Charlemagne is crowned Emperor and later divided by the Treaty of Verdun
A reunited Western empire splinters into France, Germany, and the middle kingdom
Quick facts
- Location
- Rome (coronation); Verdun (843 treaty)
- Key people
- Charlemagne, Louis the Pious, Charles the Bald
- Successor kingdom
- West Francia (later France)
What happened
Pope Leo III crowned Charlemagne, king of the Franks and Lombards, as emperor in Rome on Christmas Day 800, reviving an imperial title in the West that had lapsed for over 300 years. Charlemagne's empire stretched across most of Western Europe, but after his death in 814 his son Louis the Pious struggled to hold it together, and Louis's own three surviving sons fought each other for supremacy. Their war ended with the Treaty of Verdun in 843, which split the empire three ways: Charles the Bald received West Francia, Louis the German received East Francia, and Lothair kept a central strip along with the imperial title.
Why it matters
West Francia, the portion Charles the Bald received at Verdun, is the direct territorial ancestor of the kingdom of France, while East Francia became the germ of Germany. The three-way split also created the contested middle strip between them, a source of French-German conflict for the next thousand years, right through to the world wars.
How we know
Nithard, Charlemagne's own grandson, wrote a firsthand chronicle of the succession war and the negotiations that led to Verdun, making him a direct participant-observer of the events he describes.
Sources
- World History Encyclopedia. Charlemagne · Reputable sourceworldhistory.org · The domain "worldhistory.org" is on our Reputable source registry. · Link is live and its text matches the event's key terms (Jul 2026)
- World History Encyclopedia. Division of the Carolingian Empire in 843 & 870 CE · Reputable sourceworldhistory.org · The domain "worldhistory.org" is on our Reputable source registry.
See something wrong? . Corrections with a source get fixed fastest.
Related timelines
- The Middle Ages → · See the Carolingian Empire's full rise and fall on the Middle Ages timeline