Emperor Charless II Martel "The Bald", King of France, Holy Roman Emperor

  General Notes:

Emperor Charles II Martel "The Bald," "le Chauve," King of France, Holy
Roman Emperor

Emperor of HRE 875-877; King of France 843-877.46 <../wc_src.htm>
Emperor 875-877; Duke of Swabia, King of Neustria, Aquitaine, Lorraine & Italy.48 <../wc_src.htm>
Ruled BET. 875 - 877 Emperor of the West;
Ruled BET. 843 - 877 King of the West Franks;
Ruled 869 King of Burgundy;
Ruled 875 King of Italy 7 ;
Crowned 25 DEC 875 Emperor of the West; crowned by Pope John VIII at Pavia.67 <../wc_src.htm>
Charles II, byname CHARLES THE BALD, French CHARLES LE CHAUVE, German KARL DER KAHLE (b. June 13, 823--d. Oct. 6, 877, Brides-les-Bain, Fr.), king of France (i.e., Francis Occidentalis, the West Frankish kingdom) from 843 to 877 and Western emperor from 875 to 877. (He is reckoned as Charles II both of the Holy Roman Empire and of France.)
Son of the emperor Louis I the Pious and his second wife, Judith, Charles was the unwitting cause of violent discord when, in 829, he was granted lands by his father; Louis's action precipitated a series of civil wars, lasting until 838, in which the three sons of his first marriage, Lothair I, Louis (the German), and Pepin, strove to maintain or to increase the rights that they had been guaranteed by the succession settlement of 817, the Ordinatio imperii. Pepin died in 838, but after the death of Louis I in 840 the civil war resumed. Charles allied himself with his brother Louis the German to resist the pretensions of the emperor Lothair, and the two allies conquered him in the bloody battle of Fontenoy-en-Puisaye (June 25, 841). In the following year the two brothers confirmed their alliance by the celebrated oaths of Strasbourg. The war was brought to an end by the treaty of Verdun (Aug. 843), which gave to Charles the Bald the kingdom of the western Franks, i.e., all the lands west of a line roughly following the Scheldt, the Meuse, the Saône, the eastern mountains of the Massif Central, and the lower reaches of the Rhône, practically corresponding with what is now France, in addition to the Spanish March as far as the Ebro. Louis the German and Lothair received respectively the lands of the East Franks (Germany) and the middle kingdom, lying between the other two.
Until 864 Charles's political situation was precarious because few vassals were loyal to him. His lands suffered from raids by Northmen, who left only after receiving bribes, and he was defeated by the Bretons. During the first years of his reign up to the death of Lothair I. (855) was continued the system of "confraternal government" of the sons of Louis the Pious, who had various meetings with one another, at Coblenz [848], at Meersen [851], and at Attigny [854].
In 858 Louis the German invaded the kingdom of Charles. In 860 he in his turn tried to seize the kingdom of his nephew, Charles of Provence, but met with a repulse. Yet he succeeded in gaining control of Aquitaine after the capture of Pepin's son in 864. On the death of Lothair II. in 869 he tried to seize his dominions, but by the treaty of Meersen [870] with Louis the German, he received western Lorraine. Besides this, Charles had to struggle against the incessant rebellions in Aquitaine, against the Bretons, who inflicted on the king the defeats of Ballon [845] and Juvardeil [851], and especially against the Normans, who devastated the country in the north of Gaul, the valleys of the Seine and Loire, and even up to the borders of Aquitaine. Charles led various expeditions against the invaders, and tried to put a barrier in their way by having fortified bridges built over all the rivers. In 875, after the death of the Lothair's son, the emperor, Louis II., Charles went to Italy and was crowned emperor on December 25 at Pavia by Pope John VIII. But Louis the German revenged himself for Charles's success by invading and devastating Charles' dominions.
Charles was recalled to Gaul, and after the death of Louis the German [Aug. 28, 876], in his turn made an attempt to seize his kingdom, but at Andernach met with a shameful defeat [Oct. 8, 876] by Louis's son, Louis the Younger. In the meantime, Pope John VIII., who was menaced by the Saracens, was continually urging him to come to Italy, and Charles again crossed the Alps. At the same time while Charles' own major vassals were in revolt, Carloman, son of Louis the German, entered northern Italy and was marching against Charles. Charles started on his way back to Gaul, and died while crossing the pass of the Mont Cenis, Oct. 5 or 6, 877. During Charles's reign some of the splendors of the Carolingian renaissance were revived, and his close collaboration with the church enhanced his prestige and authority. He was succeeded by his son Louis the Stammerer. [Encyclopædia Britannica, 1961 ed., Vol. 5, p. 259, CHARLES II; Encyclopaedia Britannica CD '97, CHARLES II]

Charless married Queen Ermentrude Of Orleans, daughter of Comte Eudes Of Orleans and Unknown, in 842. (Queen Ermentrude Of Orleans was born ~ 825 and died in 869.)