I first posted this translation online in 2010. That link has now broken, and although there is an Internet Archive capture of the original, I thought it might be worth reposting it, largely unchanged. I made the translation in the course of writing an article about the episode the letter describes that was published in […]

How much did kings care about ordinary people in the early Middle Ages? How far did they see it as the king’s role to intervene in their lives? The text translated below is a fascinating glimpse into one answer to that question. Known as the Capitulary of Le Mans (Capitulare in pago cenomannico datum), it […]

Around 804, a dispute broke out in Istria, in what is now Slovenia. This region north of the Adriatic sea had traditionally been under Byzantine control; around 788, however, it was conquered by Charlemagne, king and later emperor of the Franks. The Frankish agents that Charlemagne appointed in Istria, especially Duke John, introduced new practices […]