Christmas Coronation

Why the Pope Ambushed Charlemagne with the Imperial Crown

The Greek philosopher Plato identified the universal human tendency toward wealth addiction as a force that bends history and gives it a particular geometry. Economic winners become addicted to wealth, and the temptation to fuel that addiction by cheating becomes irresistible. Plato’s Republic was his meditation on what sort of governing body might be immune to that dynamic. But human history since Plato hasn’t produced any real-world examples. The Roman Empire amassed spectacular wealth and then collapsed in a proportionally spectacular fashion. The Roman Catholic Church rose from the ashes of the Roman Empire before it, too, finally succumbed to wealth addiction. And in the wake of the 2008 Financial Crisis, few would deny that the stability of modern society is once again threatened by greed. Poverty, as they say, exists not because we cannot feed the poor, but because we cannot satisfy the rich.

The Christmas Surprise of 800 AD

On Christmas morning in the year 800, Charlemagne strode into Old Saint Peter's Basilica in Rome. The Frankish king believed he was there to observe the Christmas holiday in prayer. But the Pope had other plans for him.

Centuries earlier, the Roman Empire had collapsed on the Italian peninsula, leaving the Roman Catholic Church behind without a military. Charlemagne filled that military void during the 8th century. His Christian faith compelled him to defend the Pope from the Lombards of Northern Italy and to convert, at sword-point, masses of Germanic pagans to Christianity. A delighted Pope Leo III hatched a plot to formalize this convenient arrangement.

As Charlemagne knelt at the altar to recite his Christmas prayers, Leo suddenly placed a crown on his head. Because it was a surprise coronation, Charlemagne had no chance to refuse the honor. To his shock, he became the first Holy Roman Emperor. In 1861, the German painter Friedrich Kaulbach dramatized the moment with his famous work, which serves as the title card to this essay.

The story of Charlemagne’s Christmas coronation comes to us from his contemporary biographer, a servant and friend of his named Einhard. Modern historians have cast serious doubt on Einhard’s tale of an ambush by the Pope. Nevertheless, the traditional story of the Coronation recounted by him captures the establishment of the medieval political hierarchy, in which the crowned heads of Christendom were typically subordinate to the office of the Pope. To this day, the following declaration is still made during the papal coronation ceremony when each new pope receives the Papal Tiara: “Take the tiara, and know that thou art the father of princes and kings, the ruler of the world, the vicar on earth of our savior, Jesus Christ.”

By elevating Charlemagne to the status of emperor and claiming to establish an empire, Leo asserted his own authority over the Frankish king. He made himself the kingmaker and set the political stage for the ensuing Middle Ages.

Continuity with Rome

Charlemagne’s coronation took place in Old St. Peter's Basilica, which was already 500 years old on that Christmas morning in 800 AD. The Christian Emperor Constantine had constructed the Basilica on the site of Peter’s upside-down crucifixion on the Vatican Hill. The original structure lasted until 1505, when it was finally torn down to make room for Michelangelo’s stunning replacement.

Tradition holds that Charlemagne knelt on a large, circular slab of red porphyry stone set into the floor in front of the main altar. This stone is called the Rota Porphyretica, and it became the site where all subsequent Holy Roman Emperors were crowned. When Old St. Peter's was demolished to make way for the new basilica, this precious red stone was built into the floor of the current St. Peter's. It can still be seen today, directly inside the main entrance. Most walk right over it, having no idea of its significance.

The story of Charlemagne’s coronation suggests that Leo assembled the Roman nobility and Frankish warriors beforehand. Einhard claims they saluted him, in unison, as the Roman Emperor, "To Charles Augustus, crowned by God, the great and peace-giving Emperor of the Romans, life and victory." This detail is a major reason that modern historians question Einhard’s testimony. With all those people pre-assembled, it’s hard to believe the coronation was truly a surprise. But what’s for sure is that Leo deliberately invoked the legacy of the old Roman Empire in his coronation of Charlemagne.

The Church Finally Goes Too Far with the Sale of Indulgences

The Roman Catholic Church maintained its authority over European politics for the next 500 years following Leo’s clever maneuver. And when its power began to wane, the universal human tendency toward wealth addiction was a significant reason why.

500 years after Leo’s surprise coronation of Charlemagne, his distant successor, Pope Boniface VIII, hatched another plot. It was the year 1299, and Boniface declared the Jubilee of 1300 would celebrate the turn of the century by accepting money from pilgrims to Rome in exchange for remission of their sins. Dante Alighieri was recorded among the pilgrims of that first Jubilee, and Boniface’s plot became the precursor to the infamous “Sales of Indulgences”. Several centuries later, this practice would become a contentious issue in the violent fracture of Christendom that was the Protestant Reformation.

For his part, Boniface could not believe how successful his scheme had been. He’s said to have put on the dress and insignia of the ancient Roman emperors and paraded through the streets of Rome, holding two swords high in front of him, symbolizing his dominance over both the spiritual and secular realms. Heralds are supposed to have preceded him, crying out, “Behold! I am Caesar!”

The way Popes ruled was reminiscent of the way the Caesars once ruled over the kings of their client kingdoms. Like the Caesars, the Popes exacted economic tribute. However, they didn’t rely directly on pure military might to achieve that, like the Caesars. Instead, they took advantage of the fact that people, like Charlemagne, believed the Pope was their only connection to heaven. In other words, the Church was perceived to hold a monopoly on access to the divine.

The Roman Catholic Church extracted its tribute by setting up a toll booth on that route and charging believers for God’s forgiveness of their sins, or later, for shortened sentences in purgatory. By the end of the Middle Ages, these “Sales of Indulgences” were seen mainly as corruption. The practice severely damaged the Church’s reputation, badly undermined its authority, and hastened the arrival of that challenge to the Church’s power that was the Protestant Reformation.

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Conclusion

The great irony of the Roman Catholic Church is that Christianity began as an outlaw group of radicals rejecting the corrupt economic hierarchy of the Roman Empire. However, as the Church was gradually co-opted over the centuries, it adopted the old Roman symbols of power without regard for the historical irony. And as the sun set on the Middle Ages, the Church became itself a corrupt power, similar to the one against which Christianity had first arisen. These two parallel stories of corruption in Rome, separated by a thousand years, illustrate just how powerful a force wealth addiction is, and why Plato singled it out as an eternal problem in governance.

Christmas Day, as Charlemagne, in the chlamys and sandals of a patricius Romanus, knelt before St. Peter’s altar in prayer, Leo suddenly produced a jeweled crown, and set it upon the King’s head. The congregation, perhaps instructed beforehand to act according to ancient ritual as the senatus populusque Romanus confirming a coronation, thrice cried out: “Hail to Charles the Augustus, crowned by God the great and peace-bringing Emperor of the Romans!” The royal head was anointed with holy oil, the Pope saluted Charlemagne as Emperor and Augustus, and offered him the act of homage reserved since 476 for the Eastern emperor.
Will & Ariel Durant, The Age of Faith, 1950, page 469