Constantine

Who is this Pepin?

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Besides having a blog named after him, who was Pepin le Bref?

As with others from the period, we have to clear away some naming confusion. Due to differences in source material and translations, his name is variously rendered Pepin, Pipin, and Pippin. I chose Pepin simply because Tolkien used Pippin (his was a deliberate selection, perhaps because hobbits are short). The nickname “le Bref” is usually translated as “the Short,” but I think it could mean other things, such as short-tempered (as we’ll see), of few words, short haired,1.Unlike the “long-haired” Merovingian kings. or something else. But there’s no way to know one way or another.

Pepin is usually considered a middling figure, sandwiched between the legendary Charles Martel, and the timeless Charlemagne. While there is no dispute with the stature history has afforded Charles the Great, his grandfather’s claim to fame has come under greater scrutiny. Personally I see Martel and Pepin as great figures in an age when only the strongest and most resolute rulers could stay on top, which Pepin did for for twenty-five years.

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Footnotes

Footnotes
↑1 Unlike the “long-haired” Merovingian kings.

The king’s daughter and the emperor’s son

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Charlemagne’s relationship with his daughters has raised eyebrows for twelve centuries. In Einhard’s famous phrasing, “[H]e kept them close beside him at home until his death, saying that he could not stand to be parted from their company.”1.Einhard, Life of Charlemagne, ch.19, in Charlemagne’s Courtier, ed. Paul Dutton, p.29. Einhard has other highly interesting things to say about Charlemagne’s daughters and their relationship with their father, and we will explore that in another post. But at least once he considered letting a daughter go, when the mighty Byzantine Empire proposed joining families. That would be enough to make the most protective father think twice about keeping his daughter at home.

Charles was a man who enjoyed life’s pleasures, and a woman’s comfort not the least of them. His wives and concubines produced eighteen children (or more), a fact which caused some concern with at least one poet.2.McKitterick notes that Wetti of Richenau includes Charlemagne in his vision of hell, with a beast chewing on his genitals. Charlemagne: Formation of a European Identity, p.91. His first daughter with his second wife Hildegard was named Rotrude, who was born in 775. Being a daughter of a king, her usual duty and fate would have been to serve as a bridge between great families. Her chance came from an unexpected quarter in 781, when her father was in Rome.

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Footnotes

Footnotes
↑1 Einhard, Life of Charlemagne, ch.19, in Charlemagne’s Courtier, ed. Paul Dutton, p.29.
↑2 McKitterick notes that Wetti of Richenau includes Charlemagne in his vision of hell, with a beast chewing on his genitals. Charlemagne: Formation of a European Identity, p.91.