Hello everyone and welcome back to the Viking Age podcast. My name is Lee and this is episode 23, The Rise of the Franks.

And this is part one of our series on the Carolingian Viking Age. That's right, it's new series time.

And we're kicking it off in style with a quick summary of what you can expect

in the coming weeks and months. And that means heading over to the Kingdom of the Franks

and winding back the clock to around the year 800. Then and there, Charles, the King of the Franks,

rules a realm which, at its height, covered over a

million square kilometers of Western Europe, stretching from northern Italy to southern Denmark,

and from the Atlantic Ocean to the vast forests of central Germany.

For much of the previous century, King Charles' family, a dynasty known to

history as the Carolingians, had forged this vast kingdom out of the fragmented, fractious

chunks of territory, which were left behind by the previous Frankish royal house, the Merivindians. Now, in 800 CE, about a half a century

after his father had first usurped the Merivangian throne, Charles put the finishing touches on

the Carolingian legacy by having himself crowned emperor by the Pope in Rome.

And with this act, he was transformed from Charles King of the Franks to Charles Imperator Augustus,

the first person to hold that title in the West since the deposition of the last Western Roman Emperor in 476C.

Of course, history knows the Augustus by a different name, Charles the Great.

In Latin, Carolus Magnus.

Over time, as the memory of the Emperor continued to loom large over Western Europe,

his greatness became fully incorporated into his name.

And today, we remember him as Charlemagne.

A large part of Charlemagne's illustrious reputation rests on his relentless conquest,

which continuously expanded the boundaries of his empire and brought the Franks into contact with new neighbors.

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