The Reichsannalen are a class of annals composed anonymously in the Carolingian Empire throughout the 9th century. They first appeared under Pepin the Short in 741 and became ubiquitous at monasteries throughout the empire in the following decades. They were not official court annals, but they often bear the bias of having been written in one regnum or another.
The Reichsannalen are distinguished from earlier and later classes of annals by their coverage of supranational and not just local events; they covered the entire empire. Though usually composed at monasteries, they are contrasted with monastic annals which emphasise ecclesiastical and especially local happenings over those of the larger Reich. Some historians, such as Ranke (Zur Kritik fränkisch-deutscher Reichsannalisten. Berlin, 1854) have seen a sheen of officiality in the various annals for the kings whose reigns they cover. The authors of the Reichsannalen show a greater awareness of external affairs, military manœuvres, and court politics than the cloistered penmen of the monastic annals.
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.
Childeric III was King of the Franks from 743 until he was deposed in 751 by Pepin the Short. He was the last Frankish king from the Merovingian dynasty. Once Childeric was deposed, Pepin became king, initiating the Carolingian dynasty.
East Francia or the Kingdom of the East Franks was a successor state of Charlemagne's empire ruled by the Carolingian dynasty until 911. It was created through the Treaty of Verdun (843) which divided the former empire into three kingdoms.
The Chronicle of Moissac is an anonymous compilation that was discovered in the abbey of Moissac, but is now thought to have been compiled in the Catalan monastery of Ripoll in the end of the tenth century. Like most chronicles, it begins with Adam, but gains increasing interest for historians as it nears its end date of 828. Unfortunately, a folio with the entries covering the years 716–770 is missing. The only surviving manuscript of the Chronicle of Moissac dates from the later 11th century and is now in the French National Library in Paris.
The Royal Frankish Annals, also called the Annales Laurissenses maiores, are a series of annals composed in Latin in the Carolingian Francia, recording year-by-year the state of the monarchy from 741 to 829. Their authorship is unknown, though Wilhelm von Giesebrecht suggested that Arno of Salzburg was the author of an early section surviving in the copy at Lorsch Abbey. The Annals are believed to have been composed in successive sections by different authors, and then compiled.
The Battle of Leuven, also called the Battle of the River Dyle, was fought in September 891 between East Francia and the Vikings. The existence of this battle is known through several different chronicles, including the Annales Fuldenses and the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle. The Battle of the Dyle occurred near the present-day location of the city of Leuven in Belgium. In the 880s the Vikings established a camp there that they used as a base of operations from which to launch raids into the fractured Frankish kingdom. Efforts to verify the report of the battle from the Annales Fuldenses, specifically the huge loss of life on the Viking side, have been hindered by the lack of archaeological excavations in Belgium.
In medieval historiography, West Francia or the Kingdom of the West Franks constitutes the initial stage of the Kingdom of France and extends from the year 843, from the Treaty of Verdun, to 987, the beginning of the Capetian dynasty. It was created from the division of the Carolingian Empire following the death of Louis the Pious, with its neighbor East Francia eventually evolving into the Kingdom of Germany.
The Annales Fuldenses or Annals of Fulda are East Frankish chronicles that cover independently the period from the last years of Louis the Pious to shortly after the end of effective Carolingian rule in East Francia with the accession of the child-king, Louis III, in 900. Throughout this period they are a near contemporary record of the events they describe and a primary source for Carolingian historiography. They are usually read as a counterpart to the narrative found in the West Frankish Annales Bertiniani.
Harald 'Klak' Halfdansson was a king in Jutland around 812–814 and again from 819–827.
Annales Bertiniani are late Carolingian, Frankish annals that were found in the Abbey of Saint Bertin, Saint-Omer, France, after which they are named. Their account is taken to cover the period 830-82, thus continuing the Royal Frankish Annals (741–829), from which, however, it has circulated independently in only one manuscript. They are available in the Monumenta Germaniæ Historica and in a later French edition taking into account a newly discovered manuscript . The Annals of St. Bertin are one of the principal sources of ninth-century Francia, and are particularly well-informed on events in the West Frankish sphere of Charles the Bald. The Annales Fuldenses are usually read as an East Frankish counterpart to their narrative.
Rudolf of Fulda was a Benedictine monk during the Carolingian period in the 9th century. Rudolf was active at Fulda Abbey in the present-day German state of Hesse. He was one of the most distinguished scholars of his time. Many of his works have been lost. However, his Annals of Fulda and Life of St. Leoba survive.
The Annales Vedastini or Annals of St-Vaast are a series of annals written in the early tenth century at the Abbey of St. Vaast in Arras. They are an important source for the ninth century. The years from 874 to 900 are covered with a strong bias for Lotharingian and West Frankish affairs. Like the Annales Fuldenses and Annales Bertiniani, the AV, as it is often abbreviated, was combined with the other Reichsannalen in the so-called Chronicon Vedastinum, a general chronicle covering the history of the Carolingian Empire up until 899.
The Annales laureshamenses, also called Annals of Lorsch (AL), are a set of Reichsannalen that cover the years from 703 to 803, with a brief prologue. The annals begin where the "Chronica minora" of the Anglo-Saxon historian Bede leaves off—in the fifth year of the Emperor Tiberios III—and may have originally been composed as a continuation of Bede. The annals for the years up to 785 were written at the Abbey of Lorsch, but are dependent on earlier sources. Those for the years from 785 onward form an independent source and provide especially important coverage of the imperial coronation of Charlemagne in 800. The Annales laureshamenses have been translated into English.
The Annales mosellani or mosellenses (AM) or Moselle Annals are a set of minor Reichsannalen covering the years 703 to 798. Its entries are brief and unliterary, but broad in scope and generally accurate. They have only partially been translated into English.
The Annales guelferbytani are a set of Latin annals covering the years 741–805 that were composed in Regensburg, the capital of the Duchy of Bavaria, in 812–13. They are found in a manuscript of the ducal library of Wolfenbüttel, which contains fourteen folios, though folio 13r was added later and folios 13v–14v later still.
The Annales sancti Amandi (maiores) are a set of imperial Frankish annals composed in Latin in the 8th and 9th centuries at the Benedictine monastery of Saint-Amand-les-Eaux. They share text with the related Annales Tiliani, Annales Laubacenses and Annales Petaviani, all originating in monasteries of the region of Belgica and having terse, somewhat sporadic entries. The Annales sancti Amandi was preserved in a now lost manuscript that also contained Bede's De ratione temporum. This manuscript was copied in 1638 by André Duchesne, and his copy is the one upon which all subsequent editions are based.
The Notitia de servitio monasteriorum is a list of monasteries in the Frankish Empire and the services they owed the crown. It was compiled under Emperor Louis the Pious in 819, probably as a summation of the royal reform of the monasteries carried out following the councils of 816 and 817. It is not a complete list of the reformed monasteries: only 82 of the 104 monasteries known to have adopted the reforms are listed in the Notitia.
The Annales Petaviani (AP) is one of the so-called "minor annals group", three related Reichsannalen, year-by-year histories of the Carolingian empire composed in Latin. They are named after the former owner of the manuscript, the French Jesuit Denis Pétau (1583–1652), whose name, in Latin, is Dionysius Petavius. The standard critical edition of the Annales is that of Georg Pertz in the Monumenta Germaniae Historica.
Annales Laurissenses minores or ALM is the Latin name of a medieval, historiographic text from the abbey at Lorsch near Worms in Germany. In many German texts, they are also called the Kleine Lorscher Frankenchronik, but in English may be referred to as the "Short chronicle of Lorsch" or "Lesser Annals of Lorsch".
The Chronicon universale usque ad annum 741 is an anonymous Latin chronicle from the creation of the world to AD 741. It was written in Francia, probably in Burgundy, between 741 and 775. It survives wholly or partially in at least six manuscripts.
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