CHAP. guished about twenty years in a state of langour and decay. XLIX.

But their minds were not yet humbled to their condition; and instead of affecting the pacific virtues of the feeble, they peevishly harassed the Romans with a repetition of claims, evasions, and inroads, which they undertook without reflection and terminated without glory. On either side, their expiring monarchy was pressed by the zeal and prudence of pope Adrian the first, the genius, the fortune, and greatness of Charlemagne the son of Pepin: these heroes of the church and state were united in public and domestic friendship, and while they trampled on the prostrate, they varnished their proceedings with the fairest colours of equity and moderation.53 The passes of the Alps, and the walls of Pavia, were

the only defence of the Lombards; the former were surConquest prised, the latter were invested, by the son of Pepin; and

after a blockade of two years, Desiderius, the last of their bardy by Charle. native princes, surrendered his sceptre and his capital. Un

der the dominion of a foreign king, but in the possession A. D. 774.

of their national laws, the Lombards became the brethren, rather than the subjects, of the Franks; who derived their blood, and manners, and language, from the same Germanic

origin.54 Pepin and

The mutual obligations of the popes and the Carlovingian Charle

family, form the important link of ancient and modern, of magne, kings of

civil and ecclesiastical, history. In the conquest of Italy, the France, A. D. 751. champions of the Roman church obtained a favourable oc753. 768. casion, a specious title, the wishes of the people, the prayers

and intrigues of the clergy. But the most essential gifts of the popes to the Carlovingian race were the dignities of king of France, 55 and of patrician of Rome. I. Under the sacer

of Lom.

magne,

a

dotal monarchy of St. Peter, the nations began to resume CHAP. the practice of seeking, on the banks of the Tyber, their

XLIX. kings, their laws, and the oracles of their fate. The Franks were perplexed between the name and substance of their government. All the powers of royalty were exercised by Pepin, mayor of the palace; and nothing, except the regal title, was wanting to his ambition. His enemies were crushed by his valour; his friends were multiplied by his liberality; his father had been the saviour of Christendom; and the claims of personal merit were repeated and ennobled in a descent of four generations. The name and image of royalty was still preserved in the last descendant of Clovis, the feeble Childeric; but his obsolete right could only be used as an instrument of sedition: the nation was desirous of restoring the simplicity of the constitution: and Pepin, a subject and a prince, was ambitious to ascertain his own rank and the fortune of his family. The mayor and the nobles were bound by an oath of fidelity to the royal phantom: the blood of Clovis was pure and sacred in their eyes ; and the common ambassadors addressed the Roman pontiff, to dispel their scruples, or to absolve their promise. The interest of pope Zachary, the successor of the two Gregories, prompted him to decide, and to decide in their favour: he pronounced that the nation might lawfully unite, in the same person, the title and authority of king; and that the unfortunate Childeric, a victim of the public safety, should be degraded, shaved, and confined in a monastery for the remainder of his days. An answer, so agreeable to their wishes, was accepted by the Franks as the opinion of a casuist, the sentence of a judge, or the oracle of a prophet: the Merovingian race disappeared from the earth: and Pepin was exalted on a buckler by the suffrage of a free people, accustomed to obey his laws and to march under his standard. His coronation was twice performed, with the sanction of the popes, by their most faithful servant St. Boni. face, the apostle of Germany, and by the grateful hands of Stephen the third, who, in the monastery of St. Denys, placed the diadem on the head of his benefactor. The royal

the crown. Yet they are hard pressed by the text which they produce of
Eginhard, Theophanes, and the old annals, Laureshamenses Fuldensis, Loja,
sielani.
VOL. VI.

AA

CHAP. unction of the kings of Israel was dexterously applied :56 XLIX.

the successor of St. Peter assumed the character of a divine ambassador: a German chieftain was transformed into the Lord's anointed; and this Jewish rite has been diffused and maintained by the superstition and vanity of modern Europe. The Franks were absolved from their ancient oath: but a dire anathema was thundered against them and their posterity, if they should dare to renew the same freedom of choice, or to elect a king, except in the holy and meritorious race of the Carlovingian princes. Without apprehending the future danger, these princes gloried in their present security: the secretary of Charlemagne affirms, that the French sceptre was transferred by the authority of the popes;57 and in their boldest enterprises, they insist, with confidence, on

this signal, and successful act of temporal jurisdiction. Patricians II. In the change of manners and language, the patricians of Rome. of Romes were far removed from the senate of Romulus,

or the palace of Constantine, from the free nobles of the republic, or the fictitious parents of the emperor. After the recovery of Italy and Africa by the arms of Justinian, the importance and danger of those remote provinces required the presence of a supreme magistrate; he was indifferently styled the exarch or the patrician: and these governors of Ravenna, who fill their place in the chronology of princes, extended their jurisdiction over the Roman city. Since the revolt of Italy and the loss of the exarchate, the distress of the Romans had exacted some sacrifice of their independence. Yet, even in this act, they exercised the right of disposing of themselves; and the decrees of the senate and peo

56 Not absolutely for the first time. On a less conspicuous theatre, it had been used, in the sixth and seventh centuries, by the provincial bishops of Britain and Spain. The royal unction of Constantinople was borrowed from the Latins in the last age of the empire. Constantine Manasses mentions that of Charlemagne as a foreign, Jewish, incomprehensible ceremony. See Selden's Titles of Honour, in his Works, vol. iii. part i. p. 234...249.

57 See Eginhard, in Via Caroli Magni,c.i. p. 9, &c. c. č.p.24. Childeric was deposed....jussii

, the Carlovingians were established....auctoritate Pontificis Romani. Launoy, &c. pretend that these strong words are susceptible of a very soft interpretation. Be it so; yet Eginhard understood the world, the court, and the Latin language.

2 a

ple successively invested Charles Martel and his posterity, CHAP.

XLIX. with the honours of patrician of Rome. ' The leaders of a powerful nation would have disdained a servile title and subordinate office; but the reign of the Greek emperors was suspended; and, in the vacancy of the empire, they derived a more glorious commission from the pope and the republic. The Roman ambassadors presented these patricians with the keys of the shrine of St. Peter, as a pledge and symbol of sovereignty; with a holy banner, which it was their right and duty to unfurl in the defence of the church and city.59 In the time of Charles Martel and of Pepin, the interposition of the Lombard kingdom covered the freedom, while it threatened the safety, of Rome; and the patriciate represented only the title, the service, the alliance, of these distant protectors. The power and policy of Charlemagne annihilated an enemy, and imposed a master. In his first visit to the capital, he was received with all the honours which had formerly been paid to the exarch, the representative of the emperor; and these honours obtained some new decorations from the joy and gratitude of pope Adrian the first.60 No sooner was he informed of the sudden approach of the monarch, than he dispatched the magistrates and nobles of Rome to meet him, with the banner, about thirty miles from the city. At the distance of one mile, the Flaminian way was lined with the schools, or national communities, of Greeks, Lombards, Saxons, &c.: the Roman youth were under arms; and the children of a more tender age, with palms and olive branches in their hands, chaunted the praises of their great deliverer. At the aspect of the holy crosses, and ensigns of the saints, he dismounted from his horse, led the procession of his nobles to the Vatican, and, as he ascended the stairs, devoutly kissed each step of the threshold of the apostles. In the portico, Adrian expected him at the head of his cler

CHAP. gy: they embraced, as friends and equals; but in their march
XLIX.

to the altar, the king or patrician assumed the right-hand of
the
pope.

Nor was the Frank content with these vain and empty demonstrations of respect. In the twenty-six years that elapsed, between the conquest of Lombardy and his Imperial coronation, Rome, which had been delivered by the sword, was subject, as his own, to the sceptre, of Charlemagne. The people swore allegiance to his person and family: in his name money was coined, and justice was administered; and the election of the popes was examined and confirmed by his authority. Except an original and self-inherent claim of sovereignty, there was not any prerogative remaining, which the title of emperor could add to the pa

trician of Rome.61 Donations The gratitude of the Carlovingians was adequate to these of Pepin and Char

obligations, and their names are consecrated as the saviours lemagne to and benefactors of the Roman church. Her ancient patri

mony of farms and houses was transformed by their bounty into the temporal dominion of cities and provinces; and the donation of the Exarchate was the first fruits of the cons quests of Pepin.62 Astolphus with a sigh relinquished his prey; the keys and the hostages of the principal cities were delivered to the French ambassador; and, in his master's name, he presented them before the tomb of St. Peter. The ample measure of the Exarchaten3 might comprise all the provinces of Italy which had obeyed the emperor and his vicegerent: but its strict and proper limits were included in the territories of Ravenna, Bologna, and Ferrara: its inseparable dependency was, the Pentapolis, which stretched

the popes.

61 Paulus Diaconus, who wrote before the empire of Charlemagne, de. scribes Rome as his subject city...vestræ civitates (ad Pompeium Festum), suis addidit sceptris (de Metensis Ecclesiæ Episcopis). Some Carlovingian medals, struck at Rome, have engaged Le Blanc to write an elaborate, though partial, dissertation on their authority at Rome, both as patricians and emperors (Amsterdam, 1692, in 4to).

62 Mosheim (Institution Hist. Eccles. p. 263). weighs this donation with fair and deliberate prudence. The original act has never been produced; but the Liber Pontificalis represents (p. 171), and the Codex Carolinus supposes, this ample gifi. Both are contemporary records: and the latter is the more authentic, since it has been preserved, not in the papal, but the Imperial, library.

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