Charlemagne was King of the Franks from 768,King of the Lombards from 774,and Emperor of what is now known as the Carolingian Empire from 800,holding these titles until his death in 814. He united most of Western and Central Europe,and was the first recognised emperor to rule in the west after the fall of the Western Roman Empire approximately three centuries earlier. Charlemagne's reign was marked by political and social changes that had lasting influence on Europe throughout the Middle Ages.
Louis the German,also known as Louis II of Germany,was the first king of East Francia,and ruled from 843 to 876 AD. Grandson of emperor Charlemagne and the third son of Louis the Pious,emperor of Francia,and his first wife,Ermengarde of Hesbaye,he received the appellation Germanicus shortly after his death,when East Francia became known as the kingdom of Germany.
The Carolingian Empire (800–887) was a Frankish-dominated empire in Western and Central Europe during the Early Middle Ages. It was ruled by the Carolingian dynasty,which had ruled as kings of the Franks since 751 and as kings of the Lombards in Italy from 774. In 800,the Frankish king Charlemagne was crowned emperor in Rome by Pope Leo III in an effort to transfer the Roman Empire from the Byzantine Empire to Western Europe. The Carolingian Empire is sometimes considered the first phase in the history of the Holy Roman Empire.
Desiderius,also known as Daufer or Dauferius,was king of the Lombards in northern Italy,ruling from 756 to 774. The Frankish king of renown,Charlemagne,married Desiderius's daughter and subsequently conquered his realm. Desiderius is remembered for this connection to Charlemagne and for being the last Lombard ruler to exercise regional kingship.
Aistulf was the Duke of Friuli from 744,King of the Lombards from 749,and Duke of Spoleto from 751. His reign was characterized by ruthless and ambitious efforts to conquer Roman territory to the extent that in the Liber Pontificalis,he is described as a "shameless" Lombard given to "pernicious savagery" and cruelty.
Rosamond Deborah McKitterick is an English medieval historian. She is an expert on the Frankish kingdoms in the eighth and ninth centuries AD,who uses palaeographical and manuscript studies to illuminate aspects of the political,cultural,intellectual,religious,and social history of the Early Middle Ages. From 1999 until 2016 she was Professor of Medieval History and director of research at the University of Cambridge. She is a Fellow of Sidney Sussex College and Professor Emerita of Medieval History in the University of Cambridge.
Hildegard was a Frankish queen and the wife of Charlemagne from c. 771 until her death. Hildegard was a noblewoman of Frankish and Alemannian heritage. Through eleven years of marriage with Charlemagne,Hildegard helped share in his rule as well as having nine children with him,including the kings Charles the Younger and Pepin of Italy and the emperor Louis the Pious.
The Battle of Tertry was an important engagement in Merovingian Gaul between the forces of Austrasia under Pepin II on one side and those of Neustria and Burgundy on the other. It took place in 687 at Tertry,Somme,and the battle is presented as an heroic account in the Annales mettenses priores. After achieving victory on the battlefield at Tertry,the Austrasians dictated the political future of the Neustrians.
Hugh Nigel Kennedy is a British medievalist and academic. He specialises in the history of the early Islamic Middle East,Muslim Iberia and the Crusades. From 1997 to 2007,he was Professor of Middle Eastern History at the University of St Andrews. Since 2007,he has been Professor of Arabic at SOAS,University of London.
Walter Ullmann was an Austrian-Jewish scholar who left Austria in the 1930s and settled in the United Kingdom,where he became a naturalised citizen. He was a recognised authority on medieval political thought,and in particular legal theory,an area in which he published prolifically.
Judith of Bohemia,also known as Judith Přemyslid,was a member of the Přemyslid dynasty and duchess of Poland by marriage. She was a daughter of Duke Vratislaus II of Bohemia and Adelaide of Hungary,and was married to Władysław Herman.
The Gladstone Book Prize is an annual prize awarded by the Royal Historical Society to debut authors for a history book published in Britain on any topic which is not primarily British history. The prize is named in honour of William Ewart Gladstone and was made possible by a grant by the Gladstone Memorial Trust. It was first awarded in 1998,the centenary of Gladstone's death.
The Annals of Metz are a set of Latin Carolingian annals covering the period of Frankish history from the victory of Pepin II in the Battle of Tertry (687) to the time of writing. Sections covering events after 806 are not original writings but were borrowed from other texts and appended to the original annals in the 9th and 12th centuries.
Kathleen Winifred Hughes was an English historian,her specialisation was Irish ecclesiastical history,particularly the early Christian Church in Ireland.
Anthony Bale is an English medievalist.
Warren C. Brown is Professor of History at the California Institute of Technology. His research relates to the social history of early Medieval Europe,conflict resolution and social and institutional memory. He is the editor of the Medieval World Series published by Routledge.
Caroline Jane Goodson is an archaeologist and historian at the University of Cambridge,previously at Birkbeck College,University of London. In 2003 she won the Rome Prize for medieval studies of the American Academy in Rome. In archaeological work,Goodson is most closely associated with the Villa Magna site in Italy where she has been field director since 2006.
Caroline Humfress,FRHS,FSLS,is a legal historian who is professor at the University of St Andrews and a former director of its Institute of Legal and Constitutional Research. In 2020 she was appointed L. Bates Lea Global Professor of Law,University of Michigan Law School,where she teaches on the history of the Civil Law tradition.
Erluin was a ninth-century Carolingian nobleman who became prefect of the palace at Ingelheim.
David John McKitterick,is an English librarian and academic,who was Librarian and Fellow of Trinity College,Cambridge.
