Celtic foundations originally.
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After nearly three decades of peace, the Lombards launched a new aggressive policy against the Exarchate of Ravenna early in the eighth century. To complicate these matters, Emperor Leo III ordered the Exarch to enforce the iconoclastic policy on imperial Italy. The Pope condemned the iconoclastic policy of the Syrian Emperor at Constantinople, and the Italo-Romans rebelled. Aided by the Lombards the rebels almost destroyed the Exarchate, c. 730.
Emperor Leo III at Constantinople thereupon exercised his superior authority over the administration of the Church and adjusted the geographic borders of the Patriarchate of Rome, c. 733. The result was that the Pope's jurisdiction was excluded from most of southern Italy as well as the area across the Adriatic including the majority of the Balkans and Greece over as far as the city of Thessalonika in Macedonia. More to the point, a substantial proportion of the Pope's patrimony was located in these areas; hence, this action constituted a considerable reduction in Papal income and a corresponding increase in the income of the Bishop of Constantinople. Further actions by the Exarch against the Pope after 733 resulted in the Pope seeking to aid the Lombards in their struggle against the Exarchate as a means of remaining independent of imperial control.
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The Lombards then put pressure on the city of Rome in 739 forcing the Pope to seek unsuccessfully the assistance of the distant Frankish warlord, Charles Martel. Charles had an alliance with the Lombard king and was also deeply engaged against the Muslim Saracens. Meanwhile, the Exarch in turn called on Constantinople for reinforcements, but Emperor Constantine V was fully committed against the Muslims. The Exarch made peace with the Bishop of Rome in order to get what help he could from him, but it was not enough. Ravenna fell to the Lombards and the Exarch was killed in 751.
The Lombard threat to Rome became serious after the fall of Ravenna in 751. Emperor Constantine V also denied the Pope's request for military assistance. The Emperor ordered the Papacy to surrender to the king of the Lombards and, as a deputy of the Emperor, to officially recognize the Lombard king, Aistulf, as the governor of all imperial Italy, the role formerly exercised by the Exarch of Ravenna. Instead of going to Ravenna, Pope Stephen II crossed the Alps in late 753 and sought out Pepin the new king of the Franks in January. The following Easter, Stephen met with Pepin and the Frankish nobles and made a plea for military action against the Lombards. Later, in midsummer, before returning to Italy, Stephen again met with Pepin and his two sons. This time the Pope anointed Pepin and officially crowned him King of the Franks and patricius romanorum, protector of the Romans, a title long recognized as pertaining to the city of Rome.
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There are many theories about the function of a document entitled "The Donation of Constantine" in connection with this transaction. Some scholars think the document was already well known at Rome and influenced the details of the meetings between Pope Stephen II and Pepin that were recorded and even the words that were used. More to the point many students have seen this spurious document as offering Pope Stephen the rational basis for disobeying the Emperor at Constantinople, crowning Pepin as King of the Franks and naming him "protector of the Romans" instead of Aistulf. This document was an elaboration of the Legend of St. Sylvester which, as you may remember, had appeared at Rome in the late fifth century. It is an account rich in interesting and significant details but recognized since the fifteenth century as a document composed in the eighth century. Its author or authors are unknown.
Pepin brought his Frankish army into Italy promptly in 754 and again in 756 and crushed the Lombard power around Ravenna. In 756 Pepin conferred on the Bishop of Rome some special new powers making the Bishop the resident political governor of all the lands formerly constituting the Exarchate of Ravenna. Again "the Donation of Constantine" served as a model and provided Pepin with an encouraging precedent for his own "Donation". Bishop Sylvester, according to the fictional account, had been the recipient of a donation of supreme political power over the western regions of the Empire granted by Constantine himself before the Emperor departed to build his new capital in the east. Surely, the Lombards had deprived the Papacy of this political jurisdiction; hence, it was only proper to restore that lost power to its rightful office. Unfortunately, the Bishop of Rome was unable to prevent the Lombards from regaining most of their power in the north, and his new governing power was virtually ignored in the former imperial regions south of Rome which remained steadfastly loyal to the Emperor at Constantinople.
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When King Pepin died in 768, he left his two sons, Carloman and Carolus (Charles), each with a part of the Frankish state to rule. Charles who ruled the northern Franks had allied with the Lombard kingdom in Italy as a counter weight against his brother Carloman who ruled the southern Franks. When Carloman retired to a monastery Charles became sole ruler in 771. Because of his successes Charles came to be known to later generations as "Charles the Great" or Charlemagne. In 772 Charles broke his alliance with the Lombards. After two years of campaigning in Italy he made himself King of the Lombards. He affirmed his father's "Donation," the appointment of the Pope as governor of the once imperial districts of central Italy. Only extreme southern Italy and Sicily remained a part of the eastern Roman Empire.
As ruler of the Franks Charlemagne conquered Saxony, Bavaria, Austria, Italy, Croatia, and the Pyrenees mountain region on the Moslem frontier. In addition he campaigned against the Danes, against the peoples of Bohemia and Moravia, against the Moslems in the island of Corsica, against the peoples of Brittany, against the Byzantines in Dalmatia, and against the Avars (whom he destroyed) in Hungary.
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Even after Charlemagne's "Donation" the Pope had difficulties ruling his new political patrimony. Indeed, in 800 he was expelled from Rome by a popular uprising among the Roman nobility. Charlemagne came to Rome, presided over a trial where the Bishop Leo III's innocence was determined by barbarian law, and reinstated Leo III in Rome. A few days later on Christmas day King Charles went to Church and during the service when all the faithful, including Charles, were kneeling, Pope Leo III placed a crown on the King's head. The congregation, as if on cue, stood to their feet in acclamation of the new Roman Emperor: "Life and victory to Charles Augustus, crowned by God, great and peace-giving emperor of the Romans!" (from the Frankish Royal Annals, December 25, 800, quoted by S. Easton and H. Wieruszowski, The Era of Charlemagne, p. 127.) Pope Leo III prostrated himself before Charles as the long established imperial court etiquette required.
No major author had yet expressed the opinion that Rome had "fallen" so this was not a matter of a resurrection of a lost concept. The Roman Empire was very much a viable institution at the time. Perhaps Pope Leo III thought that Charles should marry Emperor Leo IV's widow, the Empress Irene, who was currently reigning in Constantinople. Although Charlemagne did send a proposal of marriage and received, apparently, a somewhat positive reply from Irene she was soon deposed and relegated to a women's monastery by a usurper, Emperor Nicephorus. More likely, however, the "Donation of Constantine" had again inspired the understanding that such an action was within the powers of the Papacy. That fictional account told how Constantine had bestowed on Bishop Sylvester the crown of the Roman Empire, but Sylvester had decided not to wear it--indicating that his tonsure made it too uncomfortable--and put it back on Constantine's head. Therefore, if the Pope could allow Constantine to wear the crown, the Pope could allow others to wear it.
However it is explained, this action on the part of the Bishop of Rome was completely without real historical precedent and did not have any validity. Nevertheless the Eastern Emperor eventually recognized Charlemagne as "Emperor of the Franks" to keep Charles from encroaching and claiming more imperial territory in the western Balkans. Besides, Constantinople must have reasoned, all truly civilized people would know that such a claim by a barbarian king was superficial posturing, wishful thinking at best. And so far as Charlemagne's personal stature as a ruler was concerned the title was an empty honor, adding nothing measurable to his power or greatness.
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Although it is customary among some authors today to refer to this revived western "Roman Empire" under Charlemagne and his immediate successors as the "Holy Roman Empire", that practice stems more from convenience than from a true representation of the facts. Although it conveniently distinguishes this "Roman Empire" in western Europe from the original "Roman Empire" which survived at Constantinople, the "Holy Roman Empire" title was never used, officially or otherwise, before the twelfth century.
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Charlemagne accomplished the conversion of the north European Saxons by means of a process of military conquest. At the death of Boniface the Saxons were the only Germanic people still unconverted. There had been attempts to evangelize them, which had produced a share of martyrs. They remained ruthlessly aggressive toward the Franks and despite repeated encounters with Charles Martel, Carloman and Pepin they continued to invade to ravage Frankish settlements. Charlemagne's campaigns against them began in 772 and lasted intermittently over thirty years. It was not until after a severe clash in 776 that the question of religion was inserted in the peace discussions by the Saxons suggesting that they might accept Christianity more readily than they could tolerate the Franks, but by accepting Christianity they would pledge their submission to the Franks. When Charlemagne accepted their proposition great numbers were baptized.
In 782 a leader of the Saxon nobility launched a war for independence and the restoration of paganism. Frankish clergy were expelled or executed, churches were destroyed and Saxon Christians were persecuted. Charlemagne's response was to execute large numbers of Saxons, which only provoked further rebellion. Finally the leader of the revolt, Widukind and many of his followers were baptized in 785. Charlemagne seems to have issued special laws for the Saxons which imposed the penalty of capital punishment for neglect of baptism, plundering or burning a church, cremating the dead, cannibalizing witches, human sacrifice or other pagan customs. The imposition of tithe collections pushed northern Saxony into rebellion more than once between 792 and 804. Peace was eventually realized only after forced migrations and colonization of the area. The Saxon church gradually took shape with bishoprics early created at Bremen, Verden, Minden, Paderborn, and Münster. Later Osnabrück, Halberstadt and Hildesheim were added before 840. The most famous monastery was Corvey, an offshoot of Corbie, was founded in 822.
The evangelization of the southern part of Denmark (i.e. Schleswig) was also carried out before 840. Archbishop Ebbo of Rheims became Papal legate for the North in 822, but a learned monk from Corvey named Anschar, or Ansgar, did the legwork, and earned thereby the memorial of "Apostle of the North". In 831 Anschar became archbishop of Hamburg. While in Rome for his consecration, Pope Gregory IV (731-741) made him legate for the Danes, Swedes and Slavs of the North. Viking pirates destroyed Hamburg in 845. When the bishopric of Bremen became vacant in 848, it was detached from the archbishop of Cologne and united with Hamburg as a unified archbishopric. Anschar did the first preaching in Sweden between 829 and 831. The first bishop was Gauzbert, a relative of Archbishop Ebbo of Rheims, who had some success between 832 and 845. Archbishop Anschar returned a second time to the Swedish work in 850 with little success.
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Charlemagne determined that only the king had the right to use the property of a non-proprietary church as a financial resource. The older cathedral churches had never been proprietary foundations, but several were in jeopardy of becoming proprietary. The clergy of these older churches had not always remained in fellowship with the prevailing church hierarchy in Frankland. In order to bring these churches and their clergy into line with the church's established practices and to protect them from predatory warlords Charlemagne extended the privileges of the bannun, ban, over them. The royal ban included not only the privilege of protection, but also the privilege of jurisdiction and the privilege of immunity.
The privilege of protection was granted not only to certain churches and monasteries, but also to certain individuals (royal vassals) assigned to royal business. All cathedral churches and their properties were automatically granted this privilege. However, only certain monasteries that commended themselves or were commended by their proprietors to the king's proprietorship and thus became royal monasteries could enjoy these privileges.
The privilege of jurisdiction was the right to have a case presented in the royal court. Widows and orphans already enjoyed this privilege of the ban. All archbishops and bishops (Cathedral churches and any local churchmen under the supervision of the bishop) enjoyed this benefit.
The privilege of emunitas--immunity--was granted to all the cathedral church's buildings and lands in the same way it was enjoyed by all the royal properties across the realm. Local governmental officials were prohibited from entering immune estates or buildings to carry out any official actions. After 792 every county or mark (frontier region) was to have an appointed advocatus, advocate, who was the king's local agent to protect and administer the immune properties. He was regularly to hold court for the inhabitants on immune estates and to organize and lead any soldiers recruited from this population.
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Most bishops and archbishops and abbots of royal monasteries in Charlemagne's day were selected and invested by the king after which they were duly elected and consecrated by their fellow clergy according to procedures prescribed by canon law. These leaders were invested with the symbols (ring, pastoral staff or crozier, and pallium) of ecclesiastical authority either by the Pope in Rome or by an authorized Papal representative who carried the symbols to them from Rome. Royal investiture was the exercise of royal proprietorship over these institutions. We do not know to what degree if any at all, Charlemagne and Louis sought to establish the policy of exercising full proprietary rights over the benefices and spoli of the royal institutions.
While Charlemagne and his son, Louis the Pious, concerned themselves with the most important church offices, archbishop and bishop, the ranks of lesser clergy were left to canonical election and appointment procedures. Both, however, attempted to regulate the appointment of churchmen to proprietary institutions and the assigned duties of such churchmen. Proprietors were required to allow the local bishop to exercise his canonical responsibilities of approval and supervision over the appointment, dismissal and discipline of churchmen serving in proprietary positions. These decrees sometimes fell on ears that were not listening.
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In about 760 Bishop Chrodegang of Metz organized the clergy of his cathedral chapter to live and eat together under a simple rule, thus reviving the practice of a vita communis among the priests. It was these organized priests who now began the practice of regular liturgical observance at the seven canonical hours, not unlike the monks in many monasteries. Hence the term applied to these priests, the canonici, canons, may have been because they recited the canonical prayers or because they lived the viti canonica, canonical life. Charlemagne encouraged the widespread adoption of this manner of organization and the liturgical practice, requiring that the liturgy be sung. Under Louis the Pious the Synod of Aachen in 816 made new regulations for canons in Cathedral and Collegiate chapters whether they adopted a rule and practiced the common life or not. There were also regulations pertaining to canonesses!
Lesser clergy in chapels and proprietary sites were required to submit themselves to the authority and discipline of the local bishop and to attend diocesan synods. Charlemagne legislated that each bishop must always be accompanied by a government official for protection during his annual visits to the various local congregations in his diocese. The Carolingian rulers sometimes called the bishops and archbishops to assemble in a national synod in conjunction with the assembly of all the Frankish nobility.
In 769 Charlemagne issued an edict prescribing that bishops in every diocese establish a school for the education of the clergy and any laymen who were inclined to seek an education. This revived the role of the scholasticus, now more frequently called the magister scholarum, master of the scholars. Ignorant priests were to be suspended until they become educated, and if they do not improve they were to be deposed. In 803 Charlemagne made competent literacy a requirement for ordination to the priesthood.
Penitential handbooks continued to be generated in great variety for they were, apparently, in high demand among the lower clergy and monks. Bishops in the early ninth century attempted to reverse the trend toward private confession and penance, or at least to control it. Despite the fulminations of the Synod of Paris in 829 against lower clergy and monks using penitential books in defiance of episcopal discipline, the practice continued.
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We have noted the enormous role of monasticism in missions and evangelism in the two centuries before Charlemagne. The cultural role of monasticism had likewise been important at least since the sixth century, but that role in this period takes center stage in the Carolingian Renaissance. We have also noted that the Anglo-Saxon missionaries that came in substantial numbers with Willibrord and Boniface introduced the Anglo-Saxon version of Benedictine Rule into Frankland. Efforts to replace existing rules of all sorts with the Anglo-Saxon Benedictine Rule created various further adjustments in the Rule. Considerable resistance delayed the full adoption of the revised Benedictine Rule by nearly a century.
During the reign of Louis the Pious, in 816, the monk Benedict of Aniane was charged with establishing and regulating uniform practice in all monasteries in Frankland. All abbots were to recognize the supervision of the diocesan (i.e., parochial) bishop. Monks could not leave their monastery without the abbot's permission nor leave the diocese without the bishop's permission. Benedict henceforth required all monasteries to follow a revised form of the Rule of Benedict of Nursia.
The Rule of Benedict of Nursia (d. 543) as it was revised in the ninth century substituted social, educational and spiritual service for the required manual labor of the original rule. Rather than support themselves with labor the monks would now be supported by the labor of others, the peasants farming the monastery's lands. Of course, before long the monasteries began to collect tithes also. Since the monks no longer had manual labor to occupy most of their time they were to spend more time in worship and intercessory prayer as their spiritual service. The local bishop was to staff the monastic chapel as if it were a regular part of his diocese; indeed, in some instances the monastic chapel doubled as a parish church. The monks were encouraged to open a portion of their monastery as shelter for wayfarers and especially for male orphans who might make their home in the monastery until they were teenagers. Monks were also encouraged to share their frequently superior skills such as the design, construction and operation of water mills, forges, winepresses, agricultural implements, etc., as well as any specialized knowledge (e.g. medicine) they might have with the people living in the vicinity. None of these activities was absolutely new or unheard of, but the reforms of 816 were designed to make them much more widespread than they had been.
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The Carolingian family, like the Merovingians they replaced, treated kingship as a possession to be divided among all the male heirs. Two of Charlemagne's sons predeceased him: Pepin II, the King of Italy (781-810) and Charles II, the Duke of Main (787-811). His only surviving son, Louis, the Pious, King of Aquitaine (since 781) succeeded to the Carolingian throne in 814. While Louis lived his three adult sons quickly laid claim to choice portions of the kingdom. Louis' fourth son, born after Charlemagne's death, interjected bitterness and violence when he tried to force his three older brothers to share a portion of their inheritance with him. A possible solution appeared when one of the older brothers was killed in a skirmish against renegades in his own region shortly before Louis the Pious' death. After some indecisive maneuvering, the three surviving heirs settled their differences by dividing the Empire into three parts in 843, at the Treaty of Verdun.
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