Mohammed and Charlemagne

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MOHAMME and CHARLEMAGN Henri Pirenn

mERIDIAN BOOKS Canada $1

MOHAMMED

AND

CHARLEMAGNE

by HENRI ^IRENNE

meridian

BOOKS,

inc.

New York

Henri Pirenne Born and educated in Belgium, Henri Pirenne (18621935) first lectured at the University of Liège. From 1886 to 1930 he was professor of history at the Univer­ sity of Ghent. He was the first president of the Union Académique Internationale (1920-23), and received many foreign academic honors. Noted for his works on medieval cities and social conditions, his Histoire de Belgique in seven volumes revolutionized current con­ ceptions of Belgian history and nationality by showing how’ the Flemings and the Walloons were drawn together by a community of tradition and economic interest. This edition of Mohammed and Charlemagne was translated by Bernard Miall from the French of the tenth edition published by Librarie Félix Alcan, Paris, and Nouvelle Société d’Editions Brussels.

1VI Meridian Books Edition published February 1957 First printing January 1957 Second printing April 1958 Third printing October 1959

Reprinted by arrangement with Barnes fc Noble, Inc. First published 1939 by W. W. Norton fc Company, Inc. Library of Congress Catalog Card Number: 57-6675 Manufactured in the United States of America

CONTENTS CHAPTER

PACE

PREFACE

9

NOTE

13

Parí One WESTERN EUROPE BEFORE ISLAM I. THE CONTINUATION OF THE MEDITERRANEAN CIVILIZA­ TION IN THE WEST AFTER THE GERMANIC INVASIONS

17

1. "Romania" before the Germans

2. The Invasions 3. The Germans in “Romania” 4. The Germanic States in the West 5. Justinian (527-565) H. THE ECONOMIC AND SOCIAL SITUATION AFTER THE INVASIONS AND THE MEDITERRANEAN NAVIGATION

75

1. Personal Property and the Soil

2. Navigation in the East. Syrians and Jews 3. Inland Commerce 4. Money and the Monetary Circulation HI. INTELLECTUAL LIFE AFTER THE INVASIONS

Il8

1. The Tradition of Antiquity

2. The Church 3. Art 4. The Secular Character of Society

I40

CONCLUSION

Part Two ISLAM AND THE CAROLINGIANS I.

THE EXPANSION OF ISLAM IN THE MEDITERRANEAN BASIN

I47

1. The Islamic Invasion 2. The closing of the Western Mediterranean 3. Venice and Byzantium

7

MOHAMMED

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CHARLEMAGNE

CHAPTER

PAGE

n. THE CAROLINGIAN COUP d’eTAT AND THE VOLTE-FACE OF THE PAPACY

186

1. The Merovingian Decadence 2. The Carolingian Mayors of the

Palace 3. Italy, the Pope, and Byzantium. The volte-face of the Papacy 4- The New Empire III. THE BEGINNINGS OF THE MIDDLE AGES

2j6

Economic and Social Organization Political Organization 3- Intellectual Civilization

1. 2.

CONCLUSION

284

INDEX

287

8

PREFACE When my father was taken ill, on May 28th, 1935—it was the day on which his eldest son, Henri-Edouard, died—he left on his table the three hundred pages of the manuscript of Mohammed and Charlemagne, which he had completed on May 4th. This was the crowning achievement of his last years of work. The problem of the end of Antiquity and the beginning of the Middle Ages had always preoccupied him. Before the War, in his lectures on the History of the Middle Ages, he drew attention to the profound traces which the institutions of the late Roman Empire had left upon those of the Frankish epoch. But it was during his captivity in Germany, when, as a prisoner in the camp of Holzminden, he organized, for the many Russian students who shared his fate, a course of lectures on the economic history of Europe, that the solution of this capital problem seems to have dawned upon him. And during his exile in the viUage of Kreuzburg, in Thuringia, while he was writing his History of Europe, he emphasized, for the first time, the close relation that existed between the conquests of Islam and the formation of the mediaeval Occident. The History of Europe, which he did not five to complete, was

published only after his death. At that time no one was aware of the subject of the present volume. My father, however, returning again and again to his study of the available sources, had never ceased to examine this problem, which was the great scientific interest of the last twenty years of his life. In 1922 he published in the Revue beige de Philologie et d'Histoire a short article entitled “Mahomet et Charlemagne,” which con­ tained a statement of his thesis. He then expounded it before the International Historical Congress—which met in Brussels in 1923 and in Oslo in 1928; it was also the subject of a course of public lectures delivered in the University of Brussels in 1931-1932, and of other lectures given in the following Universities: Lille (1921),

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New York (Columbia College 1922), Cambridge (1924), Mont­ pellier (1929), Algiers (1931), and Cairo (1934); and also in Rome, at the Institute historique Belge (1933). Further, while the present history was in preparation, he wrote a number of papers dealing with various details: “Merovingians et Carolingiens” (Revue belge de Philologie et ¿'Histoire, II, 1923), “Le commerce du papyrus dans la Gaule mérovingienne” (Comptes rendus de l’Académie des Inscriptions et Belles Lettres, Paris, 1928), “L’instruction des marchands au Moyen Age” (Annales ¿’Histoire économique et sociale, I, 1929), “Le trésor des rois mérovingiens” (Festschrift til Halvdan Koht, Oslo, 1933), “De l'état de l’instruction des laïques à l’époque mérovingienne ’’(Revue Bénédictine, 1934). And he expounded liis theory in the first chapters of his “Villes du Moyen Age” (1927), as explaining the economic and social evolu­ tion of the centuries following on the fall of Rome. The volume which my father completed on May 4th, 1935, is therefore the climax of many years of research. But although it contains all the author’s ideas, it would not, had he lived, have been given to the public in its present form. It was my father’s custom to write all his books a second time. In the first version he put the book together regardless of form; it was in some respects a rough draft. A second version, which was not a mere revision of die first, but an entirely new text, gave the work that objective and deliberately reticent form behind which he chose to conceal his own personality. This first draft was written for himself; urged on by the ideas which he was in haste to express, it often happened that he did not complete the construction of a sentence, so that it thus assumed a schematic aspect, or he ended it with an irregular stroke of the pen, comprehensible to all those who have heard how often, when speaking, he dropped the last few words of a sentence, in his impatience to pursue an idea that outstripped his speech. The references were indicated in a summary fashion, and some­ times my father even contented himself with indicating one of his files. 10

PREFACE

It was therefore necessary, before the work could be offered to the public, to undertake a certain amount of revision—as little as possible—in respect of its form, to complete the references, and to collate the texts which were cited in the latter. Wherever the text was complete I have treated it with scrupulous respect. I have ventured to revise it only where it appeared to be unfinished, and in this case I have restricted myself, making use of my father’s own notes, to adding the few words w'hich were needed to make them comprehensible. The revision and completion of the references was a more delicate matter. In order to do this effectively my mother and I appealed to one of my father’s most valued pupils, M. F. Vercautcrcn, Associate of the Fonds Nationale de la Recherche Scientifique, and professor in the Université Coloniale of Antwerp. The studies to which he has devoted himself have made him one of the most erudite authorities on the historical sources and the scientific literature of the early Middle Ages. He granted our request with the greatest alacrity, and devoted several months to the work of collating all the texts wliich have been cited in this volume, and in verifying and completing the references. I take this opportunity of expressing our warmest and sincerest thanks. Just as it stands, in its first draft, this last work of my father’s pen contains his most vital, boldest, and most recent ideas, on which his mind was actively engaged upon the eve of his death. It is with confidence that we offer them to the public, dedicating them to all those who loved him, and who, now that he is no more, have paid such unanimous homage, not only to the work which finds its conclusion in the publication of this book, but also to the man; and they will doubdess feel that he fives again in these pages, the last he was to write. JACQUES PIRENNE

II

NOTE In January 1937 Mme. Henri Pirenne and M. Jacques Pirenne brought to my notice the manuscript of a posthumous work of my late master, asking me to assist in its revision with a view to its publication. The text with which I had to deal was complete, but it was a first draft. It had, however, been slightly revised, as regards its form only, by M. Jacques Pirenne. Before all, Henri Pirenne’s ideas had to be loyally respected. I have therefore refrained from making any alterations or suppres­ sions or additions which would in any way have modified the thesis expounded by this eminent historian, even though there were passages which seemed to me debatable. In these pages, therefore, the reader will find a work which is strictly personal to Henri Pirenne. At the same time, however, I had to verify the material accuracy of a certain number of facts, dates, and quotations. The footnotes and bibliographical references indispensable in a work of this character were very often given only in the germ; these I felt I could revise and develop in conformity with the requirements of contemporary scholarship. In some cases I have even thought it desirable to cite one or more additional texts in support of the views expressed by my eminent master. For more than twelve years it was my great privilege to work under the guidance and with the assistance of Henri Pirenne: and I diink I may say that I was fully conversant with the ideas and the theories which he held as regards the subject of die present volume, in respect of which he had already undertaken a great deal of preparatory work. Destiny unhappily decreed that he was not to offer to the public a completed work, fresh from his own pen. It goes without saying that I have not entertained the pre­ sumptuous ambition of giving to the work those finishing touches of which he alone would have been capable, and to which he would have brought an objective care, a conscientious scholarship

MOHAMMED AND

CHARLEMAGNE

as great as the ardour and enthusiasm with which he applied himself to its first writing. Above all, I do not forget that if there are those who were kind enough to consider that I had some qualifications for undertaking this work, I owe them, before all, to Henri Pirenne himself, to his teaching and liis example. I have felt that I was performing a pious duty in enabling the thought of the master to bring us, even from beyond the tomb, the benefit of his profound learning, his synthetic vision and his incomparable talent. F. VERCAUTEREN

14

Part One

WESTERN EUROPE BEFORE ISLAM

CHAPTER

ONE

THE CONTINUATION OF THE MEDITERRANEAN CIVILIZATION IN THE WEST AFTER THE GERMANIC INVASIONS

I. "Romania” before the Germans

Of all the features of that wonderful human structure, the Roman Empire,1 the most striking, and also the most essential, was its Mediterranean character. Although in the East it was Greek, and in the West, Latin, its Mediterranean character gave it a unity which impressed itself upon the provinces as a whole. The inland sea, in the full sense of the term Mare nostrum, was the vehicle of ideas, and religions, and merchandise.* The provinces of the North—Belgium, Britain, Germany, Raetia, Noricum, Pannonia—were merely outlying ramparts against barbarism. Life was concentrated on the shores of the great lake. Without it Rome could not have been supplied with African wheat. It was more beneficent than ever now that it could be navigated in perfect security, since piracy had long disappeared. On the roads that led thither from all the provinces the traffic of these provinces converged upon the sea. As one travelled away from it civilization became more rarefied. The last great city of the North was Lyons. Trêves owed its greatness only to its rank of temporary capital. All the other cities of importance—Carthage, Alexandria, Naples, Antioch— were on or near the sea. 1 The term Romania, denoting all the countries conquered by Rome, made its appearance in the 4th century, eug. Albertini, L’Empire romain, in the collection peuples et ctvuisation, published under the editorship of 1. halphen and ph. sacnac, vol. iv, Paris, 1929, p. 388. Cf. A. grenœr's review of Holland rose, 77«e Mediterranean in the Ancient World, 2nd ed., 1934. revue historique, vol. 173, 1914. P- 194. 1 It was undoubtedly the Mediterranean that prevented the dyarchy following the reign of Theodosius from giving rise to two Empires.

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MOHAMMED

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This Mediterranean character of “Romania” became even more marked after the 4th century, for Constantinople, the new capital, was before all a maritime city. It was opposed to Rome, wliich was merely a consumer-city, by virtue of the fact that it was a great emporium, a manufacturing city, and an important naval base. The more active the Orient, the greater its hegemony; Syria was the terminus of the routes by which the Empire was in communi­ cation with India and China, while by way of the Black Sea it was in touch with the North. The West depended on Constantinople for manufactured articles and objets de luxe. The Empire took no account of Asia, Africa and Europe. Even though there were different civilizations, the foundation was everywhere the same. The same manners, the same customs, the same religions were found upon these coasts, which had formerly known civilizations as different as the Egyptian, the Tyrian and the Carthaginian. The maritime traffic of the Mediterranean was concentrated in the East.1 The Syrians, or those who were known as such, were the pilots and traders of the Eastern Seas. It was in their bottoms that papyrus, spices, ivory, and wines of quality found their way even to Britain. Precious fabrics were brought from Egypt, and also herbs for the ascetics.1 There were colonies of Syrians every­ where. The port of Marseilles was half Greek. As well as these Syrians, the Jews were to be found in all the cities, living in small communities. They were sailors, brokers, bankers, whose influence was as essential in the economic life of 1 This supremacy of the Orient, from the 3rd century (but it existed even earlier) is emphasized by bratianu, in his article: La distribution de Pot et tes raisons économiques de la division de l'Empire romain, istros, in the revue ROUMAINE D’ARCHÉOLOGIE ET D’HISTOIRE ANCIENNE, Vol. I, 1934, Part II. Here we see the beginning of the separation of Occident and Orient which was completed by Islam. Cf. also paulova’s essay on L'Islam et la civilisation méditerranéenne, in the vestnk ceske akademie tcheque (memoirs of the Czech academy), Prague, 1934. * p. perdrizet, Scété et Landevenec, in melanges n. jorga, Paris, 1933, P- 745-

18

MEDITERRANEAN

CIVILIZATION AFTER

THE INVASIONS

the time as was the Oriental influence which made itself felt at the same period in the art and the religious thought of the period. Asceticism came to the West from the East by sea, as the worship of Mithra and Christianity had come. Without Ostia, Rome is unimaginable. And if, on the other side of Italy, Ravenna had become the residence of the Emperors in partibiis occidentis, it was because of the attraction of Constantinople. Thanks to the Mediterranean, then, the Empire constituted, in the most obvious fashion, an economic unity. It was one great territory, with tolls but no custom houses. And it enjoyed the enormous advantage of a common monetary unit, the gold solidus of Constantine, containing 4-55 grammes of fine gold, which was current everywhere.1 We know that since the reign of Diocletian there had been a general economic decline. But it seems that in the 4th century there was a recovery and a more active circulation of money. In order to provide for the security of this Empire surrounded by Barbarians the frontier guard of the Legions had long sufficed: on the edge of the Sahara, on the Euphrates, the Danube, and the Rhuie. But behind the dyke the waters were rising. In the 3rd century, owing partly to civil disturbances, there were cracks in the dyke, and then breaches. From all directions there was an irruption of Franks, Alamans and Goths, who ravaged Gaul, Rhaetia, Pannonia and Thrace, advancing even as far as Spain. They were swept back by the Illyrian Emperors, and the frontier was re-established. But on the German side of the Empire the limes no longer sufficed; a deep defensive front was necessary. The cities of the interior were fortified: those cities that were the nerve-centres of the Empire, Rome and Constantinople, became two model fortresses. And there was no longer any question of closing the Empire to the Barbarians. The population was diminishing; the soldier had become a mercenary. The Barbarians were needed, as soldiers, and as agricultural labourers. They asked nothing better than to enter 1 ALBEBTtNI, op. at., p. 365.

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the service of Rome. Thus the Empire, on its frontiers, became Germanized in respect of blood; but not otherwise, for all who entered the Empire became Romanized? All these Germans who entered the Empire did so to serve it and to enjoy its advantages. They felt for it all the respect of the Barbarian for civilization. No sooner did they enter it than they adopted its language, and also its religion: that is to say, Christiajiity, after the 4th century; and in becoming Christians, in losing their national gods, and frequenting the same churches, they gradually merged into the population of the Empire. Before long almost the entire army was composed of Barbarians; and many of them, like the Vandal, Stilicho, the Goth, Gainas, and the Suevian, Ricimcr, achieved fame as soldiers of the Empire.®

2. The Invasions As we know, in the course of the 5th century the Roman Empire lost its Western territories to the Germanic Barbarians. This was not the first time that the Empire had been attacked by the Germans. The menace was of long standing, and it was to guard against it that the military frontier Rhine-Danube limes had been established. It had sufficed to defend the Empire until the 3rd century; but after the first great assault of the Barbarians it had been necessary to abandon the old comfortable confidence and to adopt a defensive attitude, reforming the army by reducing the size of its units in order to render them more mobile; and finally it consisted almost entirely of Barbarian mercenaries.3 * However, in 370 or 375 (?) a law of Valentinian and Valens prohibited marriages between Provintiales and Gentiles, under penalty of death (Code Theod., Ill, 14, I). Cf. F. lot, Les Invasions germanujues, Paris, 1933 (Bibl. hist.), p. 168. 2 ALBERTINI, op. dt., p.