Page:A Short History of the World.djvu/269

 The Development of Latin Christendom 249 account of this, communication was difficult between these two groups of barbarian conquerors and a split easily brought about. The spht was made the more easy by the fact that the Frankish usage made it seem natural to divide the empire of Charlemagne among his sons at his death. So one aspect of the history of Europe from the days of Charlemagne onwards is a history of first this monarch and his family and then that, struggling to a precarious headship of the kings, princes, dukes, bishops, and cities of Europe, while a steadily deepening antagonism between the French and German-speaking elements develops in the medley. There was a formality of election for each emperor ; and the climax of his ambi- tion was to struggle to the possession of that worn-out, misplaced capital Rome and to a coronation there. The next factor in the European political disorder was the resolve of the Church at Rome to make no temporal prince but the Pope of Rome himself emperor in effect. He was already pontifex maximus; for all practical purposes he held the decaying city ; if he had no armies he had at least a vast propaganda organization in his priests through- ^tvea, move otr lesss- nxiSjev TR3V?^IKI5H ciomxnxtyn. in lite Hme oP CHA11LE5 7MARTEL