Codex Carolinus: Päpstliche Epistolographie im 8. Jahrhundert (review)

The detailed examination in two volumes of the ninety-nine papal letters addressed to the Carolingian rulers between the years 739 and 791 and collected by royal command in the Codex Carolinus is primarily designed by the author as a study of the elements of early-medieval epistolography. Formulary elements are the focus here: those that may or may not differentiate letters from other types of texts such as general documents, privileges, and historical narratives—a science that has been much neglected. The direct discussion of the Codex Carolinus itself (used in the MGH edition of W. Grundlach with occasional references to its facsimile edition by F. Unterkircher and its possible continuation in MS HAB Helmstadensis 254 at Wolfenbüttel with ten letters of Pope Leo III addressed to Charlemagne [p.133]) seems to make up a relatively minor part of the book (pp. 59–96; 869–928). But this impression is deceptive, for these letters form a constant background to Achim Thomas Hack’s vast investigation of the history of the letter and its role in the network of communication stretching from antiquity to the end of the ninth century. Communication is understood in the widest imaginable sense, encompassing classical diplomatics, rhetoric and literature, history, philology, liturgy, anthropology, sociology, diplomacy with rituals and its agents, and economics. It is expressed in a most spectacular manner through the exchanges of gifts as reflected in the papal correspondence with the Carolingian rulers, including a letter to Queen Bertrada on behalf of her son. The author considers it desirable to compare the letters of the Codex Carolinus—compiled, as its preface indicates, at the request of Charlemagne—to all extant parallel sources for the eighth century (pp. 56–57), but restricts himself for exclusively pragmatic reasons to the analysis of the Codex in comparison to the register of Pope Gregory the Great and the collected correspondence of St. Boniface (then bishop of Mainz) and his eventual successor, St. Lul. Another important primary source is the Liber Pontificalis. The results are fascinating. As Hack eventually explains—specifically with regard to gifts—early-medieval and late-antique traditions have usually left only thin traces and can be understood and evaluated only through a comparative approach (p. 822).

It is a difficult task to convey the rich contents of the volumes with an extensive historiography for each topic in a short review. An impression of their wealth can be conveyed by a list of appendices (pp. 930–1058): protocol and eschatocol of papal letters from the time of Gregory the Great to Leo III; letters by Carolingians from Charles Martell to Louis the Pious; summaries (Regesten) of lost papal, royal, or third-party letters that can be deduced from the text of letters that survived; summaries of the letters of Charles the Great in the Wolfenbüttel manuscript; prosopography of the Frankish and papal emissaries; and gifts mentioned in the register of Gregory the Great, the letter collection of Boniface and Lul, and the Codex Carolinus. Three valuable tables follow the appendices: a concordance of the manuscript with all its editions, a discussion of the date of the letters of the Codex, and a list of the references to its letters in the Jahrbücher des Fränkischen Reiches (pp. 1059–89). This is followed by a list of abbreviations and the bibliography organized by primary sources (pp. 1095–1107); secondary sources (pp. 1108–1235); and subdivided registers, including a list of all letters cited.

This impressive work is a significant addition to the scholarship of the Carolingian age and provides new insights regarding perennially debated issues such as the relationship between the papacy and the Frankish empire. The volumes are not entirely free from spelling errors, but this does not affect the general care and attention to detail that make them essential...