Charlemagne: Great Capitulary

Explanation and Analysis of the Document

The capitulary falls essentially into four parts. The first, consisting of the first paragraph of Chapter 1, announces the role of the missi dominici, that is, the messengers who disseminated the capitulary. Paragraphs 2 through 9 deal with the oath of fealty that people owed to the emperor. Paragraphs 10 through 40 outline particular regulations, and this section can be subdivided into two broad parts, one regarding the clergy and the other concerning the laity.

Concerning the Embassy Sent Out by the Lord Emperor

The first paragraph announces the method by which Charlemagne disseminated his decrees throughout the realm: He chose from among his nobles “the most prudent and the wisest men, both archbishops as well as other bishops, and venerable abbots, and pious laymen and did send them over his whole kingdom.” Their purpose was to ensure “that men should live according to law and right.” Charlemagne goes on to order his subjects to follow the written law. He enjoins the clergy, as well as nuns, to live according to their vows and to “live together in mutual charity and perfect peace.” He further empowers his messengers to “administer law and justice according to the will and to the fear of God.” In summary, the emperor announces his intention to rule over a just, peaceful, pious realm.

Paragraphs 2–9

Paragraphs 2 through 9 all bear on the fealty that Charlemagne's subjects owed to him as emperor. Many of his subjects' obligations to him were feudal in nature, and Charlemagne is generally credited with instituting the social and economic institution of feudalism in the Frankish realms. He states that everyone in the kingdom down to the age of twelve must take an oath of fealty to the emperor. Paragraphs 3 through 9 outline the particulars of this oath. Charlemagne made Christianity the centerpiece of his empire by decreeing that each subject was “wholly to keep himself in the holy service of God according to the precept of God.” The emperor asserts his feudal rights in paragraph 4 by requiring an oath that no one would use fraud or deception to take property that belonged to the emperor by “proprietary right,” including slaves; in paragraph 6 he extends this prohibition to any “fief,” or feudal land, the emperor owned. In paragraph 5 Charlemagne casts himself as the protector of the church, as well as of widows, orphans, and strangers, and thus insists that no one “plunder” them.

Paragraph 7 notes the emperor's rights as feudal lord to demand military service of his subjects, stipulating, too, that a subject was not to avoid such service by flattery, bribery, or personal relationship—that is, evading military by happening to know the right person. Paragraph 8 goes on to prohibit Charlemagne's subjects from interfering with any acts or decrees of the emperor or with the collection of taxes owed to him. Paragraph 9, the last paragraph that specifies the terms of the oath of fealty, calls for justice in court proceedings, demanding that people conduct their own defenses for such legal entanglements as debt. If necessary, though, a defendant could employ someone to defend him, but legal cases were to be decided according to the dictates of justice, not on the basis of “cleverness” and certainly not through bribery, “evil adulation,” or a special relationship with the person charged with deciding the case.

Paragraphs 10–24

Beginning with paragraph 10, Charlemagne outlines the duties and obligations of the clergy. He issued these decrees in the context of an environment in which many people believed that the church was becoming corrupt and that it was as much a secular as a religious institution; in some ways it was. Accordingly, Charlemagne specifies that clerics were obligated to live by the dictates of canon law, or the law of the church. Paragraph 11 notes that clerics in positions of power—such as bishops, abbots, and abbesses—should not rule by tyranny but should “carefully guard the flock committed to them, with simple love, with mercy and charity, and by the example of good works.” Charlemagne then forbids the practice of abbots and abbesses living outside of their monasteries.

Paragraph 13 illustrates the extent to which the church held secular power over the emperor's subjects. Medieval monasteries served a variety of functions. Obviously they were centers for the practice of religion, but they also served as schools, hospitals, pilgrimage sites (with the revenue pilgrimages could generate), and administrative centers. Often they owned land and derived income from that land through natural resources and the labor of peasants. Running a monastery was complicated, and monasteries often hired bailiffs to assist in the administration of their holdings. Bailiffs, as well as sheriffs, who were less law-enforcement officers than civil administrators, could misuse their positions to abuse those under them and line their own pockets. The capitulary required officials, also referred to as provosts, to “do justice in every way, wholly observing the law without malice or fraud, always exercising a just judgment in all things.” Paragraph 14 amplifies this decree by specifying that all abbots, abbesses, and bishops were to seek “a right judgment” and live according to the will of God, extending their protection to widows, orphans, and pilgrims.

The aim of paragraph 15 is to prevent other potential abuses. All clerics are enjoined to submit themselves to the will of their bishops. Further, all church property was to remain under the care of the church and was not to be sold or gambled away. Paragraph 16 turns to the subject of the ordination of priests. Again Charlemagne's intent was to curb corruption, for he insists that only the best-qualified men be ordained as priests and that bribery, flattery, and any kind of special “relationship” were to play no role in the selection of priests.

A key passage in the capitulary is paragraph 17. In this paragraph the emperor is firm about the behavior of clerics, who were to live in the monastery and not to wander about and who were to derive no income from secular occupations outside the monastery walls. The emperor is quite particular in proscribing drunkenness, fornication, and any sort of homosexual activity; in paragraph 19 he tries to curb what he sees as another abuse—the clergy's keeping of hunting dogs and hawks, symbols of neglect of priestly duty. Paragraph 21 outlines similar demands on the “lesser clergy,” or lower-ranking priests. In paragraph 18 Charlemagne addresses convents of nuns, again requiring them to live “justly and soberly.” Interestingly, Charlemagne reflects the prejudices of his age by enjoining nuns to avoid quarreling among themselves, as if to imply that women living in close quarters would inevitably turn shrewish. Paragraph 20 specifies that any nun who needed to leave the cloister walls could do so only on the advice of the bishop.

Paragraph 22 deals with the “secular clergy.” The medieval church distinguished between regular clergy and secular clergy. The former were members of a religious order; they took vows of poverty, chastity, and obedience and submitted themselves to the rule of their order. The secular clergy were ordained priests who were not members of a particular religious order. They tended to live in the larger community, and thus they were subject to its temptations. Charlemagne attempts to curb these temptations and to ensure that the secular clergy adhered not only to canon law but also to standards of morality. The term sarabaites was originally used to refer to heretical, vagrant monks, but later it was used to signify any clergy who lived in their own homes and acknowledged no rule. Paragraphs 23 and 24 conclude the discussion of the clergy, forbidding “vain sports or worldly feastings, or songs or luxuries” and the practice of clergy admitting women in their homes.

Paragraphs 25–40

In this group of paragraphs, the capitulary turns to more secular matters. With an eye perhaps on his German domains, the emperor in paragraph 25 enjoins “counts and centenars” to “see to it that justice is done in full.” A centenar was an official in charge of a “hundred” (hence the syllable cent), or an area of land analogous to a county. Young men in the service of these officials should avoid consorting not only with thieves and murderers but also with wizards and witches. In paragraph 26 judges are ordered to follow the written law and not their own judgment. Standards of behavior are further established in paragraph 27, which requires hospitality to all, particularly to pilgrims. To buttress this point, the capitulary quotes from the New Testament of the Bible, specifically Matthew 18:5 and 25:35.

Paragraphs 28 through 31 deal with the issue of the emperor's relationship with his subjects. His envoys, for example, were to be received and shown cooperation during their visits throughout the realm. Judges could not exact fines from people whom the emperor had forgiven because they were destitute. Further, no one was to interfere with any person who was attempting to arrive in the presence of the emperor to solicit alms or to provide information. Finally, no one was to harass legally those persons chosen to announce the judgments of the emperor. It is unclear what “the king's bann” was specifically, but it could have referred either to the king's curse, or to public condemnation, or to a summons for military service. It could also be a variant of bane, referring generally to a threat to inflict woe or harm.

Paragraph 32 constitutes a short sermon against murder. The emperor appeals to his subjects to avoid murder on religious grounds, making clear that “we wish rather to punish with the greatest severity him who dares to commit the crime of murder.” Interestingly, though, the emperor avoided speaking in terms of vengeance. He orders that anyone guilty of murder was to make recompense to the victim's survivors and that “the relatives of the dead man shall by no means dare to carry further their enmity on account of the evil inflicted or refuse to make peace with him who seeks it.” He also notes that the guilty person was to pay “wergeld” (wergild), or a payment of reparations (from wer, meaning “man,” and geld, meaning “money” or “fee”). Much of the purpose of the emperor's decree on murder and reparations was to avoid blood feuds between clans, with further violence being the result. Blood feuds had been commonplace among the Germanic tribes that were now under Charlemagne's rule.

In paragraph 33 the emperor forbids the practice of incest, citing “the case of the incest committed by Fricco in the temple.” This is likely a reference to a god in Scandinavian mythology, Freyr, sometimes called by his Latinized name, Fricco or Frikko. The image of this god in the Temple of Uppsala (Sweden) was in the shape of a giant phallus. Issues surrounding incest were complicated in medieval Europe. The taboo was influenced by biblical tradition, ancient Greek and Roman law, canon law, and the pronouncements of early church fathers, such as Saint Augustine. The perceived need for people to marry outside of the kin group, and thus to expand their network of social relationships, was so pronounced that a union was often forbidden because of the most distant of blood relationships.

The final paragraphs of the capitulary deal with several miscellaneous matters. Paragraph 34 requires subjects to answer to the emperor's demands. Paragraph 35 orders subjects to honor their priests and bishops and then goes on to urge care in marriages so as to avoid incest. Paragraph 36 threatens perjurers with the loss of their right hand, a common punishment for this crime in medieval law treatises. Paragraph 37 deals with patricide (the killing of one's father) and fratricide (the killing of one's brother). These people were to be “deprived of their property” and summoned to the emperor's presence, as were those guilty of incestuous unions, noted in paragraph 38. Paragraph 39 proscribes the poaching of game on the emperor's territory, a further assertion of the emperor's feudal rights. Finally, paragraph 40 orders that the emperor's decrees be disseminated to ecclesiastical and civil officials.