 742 - 814 (71 years) Has 23 ancestors and more than 100 descendants in this family tree.
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| Name |
Charlemagne Karling |
| Suffix |
King of the Franks |
| Nickname |
Charles the Great |
| Birth |
2 Apr 742 |
Ingelheim, Daxweiler, Rhineland, Deutschland  |
| Gender |
Male |
| Death |
28 Jan 814 |
Aachen, Köln, Nordrhein-Westfalen, Deutschland |
| Burial |
5 Feb 814 |
Aachen Cathedral, Köln, Nordrhein-Westfalen, Deutschland |
| Initiatory (LDS) |
21 Jan 1922 |
| FamilySearch ID |
LZ62-TSV |
| Headstones |
 Submit Headstone Photo |
| Person ID |
I13586 |
mytree |
| Last Modified |
25 Feb 2024 |
| Father |
Pepin Karling, King of the Franks, b. 714, Metz, Austrasia d. 24 Sep 768, Saint-Denis, Neustria (Age 54 years) |
| Mother |
Bertrada, of Laon, b. Abt 720, Laon, Aisne, Picardie, République française d. 12 Jul 783, Choisy, Haute-Savoie, Rhône-Alpes, République française (Age 63 years) |
| Marriage |
Abt 740 |
| Family ID |
F7068 |
Group Sheet | Family Chart |
| Family 1 |
Ermengarda, b. Hesbaye, België d. 3 Oct 818, Angers, Maine-et-Loire, Pays de la Loire, République française |
| Marriage |
770 |
| Annulled |
771 |
| Family ID |
F7065 |
Group Sheet | Family Chart |
| Last Modified |
6 Mar 2025 |
| Family 2 |
Hildegard, b. 758, Aachen, Köln, Nordrhein-Westfalen, Deutschland d. 30 Apr 783, Thionville, Moselle, Lorraine, République française (Age 25 years) |
| Marriage |
Abt 771 |
Aachen, Köln, Nordrhein-Westfalen, Deutschland |
| Children |
| | 1. Charles Karling, Count of Maine, b. 772, Aachen, Köln, Nordrhein-Westfalen, Deutschland d. 4 Dec 811 (Age 39 years) |
| + | 2. Pepin (Carloman) Karling, King of Italy, b. Apr 773, Aachen, Köln, Nordrhein-Westfalen, Deutschland d. 8 Jul 810, Milan, Milano, Lombardia, Italia (Age 37 years) |
| | 3. Adelheid Karling, b. 774, Pavia, Lombardia, Italia d. Aug 774 (Age 0 years) |
| + | 4. Rotrude Karling, b. 775, Aachen, Köln, Nordrhein-Westfalen, Deutschland d. 6 Jun 810 (Age 35 years) |
| + | 5. Louis Karling, King of the Franks, b. 16 Aug 778, Chasseneuil-du-Poitou, Vienne, Poitou-Charentes, République française d. 20 Jun 840, Ingelheim, Daxweiler, Rhineland, Deutschland (Age 61 years) |
| | 6. Lothaire Karling, b. Aug 778, Chasseneuil-du-Poitou, Vienne, Poitou-Charentes, République française d. Aug 778 (Age 0 years) |
| + | 7. Bertha Karling, b. 779, Aachen, Köln, Nordrhein-Westfalen, Deutschland d. 11 Mar 826 (Age 47 years) |
| | 8. Gisele Karling, b. 781, Milan, Milano, Lombardia, Italia d. 808 (Age 27 years) |
| | 9. Hildegard Karling, b. 782, Aachen, Köln, Nordrhein-Westfalen, Deutschland d. 9 Jun 783, Aachen, Köln, Nordrhein-Westfalen, Deutschland (Age 1 year) |
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| Family ID |
F7047 |
Group Sheet | Family Chart |
| Last Modified |
6 Mar 2025 |
| Family 3 |
Fastrada, b. 765, Ingelheim, Daxweiler, Rhineland, Deutschland d. 10 Aug 794, Frankfurt, Mittelfranken, Bayern, Deutschland (Age 29 years) |
| Marriage |
Oct 783 |
Worms, Worms, Rheinland-Pfalz, Deutschland |
| Children |
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| Family ID |
F7066 |
Group Sheet | Family Chart |
| Last Modified |
6 Mar 2025 |
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| Event Map |
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 | Birth - 2 Apr 742 - Ingelheim, Daxweiler, Rhineland, Deutschland |
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 | Marriage - Abt 771 - Aachen, Köln, Nordrhein-Westfalen, Deutschland |
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 | Marriage - Oct 783 - Worms, Worms, Rheinland-Pfalz, Deutschland |
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| Death - 28 Jan 814 - Aachen, Köln, Nordrhein-Westfalen, Deutschland |
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 | Burial - 5 Feb 814 - Aachen Cathedral, Köln, Nordrhein-Westfalen, Deutschland |
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| Notes |
- Charlemagne also known as Charles the Great (Latin: Carolus or Karolus M a gnus) or Charles I, was King of the Franks. He united most of Western E ur ope during the early Middle Ages and laid the foundations for modern F ran ce and Germany. He took the Frankish throne in 768 and became King o f Ita ly from 774. From 800 he became the first Holy Roman Emperor — th e firs t recognized emperor in Western Europe since the fall of the Weste rn Roma n Empire three centuries earlier. While Charlemagne already rule d his kin gdom without the help of the Pope, recognition from the pontif f granted h im divine legitimacy in the eyes of his contemporaries.
The expanded Frankish state Charlemagne founded was called the Carolingi a n Empire.
The oldest son of Pepin the Short and Bertrada of Laon, Charlemagne beca m e king in 768 following the death of his father. He was initially co-ru le r with his brother Carloman I. Carloman's sudden death in 771 under un exp lained circumstances left Charlemagne as the undisputed ruler of th e Fran kish Kingdom. Charlemagne continued his father's policy towards th e papac y and became its protector, removing the Lombards from power in n orther n Italy, and leading an incursion into Muslim Spain. He also campa igned a gainst the Saxons to his east, Christianizing them upon penalty o f death , leading to events such as the Massacre of Verden. Charlemagne r eached t he height of his power in 800 when he was crowned Emperor of th e Romans b y Pope Leo III on Christmas Day at Old St. Peter's Basilica.
Called the "Father of Europe" (Pater Europae),[3] Charlemagne united mo s t of Western Europe for the first time since the Roman Empire. His rul e s purred the Carolingian Renaissance, a period of energetic cultural an d in tellectual activity within the Western Church. All Holy Roman Empero rs u p to the last Emperor Francis II, as well as both the French and Ger man m onarchies, considered their kingdoms to be descendants of Charlemag ne's e mpire. However, the Eastern Orthodox Church views Charlemagne mor e contro versially, seeing his support of the filioque and recognition b y the Bish op of Rome as legitimate Roman Emperor rather than Irene of At hens of th e Eastern Roman Empire would be one of the machinations that w ould lead t o the eventual split of the Rome and Constantinople in the Gr eat Schism o f 1054 AD.
Charlemagne died in 814, having ruled as emperor for just over thirtee n y ears. He was laid to rest in his imperial capital of Aachen in what i s to day Germany. His son Louis the Pious succeeded him.
Political background
Francia, early 8th century
By the 6th century, the western Germanic Franks had been Christianised , a nd Francia, ruled by the Merovingians, was the most powerful of the k ingd oms that succeeded the Western Roman Empire. Following the Battle o f Tert ry, however, the Merovingians declined into a state of powerlessne ss, fo r which they have been dubbed the rois fainéants ("do-nothing king s"). Al most all government powers of any consequence were exercised by t heir chi ef officer, the mayor of the palace.
In 687, Pepin of Herstal, mayor of the palace of Austrasia, ended the st r ife between various kings and their mayors with his victory at Tertry a n d became the sole governor of the entire Frankish kingdom.[6] Pepin him se lf was the grandson of two of the most important figures of the Austra sia n Kingdom, Saint Arnulf of Metz and Pepin of Landen. Pepin of Hersta l wa s eventually succeeded by his illegitimate son Charles, later know n as Ch arles Martel (Charles the Hammer).
After 737, Charles governed the Franks without a king on the throne bu t d eclined to call himself king. Charles was succeeded in 741 by his son s Ca rloman and Pepin the Short, the father of Charlemagne. To curb separ atis m in the periphery of the realm, in 743 the brothers placed on the t hron e Childeric III, who was to be the last Merovingian king. After Carl oma n resigned office in 746 to enter the church by preference as a monk , Pep in brought the question of the kingship before Pope Zachary, askin g wheth er it was logical for a king to have no royal power. The pope han ded dow n his decision in 749. He decreed that it was better for Pepin, w ho had t he powers of high office as Mayor, to be called king, so as no t to confus e the hierarchy. He therefore ordered him to become true king .[7]
Under the Carolingians, the Frankish kingdom spread to encompass an ar e a including most of Western Europe; the division of the kingdom forme d th e basis for modern France and Germany.[9] The religious, political , and a rtistic evolutions originating from a centrally positioned Franci a mad e a defining imprint on the whole of Europe
The most likely date of Charlemagne's birth is reconstructed from sever a l sources. The date of 742 — calculated from Einhard's date of death o f J anuary 814 at age 72 - predates the marriage of his parents in 744. T he y ear given in the Annales Petaviani, 747, would be more likely, excep t tha t it contradicts Einhard and a few other sources in making Charlema gne se venty years old at his death. The month and day of April 2 is esta blishe d by a calendar from Lorsch Abbey.
In 747, that day fell on Easter, a coincidence that likely would have be e n remarked upon by chroniclers but was not. If Easter was being used a s t he beginning of the calendar year, then 2 April 747 could have been , by m odern reckoning, 2 April 748 (not on Easter). The date favored b y the pre ponderance of evidence is 2 April 742, based on Charlemagne's b eing a sep tuagenarian at the time of his death. This date would appear t o support t he idea that Charlemagne was born illegitimate, which is not , however, me ntioned by Einhard.
Place of birth
Region of Aachen-Liège (contemporary borders, trade- and travel routes).
Charlemagne’s exact birthplace is unknown, although historians have sugg e sted Aachen in modern-day Germany, and Liège (Herstal) in present-day B el gium as possible locations.[11] Aachen and Liège are close to the regi o n from where both the Merovingian and Carolingian families originated . Ot her cities have been suggested, including Düren, Gauting, Mürlenbach ,[12 ] Quierzy and Prüm. No definitive evidence as to which is the righ t candi date exists.
Charlemagne was the eldest child of Pepin the Short (714 – 24 Septembe r 7 68, reigned from 751) and his wife Bertrada of Laon (720 – 12 July 78 3) , daughter of Caribert of Laon and Bertrada of Cologne. Records name o nl y Carloman, Gisela, and three short-lived children named Pepin, Chroth ai s and Adelais as his younger siblings.
Before he was elected king in 750, Pepin the Short was initially a mayo r , a high office he held "as though hereditary" (velut hereditario funge ba tur). Einhard explains that "the honor" was usually "given by the peop le " to the distinguished, but Pepin the Great and his brother Carloman t h e Wise received it as though hereditary, as had their father, Charles M ar tel. There was, however, a certain ambiguity about quasi-inheritance . Th e office was treated as joint property: one Mayorship held by two br other s jointly.[15] Each, however, had his own geographic jurisdiction . When C arloman decided to resign, becoming ultimately a Benedictine a t Monte Cas sino,[16] the question of the disposition of his quasi-shar e was settle d by the pope. He converted the Mayorship into a Kingship an d awarded th e joint property to Pepin, who now had the full right to pas s it on by in heritance.
This decision was not accepted by all members of the family. Carloman h a d consented to the temporary tenancy of his own share, which he intend e d to pass on to his own son, Drogo, when the inheritance should be sett le d at someone's death. By the Pope's decision, in which Pepin had a han d , Drogo was to be disqualified as an heir in favour of his cousin Charl es . He took up arms in opposition to the decision and was joined by Grif o , a half-brother of Pepin and Carloman, who had been given a share by C ha rles Martel, but was stripped of it and held under loose arrest by hi s ha lf-brothers after an attempt to seize their shares by military actio n. B y 753 all was over. Grifo perished in combat in the Battle of Saint- Jean- de-Maurienne while Drogo was hunted down and taken into custody.[18 ]
On the death of Pepin, 24 September 768, the kingship passed jointly t o h is sons, "with divine assent" (divino nutu). According to the Life, P epi n died in Paris. The Franks "in general assembly" (generali conventu ) gav e them both the rank of king (reges) but "partitioned the whole bod y of t he kingdom equally" (totum regni corpus ex aequo partirentur). Th e annals [19] tell a slightly different version, with the king dying at S t-Denis , near Paris. The two "lords" (domni) were "elevated to kingship " (elevat i sunt in regnum), Charles on 9 October in Noyon, Carloman on a n unspecif ied date in Soissons. If born in 742, Charles was 26 years old , but he ha d been campaigning at his father's right hand for several yea rs, which ma y help to account for his military skill. Carloman was 17.
The language in either case suggests that there were not two inheritance s , which would have created distinct kings ruling over distinct kingdom s , but a single joint inheritance and a joint kingship tenanted by two e qu al kings, Charles and his brother Carloman. As before, distinct jurisd ict ions were awarded. Charles received Pepin's original share as Mayor : th e outer parts of the kingdom bordering on the sea, namely Neustria , weste rn Aquitaine, and the northern parts of Austrasia; while Carloma n was awa rded his uncle's former share, the inner parts: southern Austra sia, Septi mania, eastern Aquitaine, Burgundy, Provence, and Swabia, land s borderin g Italy. The question of whether these jurisdictions were join t shares re verting to the other brother if one brother died or were inhe rited proper ty passed on to the descendants of the brother who died wa s never definit ely settled by the Frankish people. It came up repeatedl y over the succee ding decades until the grandsons of Charlemagne create d distinct sovereig n kingdoms.
Charles and his children
Charlemagne (left) and his eldest son, Pepin the Hunchback. Tenth-centu r y copy of a lost original from about 830.
During the first peace of any substantial length (780–782), Charles beg a n to appoint his sons to positions of authority within the realm, in t h e tradition of the kings and leaders of the past. In 781, he made his t w o youngest sons kings, having them crowned by the Pope. The elder of th es e two, Carloman, was made king of Italy, taking the Iron Crown that hi s f ather had first worn in 774, and in the same ceremony was renamed "Pe pin. "[36][37] The younger of the two, Louis, became king of Aquitaine. C harle magne ordered Pepin and Louis to be raised in the customs of thei r kingdo ms, and he gave their regents some control of their sub-kingdoms , but rea l power was always in his hands, though he intended his sons t o inherit t heir realms some day. Nor did he tolerate insubordination i n his sons: i n 792, he banished his eldest, though possibly illegitimate , son, Pippi n the Hunchback, to the monastery of Prüm, because the youn g man had join ed a rebellion against him.
Charles was determined to have his children educated, including his daug h ters, as he himself was not. His children were taught all the arts, an d h is daughters were learned in the way of being a woman. His sons too k arch ery, horsemanship, and other outdoor activities.
Charlemagne instructing his son Louis the Pious
The sons fought many wars on behalf of their father when they came of ag e . Charles was mostly preoccupied with the Bretons, whose border he shar e d and who insurrected on at least two occasions and were easily put dow n , but he was also sent against the Saxons on multiple occasions. In 80 5 a nd 806, he was sent into the Böhmerwald (modern Bohemia) to deal wit h th e Slavs living there (Bohemian tribes, ancestors of the modern Czech s). H e subjected them to Frankish authority and devastated the valley o f the E lbe, forcing a tribute on them. Pippin had to hold the Avar and B eneventa n borders but also fought the Slavs to his north. He was uniquel y poise d to fight the Byzantine Empire when finally that conflict aros e after Ch arlemagne's imperial coronation and a Venetian rebellion. Fina lly, Loui s was in charge of the Spanish March and also went to souther n Italy to f ight the duke of Benevento on at least one occasion. He too k Barcelona i n a great siege in 797 (see below).
Charlemagne's attitude toward his daughters has been the subject of mu c h discussion. He kept them at home with him and refused to allow the m t o contract sacramental marriages – possibly to prevent the creation o f ca det branches of the family to challenge the main line, as had been t he ca se with Tassilo of Bavaria – yet he tolerated their extramarital re lation ships, even rewarding their common-law husbands, and treasured th e illegi timate grandchildren they produced for him. He also, apparently , refuse d to believe stories of their wild behaviour. After his death th e survivi ng daughters were banished from the court by their brother, th e pious Lou is, to take up residence in the convents they had been bequea thed by thei r father. At least one of them, Bertha, had a recognised rel ationship, i f not a marriage, with Angilbert, a member of Charlemagne' s court circle.
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