The Ottonians as kings and emperors

Abstract

Charles the Fat had been able to reunite the Carolingian kingdoms and, apart from Provence, had exercised direct rule over all of them. Unlike Charles, who had accepted the west Frankish crown offered him in 885, Arnulf of Carinthia rejected a corresponding offer from the west Frankish magnates. Franconia and Lotharingia were former royal provinces, whose political organisation stemmed from the Carolingians; Suabia, Bavaria and Saxony were ethnically defined regions. The phrase Francia et Saxonia, used by Otto I and later by Widukind of Corvey and Adalbert of Magdeburg, corresponds to the actual structure of the Reich. Instead of the device renovatio imperii Romanorum used by Otto III Henry adopted the formula renovatio regni Francorum, which had already been used on the imperial bulls of Louis the Pious, Charles III, Arnulf and Wido of Spoleto. Acomparison of the Rheims electoral dispute of 989-97 with that of 940-48 shows how France and the Ottonian Reich had developed away from each other.

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