Page:A General Sketch of Political History from the Earlist Times.djvu/160

 148 THE EARLY MIDDLE AGES divided into east and west politically, and a few years later the churches of eastern and western Christendom were no less decisively parted. Charles was a great conqueror, who carried the eastern bound- aries of his empire to the river Elbe, and brought practically A German the whole of the German peoples under his sway, Empire. with the exception of the Scandinavian branch occupying Denmark, Sweden and Norway, and of England. Essentially, it was a German Empire that he had created ; an empire over Germans or over peoples dominated by Germans, of which only one portion had been Latinised. The bulk of the Latinised portion ultimately parted from the rest, and happened to retain as its own the name of the dominant German people ; whereas among the purely German peoples the name was retained only in the purely Frankish territory of Franconia. But the land which the Romans had called Gallia, Gaul, took its name of France from the Franks who had given it its rulers. The organisation which Charles applied to his empire became the basis of a new European system. The territorial magnates, Government generally entitled Dukes or Counts, were responsible of Charles. f or the government of their provinces or districts, who were replaced by bishops in territories held by the Church. All the magnates were politically the emperor's officers, and bound to render him military service. The emperor's authority was supreme, but Charles acted on the regular Teutonic principle of ruling formally at least by consent of his people. Twice a year he held a great assembly to which were gathered not only nobles and prelates but members of the commons, to whom his plans and his edicts were submitted, not for formal ratification, but so that the emperor might ascertain the general opinion with regard to them. It was the purpose of Charles to enforce law and order throughout his dominions, and among churchmen as well as Charles and among the laity. In his view the organisation of the Church. the Church was part of the organisation of the State. As emperor he regarded himself as the head of western Christendom and the superior of the pope, who had paid homage to him at the Imperial coronation. He assumed the entire right of control, without a suspicion of recog-