Charles Martel

Background and early life

Charles belonged to the noble family that later became known as the Carolingians, an appellation that did not appear until the late tenth century.^[1] His paternal forebears were the Arnulfings and Pippinids, with the earliest secure ancestors being Bishop Arnulf of Metz and Pepin of Landen (Pepin I).^[2] In the eastern Frankish realm of Austrasia, Pepin I had first held the office of mayor of the palace in 624 or 625. Following the victory of Pepin of Herstal (Pepin II) over the Neustrian and Burgundian mayor at the Battle of Tertry in approximately 687, the Pippinids assumed effective authority over the whole Frankish kingdom.^[3] Modern medieval historians widely regard the Battle of Tertry as a turning point marking the replacement of Merovingian power by the Pippinid-Arnulfing lineage.^[4] By the late seventh century, the Merovingian monarchs had become figurehead sovereigns, while the mayors of the palace managed the royal treasury, dispensed patronage, and granted lands and privileges in the monarch's name.^[5]

Pepin of Herstal had consolidated his authority by marrying Plectrude, who came from an influential Austrasian aristocratic clan holding extensive possessions from the middle Moselle through the Eifel to the lower Rhine.^[6] Pepin entrusted governmental responsibilities to his legitimate sons by Plectrude, appointing Drogo as duke of the Burgundians around 697 and Grimoald the Younger as mayor of the palace in Neustria. Charles, by contrast, was Pepin's son by a noblewoman named Alpaida (or Chalpaida).^[7][8] Modern historical analysis has rejected the older concept of a so-called Friedelehe as an ungrounded construct of 1930s scholarship.^[8] Although older historiography regularly branded Charles as illegitimate, eighth-century Frankish custom permitted polygamous practices, and it is likely that the accusation of illegitimacy derived from the wish of Plectrude, Pepin's first wife, to see her own descendants inherit Pepin's position.^{[8][9][10][11]}

Charles's birth is estimated by modern historians to have taken place between 688 and 691, based on the ages of his own children, though several traditions also propose 23 August 686 or 680.^[8][12][13] He was baptized by Bishop Rigobert of Reims. Nothing is known from contemporary sources regarding his youth, his appearance, his education, or his relationship with his father, his siblings, and his stepmother Plectrude.^[14] Charles is the only Carolingian who rose to power without any surviving record of his activities prior to his father's death, having been entirely excluded from the exercise of governance during Pepin's lifetime.^[14][15] He had a full brother, Childebrand, who later served as duke of Burgundy.^[7]

Succession crisis and civil war (714–723)

Shortly before his death, Pepin lost both sons from his first marriage, with Plectrude: Drogo died in 708, and Grimoald was murdered in 714.^[16] Grimoald had gone to Liège to see his sick father and was killed while praying at the tomb of Saint Lambert by a man named Rangar, a trusted man of his father-in-law, King Radbod of the Frisians.^{[16][17][18][19]} Following Grimoald's death, Pepin accepted Plectrude's counsel and nominated his grandson Theudoald, an eight-year-old child, as his sole successor. Pepin died in December 714.^[20] Plectrude assumed the regency on Theudoald's behalf, acting in the manner of a queen dowager while the name of the mother of the reigning Merovingian king, Dagobert III, remained unrecorded in chronicles.^[21] To prevent Charles from turning the discontent of the Austrasian nobility to his advantage, Plectrude had him arrested and confined in Cologne, the planned seat of her authority.^[20][21]

The rule of a woman and a child provoked immediate resistance. In 715, the Neustrian nobility rebelled to throw off Austrasian dominance. Supported by Dagobert III, they appointed Raganfrid as mayor of the palace of Neustria and Burgundy.^[20] On 26 September 715, the Neustrians confronted Theudoald's army in the Forest of Cuise near Compiègne and routed his forces.^[22] Theudoald fled back to Cologne. When Dagobert III died shortly thereafter around the age of twenty, the Neustrians took a monk named Daniel, allowed his hair to grow, and proclaimed him king under the name Chilperic II.^[17][18]

Before the close of 715, Charles escaped from confinement in Cologne and was acclaimed mayor of the palace by an Austrasian faction seeking a capable military commander.^[20][23] His core backing derived from his maternal kindred in the region between Maastricht and Liège.^[24] In 716, Chilperic II and Raganfrid led a Neustrian army through the Ardennes into Austrasia, intent on capturing the Pippinid treasure in Cologne.^[19][23] They allied with King Radbod of the Frisians, who led another invading force.^[25][26] Charles attempted to confront Radbod near Cologne with a hastily gathered force, but suffered a sharp defeat and was forced to flee the field, marking the only military reversal of his life.^[23][25] Chilperic and Raganfrid besieged Plectrude in Cologne, and she bought them off with a substantial portion of Pepin's treasure, after which they withdrew.^[25]

Charles withdrew into the hills of the Eifel to gather and train men.^[27] In April 716, he fell upon the Neustrian army near Malmedy as it was returning to Neustria.^[27][28] In the ensuing Battle of Amblève, Charles attacked the enemy forces at midday while they were resting. Utilizing feigned retreat tactics that drew the Neustrians out of their defensive positions into an ambush, Charles threw their forces into disarray and captured their supply train along with the recovered treasures.^[25][27][28] The engagement established his reputation for military skill and attracted fresh adherents to his cause, marking a decisive reversal in his fortunes.^[12][28]

Following Amblève, Charles secured the alliance of Willibrord, the Anglo-Saxon missionary who had founded the Abbey of Echternach on lands donated by Plectrude's mother Irmina of Oeren.^[29][30] Willibrord had been driven from his see at Utrecht when Radbod allied with the Neustrians, burned churches, and killed missionaries.^[29][31] According to Richard Gerberding, Willibrord judged that his life's work had a better chance of surviving with a successful field commander like Charles than with Plectrude in Cologne, and he backed Charles and baptized his infant son Pepin, likely around Easter 716.^[29] Charles also gained the support of Bishop Pepo of Verdun.^[29]

By the spring of 717, Charles commanded a force large enough to invade Neustria. After sending an embassy offering terms of peace that Chilperic rejected, Charles engaged the Neustrian army at the Battle of Vinchy near Cambrai on 21 March 717, winning a total victory.^[28] He pursued Chilperic and Raganfrid to Paris, then turned back toward Cologne and Plectrude.^[32][33][34] He besieged and captured Cologne, compelled Plectrude to hand over the remainder of the royal treasure, and dispersed her faction.^[35] The control of this treasure allowed Charles to reward his followers and consolidate his authority.^[36] Plectrude was permitted to retire from political life and became the founder of the convent of St. Maria im Kapitol in Cologne, while her grandson Theudoald lived under Charles's protection until 741.^[36]

To legitimize his position, Charles proclaimed Chlothar IV, a Merovingian prince, as king in Austrasia before 3 February 718, and Chlothar formally appointed him mayor of the palace.^[37][38] Charles deposed Archbishop Rigobert of Reims, who had wavered during the crisis, and elevated Milo to the see.^[37][39] In 718, Chilperic II and Raganfrid allied with Duke Odo the Great of Aquitaine, who had established de facto independence in the southwest during the civil wars.^[16][37] Charles confronted their combined army at the Battle of Soissons in the spring of 718 (or autumn of 719) and routed them.^[16][37][40] Chilperic and Odo fled south of the Loire, while Raganfrid retreated to Angers.^[16][37] Charles marched as far as Orléans in pursuit.^[16] Odo subsequently came to terms, surrendering Chilperic and the royal treasury in exchange for Charles recognizing Odo's ducal authority in Aquitaine.^[37][41]

King Chlothar IV died in 719. Charles then recognized Chilperic II as the sole king of the Franks, a diplomatic concession that reassured the Neustrians while securing unquestioned royal confirmation of Charles's mayoralty over all the Frankish kingdoms.^[37][41] When Chilperic died in 721, Charles elevated Theuderic IV, the son of Dagobert III, who remained on the throne as a figurehead until 737.^[41] In 723, Charles imprisoned the two sons of his deceased half-brother Drogo, neutralizing the final internal familial claimants to Pippinid authority and bringing the succession crisis to a conclusion.^[42][43] When Raganfrid revolted again in Anjou in 724, Charles besieged Angers, devastated the surrounding county, and compelled Raganfrid to yield his sons as hostages, ending the internal civil wars of his reign.^[44]

Expansion and border campaigns (718–739)

From 718 to 739, Charles directed continuous military campaigns against peripheral regions and neighboring peoples, including the Frisians, Saxons, Alemanni, and Bavarians, as well as the southern realms of Aquitaine, Burgundy, and Provence.^{[31][45][46][47]} In Frisia, King Radbod had actively suppressed Christianity to shake off Frankish overlordship, expelling Bishop Willibrord from Utrecht.^[31] Following Radbod's death in 719, Charles re-established Frankish dominance over West Frisia without substantial resistance.^[31] Charles supported the restoration of Christian mission work, granting extensive estates to Willibrord's monastery in Utrecht in 723.^[31] When Duke Bubo (or Poppo) rebelled, Charles launched a combined land and naval expedition in 734, defeating the Frisian army and slaying Bubo at the Battle of the Boarn.^[31][48] The Frankish forces annexed the Frisian core territory between the Vlie and Lauwers, destroyed pagan shrines, and pacified the region for two decades.^[31]

The Saxons represented a persistent threat along the eastern frontier, having reached a height of territorial expansion around 700 and raided the Frankish district of Hattuaria on the Rhine in 715.^[45][46] Charles conducted retaliatory expeditions rather than attempting permanent annexation.^[46] In 718, he devastated Saxon territory to the banks of the Weser, Lippe, and Ruhr, defeating them in the Teutoburg Forest.^[20][37][47] He campaigned against them again in 720, possibly in 722, and in 724 after suppressing Raganfrid's revolt.^[44] A planned campaign in 729 was aborted because of tensions in Alemannia.^[44] In 738, Charles led his final recorded expedition against the Saxons, whom the Continuator of Fredegar termed exceptionally pagan (paganissimi), forcing the Westphalian Saxons to submit, pay regular tribute, and provide hostages.^[44]

In Alemannia, Duke Gotfrid had resisted Pippin of Herstal's authority, and after his death in 709, rivalries broke out among his sons.^[49] In 724, Pirmin founded the Abbey of Reichenau on Lake Constance with the cooperation of Charles and Duke Lantfrid.^[50] In 725 and 728, Lantfrid was forced to grant passage through Alemannia for Charles's expeditions into Bavaria.^[50] According to the chronicle of Hermann of Reichenau, Lantfrid's brother Theudebald expelled Abbot Pirmin from Reichenau in 727 out of hatred for Charles (ob odium Karoli).^[50] Hostilities erupted between Charles and Lantfrid in 730, during which Lantfrid died or was killed in battle.^[51] When Theudebald expelled Pirmin's successor Heddo in 732, Charles intervened militarily, reinstated Heddo, and drove Theudebald into exile.^[51] Charles declined to appoint a replacement duke, incorporating Alemannia directly into the Frankish realm.^[51] Pirmin relocated to Alsace to establish the Abbey of Murbach in 728, and Charles appointed Heddo as bishop of Strasbourg in 734 without requiring military campaigns in Alsace.^[52][53][54]

In Mainfranken and Thuringia, the two regions had been united under the rule of the Hedene ducal dynasty.^[55] Duke Heden II had maintained complex ties with Austrasia, but following his death around 717, the eastern Frankish population overthrew the dynasty.^[55] Charles absorbed the territories into the central administrative sphere without needing a direct military campaign, providing a stable foundation for Boniface to establish monasteries and episcopal structures in the area.^[55]

Charles repeatedly intervened in Bavaria, where the Agilolfing dukes had acted with growing autonomy and allied with King Liutprand of the Lombards.^[56] In 725, Charles campaigned in Bavaria alongside Liutprand to assist Duke Hugbert against his rival uncle Grimoald.^[56] From this expedition, Charles brought back Grimoald's widow Pilitrud (or Biltrude) and her niece, the Agilolfing princess Swanhild, whom he married as his second wife.^[57] Charles returned to campaign in Bavaria in 728.^[58] Following Hugbert's childless death in 736, Charles appointed Odilo, a relative of Swanhild from Alemannia, as duke of Bavaria.^[59] When opposition later drove Odilo from the duchy, he sought refuge at Charles's court, where he married Charles's daughter Hiltrud; with Frankish backing, Odilo returned to Bavaria in March 741.^[59][60]

Confrontation with the Umayyads and the Battle of Tours

Umayyad Muslim forces consisting of Arabs and Berbers completed the conquest of the Visigothic kingdom in Iberia between 711 and 720 and began expanding across the Pyrenees into Septimania and southern Gaul.^[61][62] In 721, Duke Odo of Aquitaine repulsed an invading force under the governor al-Samh ibn Malik al-Khawlani at the Battle of Toulouse.^[12][19] In subsequent years, Umayyad forces seized Carcassonne in 724, Nîmes in 725, sacked Autun in Burgundy on 22 August 725, and besieged Sens.^[19][63] To protect his southern border, Odo entered into an alliance with Munnuza (Uthman ibn Naissa), the rebel Berber governor of Cerdanya, offering him his daughter in marriage.^[12][61][64] However, Abd al-Rahman al-Ghafiqi, the caliph's governor in Spain, defeated Munnuza, who took his own life.^[61]

In 731, after subduing the Saxons, Charles turned his attention to Aquitaine, accusing Odo of violating their treaty and consorting with Muslims.^[12] Charles crossed the Loire twice, pillaged northern Aquitaine, and took Bourges, though Odo briefly recaptured it.^[12] In 732, Abd al-Rahman launched a massive expedition across the Pyrenees to punish Odo and acquire plunder, defeating Odo's forces in a pitched engagement along the Garonne River and storming Bordeaux.^[19][61] After this defeat, Odo was forced to ask Charles for help.^[61][65] Charles mobilized an army composed of Frankish and Burgundian veterans to confront the advancing forces.^[25][61]

In October 732, the armies met between Tours and Poitiers, commonly localized at Moussais (in the present-day commune of Vouneuil-sur-Vienne).^[12][61][64] The Umayyad forces had been advancing toward the wealthy shrine of Saint Martin of Tours.^[12] The Frankish infantry formed an immovable defensive phalanx, described by the Mozarabic Chronicle of 754 as standing like a wall or a glacier.^[66] After several days of minor skirmishing, Abd al-Rahman ordered an assault, but the mounted Umayyad cavalry failed to penetrate the Frankish infantry line.^[66] Abd al-Rahman was killed during the fighting, and under cover of darkness, the Umayyad troops abandoned their camp and retreated south toward Septimania, plundering through the Limousin.^[61][64] An alternative local tradition recorded in later accounts claimed that Abd al-Rahman withdrew to Narbonne and was killed in 733 at Loupchat near the modern village of Martel in the Lot département.^[64]

Despite winning the battle, Charles did not immediately establish full control over Aquitaine, and Odo remained duke until his death in 735.^[67][68] In modern historiography, the significance of the engagement has been subject to varied interpretations. Eighteenth- and nineteenth-century historians, including Edward Gibbon, viewed Charles's victory as having preserved Christian Europe from a complete Islamic conquest.^[69][70] By contrast, contemporary scholars such as Paul Fouracre, Alessandro Barbero, and Tomaž Mastnak emphasize that the Umayyad campaign was a large-scale predatory raid rather than an attempt to annex Gaul, and that its outcome was an episode within the wider Pippinid effort to subjugate the semi-independent principalities of southern Gaul.^[12][71][72]

Campaigns in Burgundy and Provence (732–739)

Following the victory of 732 and Odo's death in 735, Charles redirected his military resources toward southern Gaul to bind Burgundy and Provence more closely to the Frankish kingdom.^[73] In Burgundy, he dismissed local counts and dukes, installing loyal Frankish supporters in their places. Charles deposed regional prelates who resisted his centralization, banishing Bishop Eucherius of Orléans to Cologne and distributing his diocesan lands to Frankish warriors, while Bishop Ainmar of Auxerre was imprisoned at Bastogne and Bishop Willicarius of Vienne was displaced.^[74] When Duke Odo died in 735, the Aquitanian nobility proclaimed his son Hunald I as duke.^[67][68] Charles marched to Bordeaux and Blaye to enforce submission, but eventually recognized Hunald after the new duke swore an oath of fidelity to Charles and his sons, Carloman and Pepin.^[68][75]

In Provence, local magnates led by Duke Maurontus resisted central Frankish authority and entered into an alliance with the Umayyad commanders in Septimania, allowing garrison forces under Yusuf ibn Abd al-Rahman al-Fihri to occupy Avignon and Arles.^[34][64][73] In 737, Charles launched an offensive into the Rhône valley alongside his half-brother Childebrand.^[64][73][76] The Frankish army stormed Avignon, capturing the city and executing or expelling its defenders.^[65][73] Charles then advanced into Septimania and besieged Narbonne.^[64][73] When an Umayyad relief army from al-Andalus commanded by Umar ibn Khalid (Amor) landed at the mouth of the Berre River near the Bages-Sigean lagoon, Charles met and destroyed the relief force at the Battle of the Berre.^[64][73][77] Although Narbonne remained in Muslim hands until Pepin the Short captured it in 759, Charles devastated the surrounding towns and fortresses, dismantling the walls of Béziers, Agde, Maguelone, and Nîmes to deny fortified bases to future invaders.^[64][73][78]

In 738, renewed Umayyad incursions threatened Provence while Charles was engaged campaigning against the Saxons.^[73][79] King Liutprand of the Lombards intervened on Charles's behalf, leading an army over the Alps that induced the invaders to withdraw without a major pitched engagement.^[79] A new revolt in Provence in 739 required another expedition, for which Charles allied with King Liutprand of the Lombards.^[17][64][80] The Frankish forces pacified Provence, expelling Maurontus, punishing local collaborators, and distributing their confiscated estates to Frankish followers.^[48][64] Among the loyal men Charles installed in Provence was Abbo, who had received the title of patrician and authority over Provence in 737.^[80][81]

The interregnum and sole rule (737–741)

In the spring of 737, the Merovingian figurehead king Theuderic IV died at approximately twenty-five years of age.^[82] Charles, titling himself mayor of the palace (maior domus) and duke and prince of the Franks (princeps et dux Francorum), opted not to name a successor, and no Merovingian claimant was acclaimed.^[82] Although Theuderic had a son, the future Childeric III, Charles allowed the throne to remain vacant for the final four years of his life, ruling the unified kingdom without a monarch.^[82][83] This vacancy represented an unprecedented development in Frankish history, reflecting the complete consolidation of authority within the hands of the mayor of the palace.^[82] Charles's position as elected mayor had previously been confirmed by the Frankish magnates at a general assembly.^[84]

During the interregnum, Charles exercised prerogatives traditionally reserved for kings.^[85] He issued judicial verdicts (placita) and immunity privileges in his own name modeled on royal diplomas, and controlled royal fiscal and ecclesiastical properties directly.^[85] In drafting documents, the dating formulas shifted: whereas earlier charters were dated by the regnal years of the monarch, Charles's final surviving charter from September 741 was dated by the years elapsed since Theuderic's death.^[86] Scholar Ingrid Heidrich noted that from the 720s, Charles had already modified standard formulas from the traditional reverential style to a more austere wording, transforming the royal chancery into an instrument of the mayor's administration.^[86][87] Charles frequently conducted court business at royal palaces in the Oise valley, particularly at Quierzy and Clichy, reflecting his adoption of Merovingian monarchical traditions.^[88]

In 737, Charles dispatched his son Pepin to the court of King Liutprand of the Lombards, where Liutprand performed a traditional ritual of adoption by shearing Pepin's hair.^[89] This adoption was intended to solidify the Frankish-Lombard alliance in Provence and northern Italy rather than establish a succession claim to the Lombard throne, for which Liutprand had already designated his nephew Hildeprand in 735.^[90] Historians have debated whether this ceremony was intended to prepare the eventual elevation of the Carolingian family to royal rank; while Jörg Jarnut suggested it elevated Pepin over his elder brother Carloman, Brigitte Kasten argued that Carloman remained at Charles's side as the primary heir because Charles suffered from recurring bouts of illness, and Florian Hartmann suggested the adoption may have originally concerned Grifo.^{[91][92][93][94][95]} Matthias Becher argued that Charles intended a complete dynastic change after Theuderic's death, utilizing Boniface's third journey to Rome in 737 and 738 to sound out papal and Lombard support, before abandoning the effort following severe illness in 740.^[96]

Charles maintained diplomatic relations with the papacy, which addressed him as vice-king (subregulus) in letters dated to 739 and 740.^[97] In 739, Pope Gregory III, besieged by Liutprand's territorial advances, sent two embassies to Charles bearing gifts, the chains of Saint Peter, and the keys to Saint Peter's tomb, requesting Frankish military intervention in Italy.^[98][99] While Charles received the papal envoys with honor and returned diplomatic gifts, he declined to intervene against his longtime ally Liutprand, citing his alliance and his failing health.^[100] Nevertheless, the direct appeal by the bishop of Rome to the Frankish mayor signaled a shift away from Byzantine influence and anticipated the future Italian interventions of his son and grandson.^[100]

During the relative peace of his final years, Charles supported the structural integration of the church in the eastern regions. In Bavaria, he endorsed Boniface's organization of four dioceses at Salzburg, Regensburg, Freising, and Passau in 739, with Boniface acting as metropolitan over territories east of the Rhine.^[101] Boniface had operated under Charles's direct protection since 723, writing to Bishop Daniel of Winchester that he could neither govern the clergy nor prevent pagan practices without the mayor's safeguard.^[101] Following the Saxon expedition of 738, Boniface initiated mass baptisms in Westphalia, reporting to Gregory III that approximately one hundred thousand souls had been brought into the Christian fold, though Saxon adherence to pagan customs quickly resumed.^[102][103] In Mainfranken and Thuringia, however, Charles delayed the establishment of the proposed sees of Würzburg, Büraburg, and Erfurt, which were only erected in 742 after his death, likely because of opposition from the Austrasian episcopate and Charles's deteriorating health.^[104][105]

Military reforms and ecclesiastical property

In older historiography, particularly following Heinrich Brunner in 1887, Charles was credited with originating the European feudal system through deliberate military and agrarian reforms.^{[106][107][108]} Brunner argued that to counter mobile mounted opponents, Charles secularized substantial portions of church property to distribute them as conditional estates (benefices) to mounted warriors, who were obligated to maintain warhorses and provide cavalry service.^[108][109] In 1962, Lynn Townsend White Jr. expanded this theory by arguing that the introduction of the stirrup provided Frankish heavy cavalry with devastating shock capability, transforming medieval warfare.^[110] However, contemporary scholarship, including the works of Susan Reynolds and Paul Fouracre, has largely dismantled this thesis, showing that there is insufficient source evidence to demonstrate a sudden shift to shock cavalry or a systemic reorganization of society under Charles.^{[12][111][112][113]} The Frankish military continued to rely heavily on veteran infantry alongside mounted troops throughout the eighth century.^[66]

Charles routinely utilized ecclesiastical offices and lands to reward loyal supporters and finance military campaigns, continuing practices that had been employed by Merovingian kings and earlier mayors.^[39][74] He appointed close relatives and lay adherents to multiple sees and abbeys; his nephew Hugh was entrusted with the abbeys of Saint-Denis, Saint-Wandrille, and Jumièges while concurrently directing the bishoprics of Paris, Rouen, Bayeux, Lisieux, and Avranches, effectively serving as governor of Neustria.^[74] Similarly, Charles installed Milo, already bishop of Trier, as archbishop of Reims, drawing sharp rebukes from Boniface for worldly conduct and episcopal pluralism.^[39] By filling offices in churches and monasteries, Charles sought to prevent long vacancies that allowed regional magnates to take over church property. For him, any loss of church property also meant a loss of his own resources.^[114]

During the ninth century, ecclesiastical traditions developed a dark portrayal of Charles as a despoiler of church lands (Kirchenräuber).^[115] In 746, Boniface wrote to King Æthelbald of Mercia describing Charles as a destroyer of monasteries and violator of church funds.^[115] In the ninth century, Archbishop Hincmar of Reims (845 to 882) described Charles in the Visio Eucherii as a robber of church property who suffered severe punishments in hell.^{[12][116][117]} Modern historical and archaeological studies have qualified this reputation: investigations of eighth-century monastic sites in the Meuse valley, such as Saint-Trond, Amay, Saint-Servatius in Maastricht, and Lobbes, demonstrate that Charles's church policy did not exceed contemporary norms, and legal diplomas from around 780 suggest that some secularizations attributed to Charles were actually executed during the reign of his son Pepin the Short around 751.^[118][119] Furthermore, contemporary hagiographical works reveal that Charles generally maintained cooperative relations with major monastic establishments.^[120]

Court, family, and succession

Early medieval Frankish governance was conducted through an ambulatory court (Reisekönigtum), where the ruler traveled between royal estates, monasteries, and cities to maintain authority.^[121] Under Charles, the traditional Merovingian palatine offices ceased to function in their older institutional forms, and from 697 to 750, no royal assembly attended by a Merovingian king is documented.^[121][122] Charles gathered sons of noble families at his court for their education, fostering aristocratic integration into the emerging Carolingian system.^[123] An institutional court chapel (capella) staffed by chaplains (capellani) emerged during his tenure to administer palace religious functions and assist in documentary production.^[124]

Charles was married first to Rotrude (or Chrodtrud), who died in 724 or 725.^[125] From this marriage, he had three children who reached prominence: Carloman, Pepin the Short, and a daughter named Hiltrud.^[126][127] Other daughters mentioned in records include Landrade and Auda (or Aldana), the latter of whom married Count Theoderic of Autun.^[128] Following Rotrude's death, Charles married the Agilolfing princess Swanhild in 725, with whom he had a son named Grifo.^[126][127] He also had three illegitimate sons, Bernard, Hieronymus and Remigius, whose mother was probably the concubine Ruodhaid.^[127] Unlike his father Pepin or his grandson Charlemagne, Charles did not associate his sons with governmental office or military commands during his lifetime, reserving all public authority and the title of maior domus exclusively to himself.^[129][130]

Prior to his death, Charles divided the governance of the realm among his sons.^[126][131] In the initial division, he assigned Austrasia, Alemannia, and Thuringia to Carloman, while Pepin was assigned Neustria, Burgundy, Provence, and the Moselle districts of Metz and Trier, with Aquitaine and Bavaria treated as dependent client principalities.^[126][132] Shortly before his death, Charles granted portions of territory in the central lands between Neustria and Austrasia to his younger son Grifo.^{[126][131][133]} In his last extant charter, issued on 17 September 741 at the royal estate of Clichy, Charles granted property to the Abbey of Saint-Denis; the consent signatures were made by Swanhild and Grifo, while Carloman and Pepin were absent.^[131][134] Historians have debated whether Charles intended Grifo to share equal inheritance; Matthias Becher suggested Charles planned to elevate Grifo prominently, while Andreas Fischer and Sören Kaschke argued that Carloman and Pepin were already establishing authority in their assigned districts.^{[134][135][136][137]}

In the autumn of 741, Charles was stricken with a severe fever at Verberie on the Oise River.^[138][139] He was conveyed to the royal palace at Quierzy-sur-Oise, where he died on 15 or 22 October 741.^[138][140] Breaking with Pippinid family custom, which favored burial at Metz or Chèvremont, Charles chose to be interred in the Basilica of Saint-Denis north of Paris.^[138][141] This choice deliberately connected his memory to the royal traditions of the Merovingians, who had long used Saint-Denis as a burial site.^[138] In the thirteenth century, King Louis IX ordered the reordering of the royal tombs at Saint-Denis (1264–1267), and Charles's remains were re-entombed beneath an idealized recumbent effigy (gisant) depicting him with a royal crown and scepter, symbolically including him within the sequence of French monarchs.^[142]

Immediately following Charles's death, Carloman and Pepin seized power, captured Grifo and Swanhild, and imprisoned them in Upper Normandy and Chelles.^[143] Meeting at Vieux Poitiers in 742, Carloman and Pepin redivided the kingdom between themselves, excluding Grifo entirely.^[143] Confronted by widespread rebellions across Bavaria, Alemannia, and Aquitaine in 743, the brothers raised Childeric III to the throne, ending the six-year interregnum and restoring a nominal Merovingian sovereign until Pepin deposed him in 751 to assume the Frankish crown.^{[143][144][145]}

Name and epithet

The name Charles (Carolus) was unprecedented within both the Arnulfing and Pippinid branches of his ancestry, lacking earlier family tradition.^[146][147] Following his military and political victories, Charles and Carloman became the leading names for Carolingian heirs, while older ancestral names such as Arnulf and Drogo were relegated to younger or secondary sons, and Grimoald disappeared entirely.^[148] During his lifetime and throughout the eighth century, contemporary official documents and narrative sources referred to him simply as Charles without an epithet.^[149]

The cognomen Martel (Latin: Martellus), meaning 'the Hammer', first appeared in written records in the late ninth century.^[7][150] Its earliest documented variant appears around 875 in the Miracula sancti Benedicti by Adrevald of Fleury, which utilized the Latin term Tudites ('the Smiter' or 'Pounder').^[149][150] Shortly thereafter, the Vita Rigoberti, written between 888 and 894, introduced the form Martellus, which became established across medieval chronicles from the eleventh century onward through authors such as Sigebert of Gembloux.^[149][150] Historians Theodor Breysig and Ulrich Nonn concluded that the nickname originated as a vernacular Frankish spoken epithet before being translated into Latin chronicles.^[151] Popular traditions frequently associate the nickname with his crushing victory at the Battle of Tours in 732, but ninth-century chroniclers applied it broadly to his general martial prowess in all his campaigns, with Pierre Riché noting possible biblical allusions to Judas Maccabaeus ('the Hammerer').^{[126][149][152]}

Historiography and cultural legacy

Primary evidence for Charles's reign is limited, with warfare occupying the prominent place in surviving narratives. Only six original charters and nine contemporary copies survive from his administration, though this exceeds the surviving documentary output of the contemporary Merovingian monarchs.^{[153][154][155]} The Liber Historiae Francorum, completed around 727, provides an early account of his rise, praising him as an uncommonly effective warrior (egregius bellator).^[156][157] The Continuations of the Chronicle of Fredegar, written up to 751 under the patronage of Charles's half-brother Childebrand, functions as an official family history, comparing Charles's campaigns to the biblical conquests of Joshua and likening the storming of Avignon in 737 to the fall of Jericho.^{[158][159][160]} The Royal Frankish Annals (Annales regni Francorum) commence their historical record in 741 with Charles's death, treating his passing as the definitive starting point of Carolingian imperial history.^[161] The Early Annals of Metz (Annales Mettenses priores), compiled in the early ninth century at Chelles or Saint-Denis, similarly present a pro-Carolingian synthesis of his achievements.^[162][163]

In the twelfth and thirteenth centuries, Charles entered vernacular literature and legendary cycles. In the chansons de geste, his figure was occasionally conflated with that of his grandson Charlemagne, as in Girart de Roussillon (c. 1180), or depicted battling alongside vassals against Saracens, as in Hervis de Metz.^{[164][165][166]} In the fifteenth century, Duke Philip the Good of Burgundy commissioned his court chronicler David Aubert to compose the Histoire de Charles Martel et de ses successeurs (1463–1465), which attributed royal status to Charles and reimagined his campaigns against the Saracens to fit the chivalric and political context of the Burgundian court.^[167]

In modern times, the historiographical interpretation of Charles Martel has centered on his defeat of the Umayyad forces in 732. Beginning in the eighteenth century with Edward Gibbon, western writers presented the battle as a world-historical event that preserved Christian civilization in Europe, a view echoed in the nineteenth century by Jacob Burckhardt, Karl Lamprecht, and Engelbert Mühlbacher.^{[69][70][168][169]} In the 1920s, Belgian historian Henri Pirenne formulated the 'Pirenne Thesis', arguing that the Islamic conquest of the Mediterranean disrupted ancient economic unity and that the Carolingian renaissance was made possible because Charles halted further expansion into northern Europe. While earlier historians viewed Charles as the creator of feudalism through church secularization, modern scholarship following Paul Fouracre, Jörg Jarnut, and Andreas Fischer emphasizes administrative continuity, the regional limits of his authority, and the overstated nature of nineteenth-century narratives regarding the battle of 732.^{[12][170][171][172][173]}

In modern public memory, Charles has been commemorated in naval history, such as the French pre-dreadnought battleship Charles Martel launched in 1897.^[174] Since the second half of the twentieth century, Charles has often been used as a figure by the identitarian right and the far right in France.^{[175][176][177]} An anti-Arab terrorist group in France named itself after him, the Groupe Charles-Martel.^[174] His memory has also been appropriated by far-right and white nationalist groups and by the perpetrator of the 2019 Christchurch mosque shootings in New Zealand.^{[174][175][176][177][178][179]}

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