The Coronation of Charlemagne

My book review was in relation to the Dark Ages, period shorty after the Fall of Rome. While the book, The Dark Ages Reconsidered, makes the case for a less dark time, there is little dispute that civilization received a substantial boost when Charlemagne was crowned emperor in 800 C.E. I found an article, "The Crowning of Charlemagne," that gives a brief overview of the event. The author, Patrick Henry Reardon, relates how Charlemagne accomplished a remarkable feat on Christmas Day of that year. Actually, there are three results of his coronation. First is the fact that Charlemagne united much of Europe. "Although the political unity Charlemagne imposed on the greater part of that continent did not outlive him, the cultural unity of Europe did." Second, his relationship with the Catholic church afforded the church great influence and power in European politics for centuries to come. Finally, Charlemagne fought against the Eastern Orthodox tradition of Christianity, furthering the schism between the East and West, and changing the dynamics of religious tradition.

Charlemagne's objection to the Eastern Orthodox form of the Nicene Creed was especially troublesome. Two and a half centuries after Pope Leo III crowned Charlemagne, those doctrinal and canonical tensions between East and West finally became schismatic and tragic, when the legates of Pope Leo IX excommunicated the Patriarchof Constantinople in 1054.

The article seems to portray Charlemagne in an almost too flattering light, but it seems that if ever there would be a time to overlook a man's faults, it would be the day of his coronation.