What did he accomplish? Is he just a meme?

More like Charlememe am i rite guys

Heribert Illig, please go.

>>275983
isn'r he like 20% of western european dna?
that might just be sensationalist articles making shit up though.

File: Aachen_Rathaus_Fresko_des_Krönungssaales_(ZdS).jpg (328KB, 1280x871px) Image search: [Google]

328KB, 1280x871px

>>275983
He expanded the Kingdom of the Franks and christianized the Saxons for example. The Saxon Wars were pretty brutal. Even the Westfalian Herzog of Saxony (dux Saxonum) Widukind, who was known for his strong resistance against the Franks, got defeated and was christianized under Carolingian rule. Carolus Magnus also ordered to cut down the Irminsul (some kind of pillar), which was worshipped as holy world tree by the Saxon people. Pic very related.

Well, if he was a "hero" is a matter of perspective, but he surely was a very important king, who has influenced Europe a lot.

>>275983
He united all the Frankish peoples under one Crown

>>276470
>>276451
What else?

>>278028
He created Europe as we know it in a sense, since his reign was such an important transitional period and he could maintain an infrastructure between Italy, Germany, and France throughout all of that.

Annihilated the Avars in the Carpathian Basin; something nobody was able to do before.

Brought a degree of civilization back in Western Europe with his sponsorship of schools and learning. Standardized silver coinage so that trade could be facilitated.

Even the Abbasid Caliph Harun al-Rashid was impressed with Charlemagne to send an embassy bearing gifts. One of which was an elephant

>>275983
Christianity got really good street cred

>>278028
With help of the pope, he usurped the roman throne from the Byzantines.

>>278028
To sum it; basically his reign laid the foundation of France and Germany

File: Charlemagne's peacock.jpg (59KB, 452x339px) Image search: [Google]

59KB, 452x339px

>>275983
http://www.yorku.ca/inpar/eginhard_grant.pdf
A decent read for any beginning historian interested in Charlemagne. Notker the Stammerer has another interesting piece on Charlemagne, but he lived and wrote much later than Einhard/Eginherd

>>275983
Nicolas Cage?

- conquered the Lombards, conquered and Christianised the Germans, created the Spanish March
- created a unified political space across Western Europe that would become Western Christendom
- revived the political idea of the res publica
- provoked the Carolingian Renaissance in art and architecture by imitation of Byzantine art
- created the cathedral schools which were capital to Western intellectual development and would one day become the universities
- began the practice by monks of copying ancient texts, which preserved knowledge that would otherwise have been lost

All in all he reconnected the West to civilisation, by making it a periphery of Byzantine culture. The West was not yet an independent civilisation, that would come later, but Charlemagne's actions were an important step in that direction.

>>284938
Basically Charlemagne's reign is considered the end of the Dark Ages.

>United the Germanic peoples under one flag before it was cool
>Took the Frankish from a minor power to one of the most famous empires in history
>Encouraged education for the public in science, logic, and the liberal arts
>Encouraged recreation of classic artwork
>Was well-liked for his humble demeanor
>Worked to bring literature that had previously been reserved for monks and nobility to the common people
>Pacified much of Europe through a chain of ambitious military campaigns
>Spent the later parts of his life learning to read and write

And he's pretty qt.

>>286556
Almost all of that is completely wrong.

>>287918
He even thinks Charlemagne, a man with an obviously French name, was German.

The way i see it, Charlemagne was shit. He got the largest state around and spent all his life conquering small fish around it. And he managed to fuck that state up with his retarded inheritance treaty.

The ones who actually had to work hard to make the state into the large entity were his dad and grandpa. He was literally just riding on their hard work and is celebrated for it.

First king of irony
>holy
>roman
>empire

>>288017
>holy
crowned by the pope himself, and on Christmas Day to boot
>roman
Court was in Rome for a while
>empire
Was an actual empire, the decentralization happened later

>>288003
Charlemagne doubled the size of France. That was the whole problem actually.

And it was inherited in full by his son Louis the Pious. It's after Louis' death that it was split up between his own sons (despite his efforts to prevent that).

>>288017
For fuck's sake, the Holy Roman Empire was founded by Otto the Great in the 10th century out of one of the three pieces of Charlemagne's empire.

>>275983
His main accomplishments were bringing back learning and scholarship to be central to what it means to be noble, it was really that and a hell of a lot of good PR work, as good as anyone in history.

His cultural legacy was huge, the explosion in the amount of documents surviving from his period onwards is a big reason why he is every historian's husbando.

>>284952
By idiots who don't read history, yeah.

>>288115
Oh PLEASE

>>288112
>Charlemagne
>France

What in christing fuck are you doing, stop that.

It was Francia. There was no concept of "France" or "Germany" at that point.

>>288122
>>288123
hurr

>>288128
Well if saying "France" in Latin instead of English makes you feel better, go for it.

>>288137
Oh come on you know it's debated and there'll never be a concise decision.

>>288140
It's much better practice, or else silly cunts will start thinking of Francia in terms of the successor states that no-one knew would form.

>>288147
France is not just a successor state though, it's for all intents and purposes the same state. The separation between the two is an artificial creation of 19th century historians. From the title of the ruler and the institutions and rituals to the capital city and patron saints, there is absolutely no break of tradition between "Francia" and France.

Yeah

>>288155
>it's for all intents and purposes the same state

Fucking wrong. The HRE had a much stronger claim to that, the fact that only one of the successor states ended up calling itself just plain "Francia" is just a historical curiosity, it doesn't mean they are magically the same state.

The capital city carried over to the HRE, it didn't go to France. There was no break in tradition between any of the Carologian successor states and his Francia, it's just that only one of them survived.

>>288171
*Carolingian, fug

But yeah, stop making teleological fallacies.

>>288147
>>288155
You guys should check out our similar thread on Belarus >>284024 , where the entire thread is people arguing whether Russia is Ruthenia or Rus or not.

>>288180
Please no.

The point I was trying to make is you shouldn't try and port one bit of history into another to try and link up shared glories, it's always going to lead you to strain things hugely.

>>288155

Not the guy you're replying to, but surely the historical continuity that you're talking about only really applies to West Francia.

To equate Middle and East Francia - and Francia as a whole - to France just feels obviously wrong.

>>288171
The HRE doesn't have any claim to that at all, it consists almost entirely of land recently conquered by Charlemagne that was either German or Lombard, and their cultural distance from France was the main reason for that durable split and why they didn't even claim to be heirs of France but instead claimed to be Rome.

Francia's capital was Paris, France's capital was Paris.
Francia's ruler was called "king of the Franks", France's ruler was called "king of the Franks".
Francia's kings were crowned in Reims and buried in Saint Denis, France's rulers were crowned in Reims and buried in Saint Denis.
Francia's patron saints were Saint Denis and Saint Genevieve, France's patron saints were Saint Denis and Saint Genevieve.
Francia covered roughly the same territory as France.
Francia literally means France.

They're the same country. Charlemagne's conquests and the subsequent independence of that conquered land is basically a colonial story.

File: King-of-Hearts-early-19th-c-deck.jpg (478KB, 790x1200px) Image search: [Google]

478KB, 790x1200px

>>275983
King of Hearts?

>>288198
Well no, that land was obviously lost after the treaty of Verdun. Eastern Francia Was like I said made of land conquered by Charlemagne, and that's what turned into the HRE/Germany. Middle Francia didn't survive, it just became disputed land between France and Germany.

>>288206
Your geography is really bad

>>275983
Most Europeans are descended from him

http://www.theguardian.com/science/commentisfree/2015/may/24/business-genetic-ancestry-charlemagne-adam-rutherford

>>288199
Basically your point is the saints thing, Saint Denis and the name

Everything you are saying is wrong.

Anyway, it's a stupid fucking argument to make. All of the successor states were Francia.

>>288210
Compare
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Frankish_Empire_481_to_814-en.svg
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Partage_de_l'Empire_carolingien_au_Trait%C3%A9_de_Verdun_en_843.JPG

As you can see Eastern Francia is made up almost entirely of land conquered by Charlemagne, with the exception of Eastern Austrasia and Swabia, which were always the most independent and unassimilated parts of France.

>>288219
Everything I listed is correct, but I can see you've given up.

You know there's nothing wrong with saying "shit you're right, I didn't know that" rather than "u wrong im right lalala I can't hear you".

>>288228
oh yeah look at all that fucking austrasia in France oh wait there's barely any at all in modern France let alone western Francia, go peddle your retarded shit somewhere else trollboy.

>>288228
Those maps fucking prove my point, there is very little correlation with what you are saying.

You are basically trying to equate Neustria as being the only "real" Francia, which is fucking retarded.

>>288237
What part of "with the exception of Eastern Austrasia" didn't you get? Neustria, Burgundy, and Aquitaine are all entirely in France.

>go peddle your retarded shit somewhere else trollboy
>>>/b/

>>288245
>with the exception of the overwhelming majority of Austrasia
Fixed that for you, retard. Now click your link and go back where you belong.

>>276451
As a heathen I'm not fond of him but he was a great ruler for the franks that's for sure. Irminsul are believed to be a Saxon representation of Yggdrasil te world tree. As I understand there was more than one, the tradition survived in maypoles if anyone knows what that is

>>288245
Wait, are you trying to say West Francia is Francia (and the other two magically where not, despite no distinction being made at the time and the imperial capital and half the Frankish heartlands not even being in West Francia), or MODERN FRANCE?

File: carolingian_empire.jpg (642KB, 2418x1892px) Image search: [Google]

642KB, 2418x1892px

>>288244
Did you even look at it? Protip: the dates and colours are important.

Here maybe this will make it clearer for you.

>>288250
Are you actually colourblind? Less than a quarter of Austrasia is in Eastern Francia. That's 1/16th of the four kingdoms of France.

>>288261
I'm saying that France is France. Really controversial stuff apparently.

>the imperial capital
Just like how France inherited all the regalia of Francia, Germany inherited the imperial regalia created by Charlemagne.

The ancient capital of Francia was Paris btw, Charlemagne is the one who moved it to Aachen after his conquests because Paris was now too far from the center of his empire.

>>288268
>Aachen Cologne and Fulda are French
wow you're actually fucking retarded aren't you, I feel bad for whoever has to wipe your ass for you

>>288262
It's okay to admit you are wrong, seriously.

>>288273
>Paris, Reims, Tournai, Metz, Tours, Lyon, Toulouse, Bordeaux, Strasburg, Geneva, Nantes, Poitiers are German
I'm sure the reason you're getting so hilariously butthurt is because you're in no way delusional.

>>288284
What are you even trying to say in this post, jesus.

You've already inadvertently destroyed your argument by posting all those maps, just stop. Please stop.

>>288281
You're seriously going to pretend that dark blue spot on the map looks like Germany to you rather than France?

BTW territory is just one of the many points listed here: >>288199

>>288292
You listed the three major Frankish cities from that map that are in Germany, trying to use this as proof that France isn't France. I listed the 12 that are in France.

>>288293
It's nothing like the shape of France, no. And why is Germany relevant in any way?

What in the...
The French nationalist is weird.

If anything, the ones that can claim the Franks and Charlemagne the way he is doing are the Belgians. France and Germany were parts of the Frankish Kingdom, but their origins were in Belgium.
And the original Frank territory was Austrasia.

>>288245
Aquitaine, historically, is not part of the Frankish Kingdom, in practice.

>>288318
lol wtf, Belgium was founded in 1830.

>>288303
That was another anon, but nevermind. You seem to think you are arguing with Angela Merkel for some reason, you should stop that.

The Frankish heartland was Neustria-Austrasia, Neustria ended up in West Francia, which solidified into France, Austrasia ended up split up between the other successor states. All of them combined amounted to "Francia" for centuries until West Francia fell out of the sphere of the Holy Roman Empire, the larger part of the successor states.

I mean i use the term "successor states" but you need to stop thinking of any of these in terms of modern states where continuity even mattered. There was no "state" in any way we'd recognise today, these are just maps of the empires of various Frankish kings and emperors. What mattered was that Frankish ruling class, and later the Carolingian family itself.

What fucking point are you even trying to make by stretching history out like this?

>>288308
OK let's just assume that you're actually blind and not just a delusional German who refuses to see that pre-Charlemagne Francia covers 95% of France vs 25% of Germany. Territories change and that's the least relevant point of all these >>288199, none of which you have addressed.

Daily reminder that the original Franks were German

>>288333
And? Belgium was the origin of the Frankish Empire.

>>288341
See
>>288338

>>288338
>responds to my post responding to that Anon's post
>that was another Anon
OK?

>you should stop that.
I'm not the one getting so hilariously butthurt about this that I can't write a sentence without calling you a retard and other toddler tier insults (not you probably but another Anon who is very obviously German).

>The Frankish heartland was Neustria-Austrasia
Clovis already conquered Aquitaine within his lifetime, and his son conquered Burgundy. All four of those kingdoms were equally "heartland", and these remained the four kingdoms of France for 300 years.

>What fucking point are you even trying to make by stretching history out like this?
You're the one who had such a massive problem with me calling France France. You're the one who started this discussion, not me.

If it "doesn't matter" now, why do you care so much?

>>288354
We're talking about states. Belgium was founded in 1830. It's not the origin of a state founded in 486.

>>288373
>Clovis already conquered Aquitaine within his lifetime, and his son conquered Burgundy. All four of those kingdoms were equally "heartland"

Top fucking lel.

Why the fuck am I arguing history with a wikipedia surfer, this is just a huge waste of time.

>>288364
Still haven't addressed any of them.

States are defined by regalia, traditions, institutions, rituals. In that sense you might say that Charlemagne's empire after 800 was two states in one: the one he inherited as king of the Franks, and the one he created as emperor of the Romans. After Verdun, "Western Francia" ie France formed the continuation of the first, and "Eastern Francia" ie the Holy Roman Empire formed the continuation of the second.

>>288199
Charlemagnes capital was in Aachen, modern day Germany
He spoke Old High German, the ancestor of the German language[1]
The Franks were a Germanic tribe

1. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charlemagne#Language

>>288373
Dear French nationalist: what language did Charlemagne speak?

>>288398
Why French of course :^)

>>288390
As opposed to your ancient aliens secret history?

>>288375
The Frankish Kingdom is the origin of France, the Holy Roman Empire (which Belgium was a part of), etc.

>>288396
Charlemagne moved the capital to Aachen from Paris, where it had been for the last 300 years.

What Charlemagne spoke is irrelevant, but nobody knows what it was, since he came from Herstal which was right on the border between the Romance speaking part of Francia (which made up the vast majority of Francia) and the still Frankish speaking piece of Eastern Austrasia. We do know for sure that he spoke Latin though, the question is just whether he had to learn it from scratch.

The Franks from the 3rd century were a Germany tribe. We're not talking about that at all. And I also don't see what point you're trying to make.

>>288395
Why does only Neustria count as Frankish in your eyes? That continuity, ie the royal court went on to Aachen and then split. There is a reason why the entire empire after Charlemagne (all the succession states) were collectively called Francia, because no-one fucking saw things in terms of the countries that would later form centuries after like you are.

>>288398
I'm neither French nor a nationalist, and I answered here >>288414, although I don't see how it has anything to do with this thread.

>>288418
Everyone is just poking fun at your fucked up back to front teleological view of Francia.

>>288411
Yes, in the same way that Britain is the origin of the USA. Doesn't mean that pre-1776 Britain is suddenly not Britain.

>>288414
Of course he had to learn Latin from scratch, it had been dead for hundreds of years by the time he was born.

>>288415
Except how the French kings were called king of the Franks, crowned in Reims with the vial of Clovis, ruled from Paris, were buried in Saint Denis, etc etc, all of which were symbols of France dating back to Clovis.

>>288395
Real talk now, you really did learn everything you know about this topic from wikipedia, right?

You know that after Verdun, "Francia" still meant the same thing it did before, right? East/West/Middle were just terms that referred to the control of the different kings, they were not "states" like you seem to think they were.

>>288414
He spoke old High German.

>>288402
The other guy is right. Your complete lack of knowledge of Aquitainian history is showing.

>>288426
Austrasia is the origin of the Frankish Kingdom. You like wikipedia, right? Read about it.

>>288431
The language(s) spoken in most of Francia was on the border between Late Latin and Old French. It was mutually intelligible with the Latin that Charlemagne read, which was just the written version of it.

>>288443
This is the only good point you have, but it still doesn't mean that calling Charlemagne's Francia "France" is anything but massively misleading and going to lead to huge confusion.

>>288448
>East/West/Middle were just terms that referred to the control of the different kings
And one of those kings inherited the regalia of all the Frankish kings since Clovis.

>>288449
>He spoke old High German.
It's just as likely that he spoke old French.

>Austrasia is the origin of the Frankish Kingdom.
Austrasia is just the territory ruled by Clovis before the conquest of Gaul and the foundation of a new state, France.

>>288466
No, he spoke High Old German.
Austrasia and Neustria were considered the two halves of the realm.

I think you should read a book. Look for his biography by Jean Favier. Don't worry, it is in French.

>>288457
It leads to a lot less confusion than calling it "Francia" or "Frankish kingdom" which will lead some people to equate it with the 3rd century Germanic tribe that were the Franks like this idiot is doing: >>288396

The fact is that there is nothing about the state of early "France" that is in any way different from "Francia".

>>288466
>And one of those kings inherited the regalia of all the Frankish kings since Clovis.

Said magic regalia didn't transform the other parts of Francia into no longer being Francia though that only happened when they solidified into OTHER states and West Francia was left the only part still waving the name around. Which is precisely why using the term "France" to refer to Francia is so problematic, and fucking needless unless you have a boner for 19th century style nationalism.

>>280195
and Italy

File: 1448202646538s.jpg (5KB, 122x125px) Image search: [Google]

5KB, 122x125px

>>275999

>>288478
Wait, we just got a whole new level of retardation here.

When, in your magic version of history, was "France" founded then?

>>288477
>if I repeat it enough it will be true!
There is absolutely no evidence for it.

I get that you're German and incredibly butthurt about this, but maybe you shouldn't post about things you're incapable of thinking rationally about.

>>288489
I'd say 486, with the conquest of Neustria by Clovis. Historically the date more commonly used was 500 for Clovis' conversion to Catholicism, but the exact date isn't known.

Either way, it wasn't a completely punctual event but it happened in the late 5th century.

>>288491
How about the fact that he was born in an Old High German speaking region and had a large collection of Old High German poetry

>>288479
>magic regalia
I don't think you understand what states are based on. Because it's literally "magic regalia".

>>288505
And that's your problem, you see things only in those terms, ignoring everything else

>>288502
Nobody even knows where he was born, but it's most likely Herstal near Liège, where his family was from, and which was right on the border between the Romance and Germanic speaking regions.

I still don't see what Charlemagne's mothertongue has to do with anything, considering he ruled over an overwhelmingly Romance-speaking kingdom where the only written language used was Latin. Although I don't even see what that has to do with anything.

Is the French nationalist a troll? Most French people I know don't believe what he does.

>>288514
What else is there to see? That's what defines a state.

>>288522
That's probably because I'm not French, so I can actually be objective about it and not wallow in self-hatred.

It's funny how between your French masochism and the Germans' arrogance, you two agree on everything. This is probably why most people have such a distorted view of this and why generally speaking France's importance in history is so massively underrated.

>>288522
you sure have daily conversations about charlemagne's empire with french people

>>288541
He's French himself, he's just trying to say "we're not all like him! most of us hate France haha pls like me ;_;"

This is what French people are like in international settings all the time, it's cringe-worthy.

>>288541
For a particular reason I had.

>>288549
I'm french myself and I mostly agree with you. It's not like history should suffer from bias anyway

>>288260
>As I understand there was more than one, the tradition survived in maypoles

neat

>>288551
I sincerly wonder in which situation that could have happened. What's more most french people are completely clueless on this topic

>>288540
>>288549
French people have a great military history. Be it in the Crusades, Phillip II, Normans in England, Normans in Italy, Louis XIV, Napoleon, etc.
The Royal House of Spain is French. The Habsburgs are actually the House of Lorraine, which is French. The House of Sweden is French. The House of Portugal is French.

But you can't say the Frankish Kingdom is France. It is France, Germany, Belgium and later Italy, etc.

>>288574
Yeah most of the claims in that post are way more questionable than what I'm saying.

>>288560
Well, it depends where you find them.

And even when it comes to the average population, the French always seemed to me to have more interest in History than most other nationalities.

>>286556
You forgot >is made of gold

File: image.jpg (26KB, 270x296px) Image search: [Google]

26KB, 270x296px

>>282188
Thanks for this

>>288262
How the fuck did Charlemagne neglect Brittany?

>>289133
He didn't really, you'll find that though Charlemagne never directly conquered a bunch of territories the Lords there would probably give him gifts, tribute, and lip service. Brittany was one of those dependent states, and I think the Princes of Ireland also held Charlemagne in high regard.

File: Charlemagne's crown.jpg (66KB, 452x339px) Image search: [Google]

66KB, 452x339px

>>288718
Of course, there are other more in depth sources out there. This is a solid start.

>>288260
>Calling yourself a heathen

Fuck off Amerifat

File: 12273089_622187267924222_371112484_n.jpg (10KB, 450x150px) Image search: [Google]

10KB, 450x150px

>>275983
>some Frankish warlord with a weird, foreign religion spreads religion by the sword
>onto a populace that must unwillingly accept this 'new' religion
>brutally executes a large portion of your population, forcing even your women to take up arms against this monster
>must abandon their traditional ways
>have all of their holy objects and sites destroyed, as well as their cultural achievements
>the whole time calls YOU the devil worshippers
>your culture fades into obscurity as you are forced to accept the "correct" language, "correct" culture and "correct" religion.

Christian equivalent of the great Muslim conquerors. From the Christian perspective he was a great man, from all others he was a monster. But that can be said about many of these conqueror-types.

tbqfh (to be quite fairly honest) the Franks, the Frankish Kingdom (or Francia) and France are all different entities.

Merovingian Franks, Carolingian Francia and Capetian France were all significantly different to each other culturally. Rather than seeing them as the same entity, I personally see them all as successors to one another.

Who here hyped for Total War Charlemagne?

>>291984
>Saxon sympathizer
into the hell-mouth you go.

>mfw there's literally no distinction of France and Francia in your language

Charlemagne was the king of the franks, of the kingdom of the franks or Regnum Francorum. And so were all french kings. Misuse of latin terms by revisionist germanics doesn't change that. Are you the kind of people who claim that Byzantium wasn't Rome?

>>292047
Byzantium was Rome though.

Francia included West Francia, Burgundy, Middle Francia and East Francia. France was a successor to only West Francia, so it isn't fair to call it the same entity desu senpai.

>>292060
Rome included Gallia, Britain Hispania, Mauretania, Egypt, Greece, etc. Byzantium was a successor to only Greece, so it isn't fair to call it the same entity desu senpai.

File: 1387692701212.jpg (547KB, 1200x967px) Image search: [Google]

547KB, 1200x967px

>>278028
He's the father of Germany, France, Italy and indirectly England (since England as we know it is a result of the French Plantagenet domination).

In short, he's the father of Western Civilization, which shaped the world we live in

>>292086
More modestly, he is also father of the eastern section of Spain. He liberated the lands that would become Navarre, Aragon and Catalonia.

File: Cartographed Vomit.png (174KB, 2100x1525px) Image search: [Google]

174KB, 2100x1525px

>>288484
>saving the thumbnail

>>292213
>tiny Lithuania
>no Gross Dumnonia
>Viking lands missing out all of their actual conquests in the British Isles and just including some of Scotland for no fucking reason

-10/10 you tried

>>292213
Oh god I just realised that your "Cornwall" doesn't include Cornwall actually vomited

>>275983
he shed the blood of the saxon men

>>292213
>Bundesrepublik Deutschland
Heh

>>292213
>United Kingdom of Ireland, Iceland and Wales

>>286556
Did you learn that from an anime?

>>278028
He BTFO'd the muslim emirate of cordoba twice and got some sick battle elephants to show for it.