Carolingian dynasty

 ( Frankish Noble Families ) 

As successful as campaigning had been, Charles seemingly took inspiration from Anglo-Saxons missionary Saint Boniface, who in 719 was sent by Pope Gregory II to convert Germany, in particular the areas of Thuringia and Hesse, where he established the monasteries of Ohrdruf Priory, Tauberbischofsheim, Kitzingen and Ochsenfurt. Charles, realising the potential of establishing Carolingian-supportive episcopal centres, utilised Saint Pirmin, an itinerant monk, to establish an ecclesiastical foundation on Reichenau Island in Lake Constance. He was expelled in 727 by Lantfrid and he retreated to Alsace, where he established monasteries with the support of the Etichonids clan, who were Carolingian supporters. This relationship gave the Carolingians long-term benefit from Pirmin's future achievements, which brought abbeys in the eastern provinces into Carolingian favour.

In 725, Charles continued his conquest from Alemannia and invaded Bavaria. Like Alemannia, Bavaria had continued to gain independence under the rule of the Agilolfings clan who, in recent years, had increased links with Lombards and affirmed their own law codes, like the Lex Baiuvariorum. When Charles moved, the region was experiencing a power struggle between Grimoald of Bavaria and his nephew Hugbert, but when Grimoald died in 725, Hugbert gained the position and Charles reaffirmed their support. The Continuations records that when Charles left Bavaria, he took hostages, one of which was Swanachild, who later would become Charles' second wife. Paul Fouracre believes this marriage could have been intentionally forced, based upon the fact that Swanchild's heritage related her both to Alemannia and Bavaria. Not only would their marriage have allowed greater control over both regions, but it also would have cut the existing family ties that the Agilofings had to the Pippinid family branch. Plectrude's sister Regintrud was married to Theodo of Bavaria, and this relation provided an opportunity for disenfranchised family members to defect.

Charles met the Muslim force at the famous Battle of Poitiers (732) and came out victorious. This moment cemented Charles Martel in historical records and gained him international praise. Bede, writing at the same time in Jarrow, England, recorded the event in his Ecclesiastical History of the English People, and his victory gained Charles Martel the admiration of seminal historian Edward Gibbon who considered him the Christian saviour of Europe. Although his victory was considered famous, in reality his victory was far less impactful, and Charles would not gain much control in Aquitaine until Eudo's death in 735. The victory may have given the Carolingians relative local support that potentially allowed Charles to assert dominance over Eudo's son and successor Hunald of Aquitaine, but records of continued hostilities in 736 only further cemented that relations were strained.

With a stronger establishment in Aquitaine, Charles made moves to assert his dominance into Burgundy. The region, at least in the Northern areas, had remained controlled and allied with Frankish interest. Influential nobility like Savaric of Auxerre, who had maintained near-autonomy and led military forces against Burgundian towns like Orléans, Nevers and Troyes, even dying whilst besieging Lyon, were the key to Charles' support. As such, Charles made multiple attempts to both gain the faction's support and remove their authority. When Savaric died during Charles' early reign, he agreed to support Savaric's nephew Bishop Eucherius of Orléans' claim to the bishopric. However, once Charles had established a powerful basis by 737, he exiled Eucherius, with the help of a man called Chrodobert, to the monastery of St Trond. Charles took further military action in the same year to fully assert his authority, and installed his sons Pippin and Remigius as magnates. This was followed by the installation of political supporters from Bavaria and local supporters like Theuderic of Autun and Adalhard of Chalon.

This acquisition of land in southern France was supported by the increased social chaos that seemingly developed during the Civil War years. This was most apparent in Provence, where local magnates, like Abbo of Provence, were incredibly supportive of Charles' attempts to reinstate Frankish power. In 739, he used his power in Burgundy and Aquitaine to lead an attack with his brother Childebrand I against Arab invaders and Duke Maurontus, who had been claiming independence and allying himself with Muslim emir Abd ar-Rahman. It is likely due to Childebrand's sponsorship of the manuscript that his involvement is so extensively recorded in the Continuations. According to the manuscript, Childebrand and Charles noticed the Arab army, with Maurontus' welcome, entering Avignon and quickly moved against the alliance. They besieged the city and claimed victory; the Franks then made the decision to invade Septimania, taking Narbonne and flanking the Arab army. The Franks then fought off a support army sent from Spain under Omar-ibn Chaled at the River Berre. From there the Franks then pursued the retreating Arabs and ravaged the cities of Nîmes, Agde and Béziers before returning to Francia. Later that year, Charles and Childebrand returned to Provence, likely collecting more forces, and then forcing the rebellious Maurontus into 'impenetrable rocky fastnesses out to sea.' Paul the Deacon later records in his Historia Langobardorum Maurontus received help from the Lombards, and his Arab allies then fled. At this time, Charles then assumed control of the region and, judging from Charter evidence, appointed Abbo of Provence as patricius (Patrician) in the region.

Due to his vast military conquests, Charles often reallocated existing land settlements, including Church property, to new tenants. Ecclesiastical property and monasteries in the late Merovingian and Carolingian period were political centres and often closely related to the royal court; as such they often became involved in political matters, which often overlapped with Charles' reallocation of land. This 'secularisation' of Church property caused serious tension between the Carolingian church and state, and often gave Charles a negative depiction in ecclastical sources. The reallocation of church land was not new by Charles' reign; Ian Wood has managed to identify the practice going back to the reigns of Dagobert I (629–639) and Clovis II (639–657). The majority of the sources that depict Charles' involvement in Church land rights come from the 9th century, and are therefore less reliable, but two supposedly contemporary sources also identify this issue. The first, a letter sent by missionary Saint Boniface to Anglo-Saxon king Æthelbald of Mercia, called Charles' a 'destroyer of many monasteries, and embezzler of Church revenues for his own use...', condemning him for his use of Church property. This is supported by the second source, the Contintuations, which related that, in 733 in Burgundy, Charles split the Lyonnais between his followers, this likely including Church land. Further chronicles like the Gesta episcoporum Autissiodorensium and the Gesta Sanctorum Patrum Fontanellensis Coenobii recorded monasteries losing substantial land. The monastery at Auxerre was reduced to a hundred mansus by Pippin III's reign, and at the Abbey of Saint Wandrille under Abbot Teutsind, who was appointed by Charles in 735/6, the Church's local property was reduced to a third its size. Wood has also criticised this point and proven that the loss of land by the Church was in reality very small, the remaining land being simply leased as it went beyond the Church's capabilities.

Therefore, until his death, Charles ruled as Princeps or First Man/First Citizen, officially gaining the title with his uncontested leadership with the acquisition of Provence in 737. This meant that the issue of kingship remained ever present for his successors who would have to work further to establish themselves as royal.

When Charles died in 741, he was buried at St Denis in Paris. He made secure succession plans, likely learning from his father, that ensured Francia was effectively divided between his sons, Carloman and Pippin as maior palatii. According to the Continuations, the eldest son, Carloman, was given control of the eastern kingdoms in Austrasia, Alammania and Thuringia, while Pippin was given the western kingdoms in Burgundy, Neustria and Provence.

The Carolingian rulers did not give up the traditional Franks (and Merovingian) practice of dividing inheritances among heirs, though the concept of the indivisibility of the Empire was also accepted. The Carolingians had the practice of making their sons minor kings in the various regions ( regna) of the Empire, which they would inherit on the death of their father, which Charlemagne and his son Louis the Pious both did for their sons. Following the death of the Emperor Louis the Pious in 840, his surviving adult sons, Lothair I and Louis the German, along with their adolescent brother Charles the Bald, fought a three-year civil war ending only with the Treaty of Verdun in 843, which divided the empire into three regna while according imperial status and a nominal lordship to Lothair who, at 48, was the eldest. The Carolingians differed markedly from the Merovingians in that they disallowed inheritance to illegitimate offspring, possibly in an effort to prevent infighting among heirs and assure a limit to the division of the realm. In the late ninth century, however, the lack of suitable adults among the Carolingians necessitated the rise of Arnulf of Carinthia as the king of East Francia, a bastard child of a legitimate Carolingian king, Carloman of Bavaria, himself a son of the First King of the Eastern division of the Frankish kingdom, Louis the German.

Around 800, the Vikings, without giving up trade practices, became aware of a new means of enrichment. Indeed, since they were not Christians, they did not have to respect the abbeys, which contained, with minimal defensive structure (a wall and sometimes a few guards), considerable treasure, consisting of chasses, reliquaries, precious metal objects for worship… These objects were particularly sought after in this period of weak monetary circulation, when metal was important not only for its value but also for the prestige associated with it.

From 800 to about 850, the Vikings continued their trading practices while attempting raids on isolated monastic establishments whenever the opportunity arose. The first establishment to suffer was the monastery of Lindisfarne, on the British coast, attacked by the Vikings in 793.

After this first attack, Viking pressure increased: they sailed up rivers aboard their shallow-draft ships, improperly called “Viking ship”, and plundered the treasures of the abbeys before returning to Scandinavia. For the moment, these were only brief expeditions: the Normans plundered, carried off goods, and left, most often after burning the place. These attacks nevertheless terrified the population by their speed, violence, and also because they struck churches which, since the establishment of Christianity, had never been attacked. In 841, the Normans attacked the Abbey of Jumièges and the city of Rouen; the monks had to flee from the danger of raids, carrying with them the relics of their saints. The Île de Noirmoutier was also repeatedly targeted by the Normans, to the point that the monks abandoned their monastery and settled about twenty-five km south of Nantes, at Déas, which became Saint-Philbert-de-Grand-Lieu. In 843, Nantes was taken and part of the population massacred. In the second third of the 9th century, most of the towns located along rivers were visited by the Normans. At the end of the 9th century, the phenomenon grew in importance. These were now much more organized bands, who had decided in advance their routes and knew where to go. The expeditions were also more numerous, sometimes a hundred boats, compared to a small dozen at most at the beginning of the century. Finally, they no longer contented themselves with plundering and leaving. More and more often, they carried away the population to be sold as slaves and settled in conquered territories where they sometimes spent the winter.