CHARLES THE FAT (882-887 A.D.)
[882-887 A.D.]
Charles the Fat [or the Thick], youngest son of Ludwig the German, inherited in 882, on the death of his childless brother, Ludwig the Younger, all the German and Lorraine territory, with the exception of Burgundy; and in 884, also France, properly the inheritance of Charles the Simple, whose two elder brothers were dead, but who being the issue of a marriage pronounced illegal by the pope, and, on account of his imbecility, being recognised by the French themselves as incapable of succeeding to the throne, Charles the Fat easily took possession of the country, and before long reunited France with Germany, in which he was greatly assisted by the pope, to whom he secretly made great concessions, in order to be acknowledged by him as legitimate heir to the crown.
Charles the Fat was good-natured and indolent. His favourite project, the restoration of the empire as it stood under Charlemagne, he sought to realise by means of bribes and promises, treaties of peace, and other transactions, perfectly in conformity with his character, in which he ever unhesitatingly sacrificed honour to interest. The same means that had succeeded with the pope he imagined would prove equally successful in treating with the Northmen, who, after the death of Ludwig the Younger, renewed their depredations under Godefrid, and laid the Rhine country waste. The palace of Charlemagne at Aachen was converted by them into a stable. Bishop Wala fell bravely fighting at the head of an unequal force before the gates of Metz. The cities on the banks of the Rhine were burned to the ground, and the whole country between Liège, Cologne, and Mainz, laid desolate. At length Siegfrid, the brother of Godefrid, was induced to withdraw his ravaging hordes by the gift of two thousand pounds of gold, and for the additional sum of twelve thousand pounds of silver (to defray which Charles the Fat seized all the treasures of the churches) consented to a truce of twelve years. Godefrid was, moreover, formally invested with Friesland as a fief of the empire. The Northmen, however, notwithstanding these stipulations, continued their depredations, advanced as far as the Moselle, and destroyed the city of Trèves, but were suddenly attacked, in the forest of Ardennes, by the charcoalmen and peasants, and ten thousand of them cut to pieces [883 A.D.]. Charles now became anxious to free himself from his troublesome vassal in Friesland, and the Markgraf Henry, who guarded the frontier at Grabfeld against the Sorbs, brother to Poppo, duke of Thuringia, the confidant of the emperor, invited Godefrid to a meeting, at which he caused him to be treacherously murdered. Godefrid’s brother-in-law, the bastard Hugo, was also taken prisoner and deprived of sight. These acts of violence and treason were no sooner perpetrated than the Northmen, glowing with revenge, rushed like a torrent over the country and laid it waste on every side, forcing their way in immense hordes up the Rhine, the Maas, and the Seine. On the Rhine they were opposed by Adalbert, of the race of Babenberg (Bamberg).e
In the autumn of the year 885 a great Norse fleet, consisting of ships large and small, almost without number, and carrying an army of between thirty and forty thousand men, sailed up the Seine as far as Paris, even then a flourishing city. Under the leadership of Bishop Gauzlin and Count Eudes of Paris, the inhabitants hastily repaired the old fortifications and collected a little army of some hundreds, which was brought into the city to defend it. The Northmen encamped round about Paris and made their first attempt to storm the city in November, 885, by a violent assault which lasted two days. The Normans were obliged to withdraw to collect wood in the country round for the construction of new siege instruments. In January, 886, they made a fresh assault which lasted for three days, and were again repulsed by the garrison. The siege lasted into the summer of 886. The besieged were reduced to more desperate straits still by a flood which destroyed the Seine bridge, and thus caused the strong tower situated on its farther side to fall into the hands of the Northmen. After this Count Eudes stole through the cordon of the enemy to implore help of the emperor. Charles had hitherto calmly left the city to its fate; but now he summoned a diet and proclaimed a great advance upon Paris. When, in the August of 886, a mighty army marched upon Paris, all men expected that a great battle would be fought there under the eyes of the emperor. Charles, however, preferred to purchase the withdrawal of the enemy. The treaty which he concluded with the Northmen was an insult to the former might of France. The enemy declared that they could not withdraw during the winter season, and he therefore gave Burgundy to them for winter quarters, and undertook to pay them seven hundred pounds in gold in the following spring. And then the great German army marched home without having struck a blow. This act of disgraceful cowardice enraged the army and the nation, and deprived Charles of the last remnant of his reputation. Moreover all kinds of evil reports were current concerning him among the people. It was said that by the help of the pope he intended to legitimise his illegitimate son Bernard, and to procure the succession for him.d
In the east, he also allowed the Slavs to gain ground, and neglected to support his nephew Arnulf, who could with difficulty defend himself against Suatopluk, who continued to extend his dominions; at the same time, the sons of the old markgrafs Engelschalk and Wilhelm declared war against each other, and Aribo, a son of the former, went over to the Moravians. Suatopluk was victorious on the Danube, and laid the country waste, until Charles appeared in person to beg for peace, which was concluded in 884 on the Tulnerfeld. This monarch proved himself as weak and despicable in his private as in his public character, by carrying on a scandalous suit against his wife, Ricardis, whom he accused of an adulterous connection with his chancellor, Bishop Lintward, and who proved her innocence by ordeal, by passing unharmed through fire in a waxen dress.
The great vassals of the empire, some of whom beheld in the fall of a sovereign they justly despised that of the Carlovingian dynasty and their own aggrandisement, whilst others were influenced by their dislike of the treaties entered into with foreign powers, the pope and the Northmen, and by an anxiety to make reparation for the loss of their national honour, convoked a great diet at Tribur in the valley of the Rhine, and deprived Charles of his crown (887 A.D.), a degradation he survived but one year.
ARNULF (887-899 A.D.)
Charles the Simple
(From a French cut of 1832)
[887-892 A.D.]
The Anti-Carlovingian party was partly successful. The French made choice of Eudes, count of Paris, as successor to the crown, whilst the lower Burgundians in the Nether-Rhone-land (Arles) elected Boson, the son of Ludwig, and the upper Burgundians in the Western Alps, Count Rudolf, a descendant of the Welfi. In Italy the dukes Guido of Spoleto and Berengar of Friuli made themselves so independent, that they even set themselves up as competitors, through the favour of the pope, for the imperial crown. The Germans alone remained faithful to the Carlovingian house, and elected, to the exclusion of Charles the Simple, who was still alive, Arnulf, the young and energetic, but illegitimate son of Carloman, a brother of Charles the Fat, who had greatly distinguished himself as duke of Bavaria against the Slavs. The consideration in which he was held was so great, that Eudes came to Worms to do homage to him as emperor, a ceremony with which Arnulf contented himself, the Northmen and Slavs affording him no opportunity for recalling his rebellious subjects to their allegiance.
Fresh hostilities instantly broke out on the part of the Northmen, who made an irruption into Lorraine, and after a bloody engagement defeated the Germans near Maestricht, where the archbishop of Mainz, who had marched against them at the head of his vassals, fell. Arnulf now took the field in person, and a dreadful battle ensued near Lyons, where the Northmen had encamped, in which Arnulf, perceiving that the German cavalry were unable to cope with the Norse foot-soldiers, who fought with unexampled dexterity, was the first to spring from his saddle; all the nobles of the arrierban followed his example, and the contest became a thick fray, in which the combatants strove hand to hand. Victory sided with the Germans. Siegfrid and Godefrid fell on the field of battle, with several thousands of their followers, whose bodies also choked up the course of the Dyle, across which they had attempted to escape. Arnulf, in gratitude for this deliverance, made a great pilgrimage, and ordained that this day, St. Gilgentag, the 1st of September, should be kept as an annual festival. The Northmen, panic-struck by this fearful catastrophe, henceforward avoided the Rhine, but made much more frequent inroads into the west of France.