(823–877). King of the West Franks. Charles II the Bald was the only son of Emperor Louis the Pious (r. 814–40) by his second wife, Judith. Three other sons, Lothair I (d. 855), Pepin of Aquitaine (d. 838), and Louis the German (d. 876), had been born to Louis’s first wife, Irmengarde. The terms of inheritance outlined in the Ordinatio imperii of 817 had divided governance of the empire among Lothair, Louis the German, and Pepin and indicated that Lothair, the eldest, would exercise supremacy as sole heir to the imperial title. But the arrival of a fourth son prompted Louis the Pious to revise his scheme by designating lands for Charles from among those of his half-brothers. The subsequent clashes of Louis the Pious with reformers at his court and with his older sons, along with the struggles for power among his children, created a turmoil that eventually destroyed the empire’s unity. In 843, the Treaty of Verdun divided the empire into three separate kingdoms for Charles, Lothair, and Louis the German, with Charles allotted the western third of the empire.
Charles’s rule in west Francia was highlighted early on by an assembly at Coulaines (843), at which the king promised to safeguard the rights of his subjects and in return requested their counsel and aid. This pact represented a new step in relations between Carolingian monarch and aristocracy. Although throughout his reign Charles’s authority was threatened by his brothers, aristocratic factions, and Viking raids along his coasts, his court remained culturally the most brilliant center of his day in the West, attracting such theologians as Hincmar of Reims and Johannes Scottus Eriugena. Moreover, Charles managed to secure and even extend his power.
By the Treaty of Meerssen (870), he and Louis the German shared the territories of their nephew Lothair II, who had ruled Lorraine from 855 to 869. When Emperor Louis II died in 875, Charles the Bald gained the kingdom of Italy and the imperial title. In 877, having decided to conduct an expedition into Italy against the Muslims, he held an assembly at Quierzy remembered for its guarantee of the rights of blood relations in the inheritance of offices and properties vacated during his absence. Charles the Bald died October 6, 877, before his return from Italy. His son, Louis the Stammerer, succeeded to the throne of west Francia.
Gibson, Margaret, and Janet Nelson, eds. Charles the Bald: Court and Kingdom. Oxford: British Archaeological Reports, 1981.
Tessier, Georges, Arthury Giry, Ferdinand Lot, and Maurice Prou, eds. Recueil des actes de Charles II le Chauve, roi de France. 3 vols. Paris: Imprimerie Nationale, 1943–65.
McKitterick, Rosamond. The Frankish Kingdoms Under the Carolingians, 751–987. London: Longman, 1983.
Nees, Lawrence. A Tainted Mantle: Hercules and the Classical Tradition at the Carolingian Court. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 1991.
Nelson, Janet L. Charles the Bald. London: Longman, 1992.
Riché, Pierre. The Carolingians: A Family Who Forged Europe, trans. Michael I.Allen. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 1993.
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