Born about 688; died at Quierzy on the Oise, 21 October, 741. He
was the natural son of Pepin of Herstal and a woman named Alpa�de
or Chalpa�de. Pepin, who in 714, had outlived his two legitimate
sons, Drogon and Grimoald, and to Theodoald, a son of the latter
and then only six years old, fell the burdensome inheritance of
the French monarchy. Charles, who was then twenty-six, was not
excluded from the succession on account of his birth, Theodoald
himself being the son of a concubine, but through the influence of
Plectrude, Theodoald's grandmother, who wished the power invested
in her own descendants exclusively. To prevent any opposition from
Charles she had him cast into prison and, having established
herself at Cologne, assumed the guardianship of her grandson. But
the different nations whom the strong hand of Pepin of Herstal had
held in subjections, shook off the yoke of oppression as soon as
they saw that it was with a woman they had to deal. Neustria gave
the signal for revolt (715), Theodoald was beaten in the forest of
Cuise and, led by Raginfrid, mayor of the palace, the enemy
advanced as far as the Meuse. The Frisians flew to arms and,
headed by their duke, Ratbod, destroyed the Christian mission and
entered into a confederacy with the Neustrians. The Saxons came
and devastated the country of the Hattuarians, and even in
Austrasia there was a certain faction that chafed under the
government of a woman and child. At this juncture Charles escaped
from prison and put himself at the head of the national party of
Austrasia. At first he was unfortunate. He was defeated by Ratbod
near Cologne in 716, and the Neustrians forced Plectrude to
acknowledge as king Chilperic, the son of Childeric II, having
taken this Merovingian from the seclusion of the cloister, where
he lived the name of Daniel. But Charles was quick to take
revenge. He surprised and conquered the Neustrians at Ambl�ve near
Malmedy (716), defeated them a second time at Vincy near Cambrai
(21 March, 717), and pursued them as far as Paris. Then retracing
his steps, he came to Cologne and compelled Plectrude to surrender
her power and turn over to him the wealth of his father, Pepin. In
order to give his recently acquired authority a semblance of
legitimacy, he proclaimed the Merovingian Clotaire IV King of
Austrasia, reserving for himself the title of Mayor of the Palace.
It was about this time that Charles banished Rigobert, the Bishop
of Reims, who had opposed him, appointing in his stead the warlike
and unpriestly Milon, who was already Archbishop of Trier.
The ensuing years were full of strife. Eager to chastise the
Saxons who had invaded Austrasia, Charles in the year 718 laid
waste their country to the banks of the Weser. In 719 Ratbod died,
and Charles seized Western Friesland without any great resistance
on the part of the Frisians, who had taken possession of it on the
death of Pepin. The Neustrians, always a menace, had joined forces
with the people of Aquitaine, but Charles hacked their army to
pieces at Soissons. After this defeat they realized the necessity
of surrendering, and the death of King Clotaire IV, whom Charles
had placed on the throne but two years previously, facilitated
reconciliation of the two great fractions of the Frankish Empire.
Charles acknowledged Chilperic as head of the entire monarchy,
while on their side, the Neustrians and Aquitainians endorsed the
authority of Charles; but, when Chilperic died, the following year
(720) Charles appointed as his successor the son of Dagobert III,
Thierry IV, who was still a minor, and who occupied the throne
from 720 to 737. A second expedition against the Saxons in 720 and
the definitive submission of Raginfrid, who had been left the
county of Angers (724), re-established the Frankish Monarchy as it
had been under Pepin of Herstal, and closed the first series of
Charles Martel's struggles. The next six years were devoted almost
exclusively to the confirming of the Frankish authority over the
dependent Germanic tribes. In 725 and 728 Charles went into
Bavaria, where the Agilolfing dukes had gradually rendered
themselves independent, and re- established Frankish suzerainty.
He also brought thence the Princess Suanehilde, who seems to have
become his mistress. In 730 he marched against Lantfrid, Duke of
the Alemanna, whom he likewise brought into subjection, and thus
Southern Germany once more became part of the Frankish Empire, as
had Northern Germany during the first years of the reign. But at
the extremity of the empire a dreadful storm was gathering. For
several years the Moslems of Spain had been threatening Gaul.
Banished thence in 721 by Duke Eudes, they had returned in 725 and
penetrated as far as Burgundy, where they had destroyed Autun.
Duke Eudes, unable to resist them, at length contented himself by
negotiating with them, and to Othmar, one of their chiefs, he gave
the hand of his daughter But this compromising alliance brought
him into disfavour with Charles, who defeated him in 731, and the
death of Othmar that same year again left Eudes at the mercy of
Moslem enterprise. In 732 Abd-er-Rahman, Governor of Spain,
crossed the Pyrenees at the head of an immense army, overcame Duke
Eudes, and advanced as far as the Loire, pillaging and burning as
he went. In October, 732, Charles met Abd-er-Rahman outside of
Tours and defeated and slew him in a battle which must ever remain
one of the great events in the history of the world, as upon its
issue depended whether Christian Civilization should continue or
Islam prevail throughout Europe. It was this battle, it is said,
that gave Charles his name, Martel (Tudites) "The Hammer", because
of the merciless way in which he smote the enemy.
The remainder of Charles Martel's reign was an uninterrupted
series of triumphant combats. In 733-734 he suppressed the
rebellion instigated by the Frisian duke, Bobo, who was slain in
battle, and definitively subdued Friesland, which finally adopted
Christianity. In 735, after the death of Eudes, Charles entered
Aquitaine, quelled the revolt of Hatto and Hunold, sons of the
deceased duke, and left the duchy to Hunold, to be held in fief
(736). He then banished the Moslems from Arles and Avignon,
defeated their army on the River Berre near Narbonne, and in 739
checked an uprising in Provence, the rebels being under the
leadership of Maurontus. So great was Charles' power during the
last years of his reign that he did not take the trouble to
appoint a successor to King Thierry IV, who died in 737, but
assumed full authority himself, governing without legal right.
About a year before Charles died, Pope Gregory III, threatened by
Luitprand, King of Lombardy, asked his help. Now Charles was
Luitprand's ally because the latter had promised to assist him in
the late war against the Moslems of Provence, and, moreover, the
Frankish king may have already suffered from the malady that was
to carry him off -- two reasons that are surely sufficient to
account for the fact that the pope's envoys departed without
gaining the object of their errand. However, it would seem that,
according to the terms of a public act published by Charlemagne,
Charles had, at least in principle, agreed to defend the Roman
Church, and death alone must have prevented him from fulfilling
this agreement. The reign, which in the beginning was so full of
bloody conflicts and later of such incessant strife, would have
been an impossibility had not Charles procured means sufficient to
attract and compensate his partisans. For this purpose he
conceived the idea of giving them the usufruct of a great many
ecclesiastical lands, and this spoliation is what is referred to
as the secularization by Charles Martel. It was an expedient that
could be excused without, however, being justified, and it was
pardoned to a certain extent by the amnesty granted at the Council
of Lestines, held under the sons of Charles Martel in 743. It must
also be remembered that the Church remained the legal owner of the
lands thus alienated. This spoliation and the conferring of the
principal ecclesiastical dignities upon those who were either
totally unworthy or else had naught but their military
qualifications to recommend them -- as, for instance, the
assignment of the episcopal Sees of Reims of Reims and Trier to
Milon -- were not calculated to endear Charles Martel to the
clergy of his time. Therefore, in the ninth century Hincmar of
Reims related the story of the vision with which St. Eucher was
said to have been favoured and which showed Charles in hell, to
which he had been condemned for robbing the Church of its
property.
But notwithstanding the almost exclusively warlike character of
his reign, Charles Martel was not indifferent to the superior
interests of civilization and Christianity. Like Napoleon after
the French Revolution, upon emerging from the years 715-719,
Charles, who had not only tolerated but perpetrated many an act of
violence against the Church, set about the establishment of social
order and endeavoured to restore the rights of the Catholic
hierarchy. This explains the protection which in 723 he accorded
St. Boniface (Winfrid), the great apostle of Germany, a protection
all the more salutary as the saint himself explained to his old
friend, Daniel of Winchester, that without it he could neither
administer his church, defend his clergy, nor prevent idolatry.
Hence Charles Martel shares, to a certain degree, the glory and
merit of Boniface's great work of civilization. He died after
having divided the Frankish Empire, as a patrimony between his two
sons, Carloman and Pepin.
GODEFROID KURTH
Transcribed by Michael C. Tinkler
From the Catholic Encyclopedia, copyright (c) 1913 by the
Encyclopedia Press, Inc. Electronic version copyright (c) 1996 by
New Advent, Inc.
