Lombardy

Black smoke, white smoke – revolution

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Usurper, interloper, anti-pope: these are some of the epithets used to describe Constantine II, who held the papal seat for just over a year. Getting him into the papal shoes involved a march on Rome with a mass of peasants to force the issue, and a threatened beat down of a bishop. Overturning his election resulted in one of the bloodiest purges in papal history. Let’s dig in.

The death of Paul I on 26 June 767 marked the culmination of decades of ‘career popes.’ These were men who had joined the ranks of the religious orders at a young age, climbed the ladder of Lateran1.The Lateran Palace was the home of popes for a thousand years, and the base of papal power during that time. positions their entire lives, before their peers elected them to the supreme office. These popes followed a more or less common policy regarding theological questions and relations between the Papal States and foreign entities. They distrusted the Lombards, sought Frankish assistance in return for the bestowal of kingship, and sought to separate themselves from the authority of the Byzantine empire to the east. For the sake of convenience, and to align with current scholarly verbiage, let’s call them the ‘clerical party.’

But these clerics were not the only power in Rome and surrounding areas. Earthly power and authority, as was true throughout Europe, was held by a nobility such as dukes and counts. We’ll call them the ‘aristocratic party.’ “During the first seven decades of the eighth century, in Rome, the clerical and military orders had usually worked together harmoniously, not only because their domestic interests converged, but also because they faced common external threats.” But the papacy was the jewel in the crown. “The clerical bureaucracy, with the pope at its head, was larger, wealthier, and more sophisticated than anything that the military aristocracy could, or in fact did, erect to confront it.”2.Noble, The Republic of St Peter, p.113.

Paul’s reign carried (sadly) unspecified seeds of conflict between the aristocratic and clerical parties. This conflict finally boiled over at his demise, and ended with mobs in the street, torture and death.

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Footnotes

Footnotes
↑1 The Lateran Palace was the home of popes for a thousand years, and the base of papal power during that time.
↑2 Noble, The Republic of St Peter, p.113.

Gregory II: the schism begins

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The pontificate of pope Gregory II marked the beginning of the end of the old “Byzantine papacy,” and the start of a new, western-facing papacy. Gregory opposed the Byzantine emperor on new taxes, inaugurated a muscular regional policy to oppose Lombard expansionism, and implacably fought the eastern empire’s policy of Iconoclasm. The popes that succeeded Gregory continued his policies, eventually culminating the coronation of Pepin the Short and the establishment of the ‘Papal States’ that continued until the 20th century. Let’s take a look.

Gregory II (his original name is not known) was born to a noble Roman family in 669. After holding a number of ecclesiastical posts he was elected pope on 19 May 715, and held the papacy until his death on 11 February 731. He is first notable to history for his work with Boniface, the English monk who proselytized among the Germans. During this period the papacy became increasingly concerned with converting German lands.1.Riche, Family Who Forged Europe, p.32. Boniface, then named Wynfrith, first worked among the Frisians, then traveled to Rome in 717. Wynfrith impressed Gregory, who renamed him Boniface and sent him to Germany.

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Footnotes

Footnotes
↑1 Riche, Family Who Forged Europe, p.32.

Pepin repays a favor, part 1

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In November of the year 751 Pepin le Bref successfully completed a coup against the royal Merovingian family of Francia, a family that had ruled as kings for three centuries. Pepin did so in part with the support of Pope Zacharias, who sided with the Frank when Pepin sent emissaries to Rome in 749 to ask the famous question, who should be king, the one in name only, or the one who actually wields power? Once Zacharias answered in favor of Pepin, the Mayor of the Palace “was chosen king by all the Franks, consecrated by the bishops and received the homage of the great men.”1.Fredegar, Continuations, ch.33, p.102. Pepin was anointed and crowned by the foremost Christian in the land, the English monk and bishop Boniface.

Only a year later the papacy was in a jam. The Lombard king Aistulf was on the move, and had taken several cities that were under the ostensible jurisdiction of the Byzantine Empire in Constantinople, and the papacy. Pope Stephen II recognized that he would need to keep all of his options open, and he appealed for help to Emperor Constantine V (later known as “the dung-named”, but that’s another story). In June of 752 Stephen also sent a messenger to Pepin, asking him to send an ambassador who could then escort the pope to the king’s presence.

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Footnotes

Footnotes
↑1 Fredegar, Continuations, ch.33, p.102.

The blood court; Judge Carloman, presiding

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In the year 746 Carloman, duke of the eastern Franks and son of Charles Martel, ordered the leaders of the tribe of the Alamanni to gather at a place called Canstatt. They were probably worried at what to expect of the summons, for Carloman and his brother Pepin had defeated them in 742 and 744, and both times the Alamanni had given oaths of fidelity and hostages. But yet again they had broken their oaths, sacrificed their hostages, and rebelled against the Frankish mayor of the palace. What did the Frankish duke want of them now?

Carloman was not a vicious man. Indeed, he was more pious than his brother, and was probably already thinking of a life beyond that of a duke. But that day he had hard choices to make. No longer could the Alamanni rebel against and defy the Frankish order.

Carloman gave a signal, and the slaughter began. “Most of those who had rebelled were put to the sword.”1.Fredegar, Continuations, c29. Thousands would die before the Blood Court of Canstatt was over.

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Footnotes

Footnotes
↑1 Fredegar, Continuations, c29.

Bertrada of Laon – Not Mother of the Year

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Bertrada of Laon is one of the very few women of the century about whom we can know anything more than just a name and a marital disposition. But from what we can see of her, particularly one series of events late in her life, she must have been a formidable lady.

She was born sometime between 710 and 727, in Laon, France, of noble parents. After that, we get nothing until she reappears as the wife of Pepin about 741, and the details immediately get fuzzy. No one is sure if she was Pepin’s first or second wife. In fact, it is hard to be sure just what a wife was back then, as the line between wife and concubine was not well defined. Also fuzzy were the rules on who could marry whom, based on how closely they were related. Always a problem when the 1% keep marrying each other.

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