Codex Epistolaris Carolinus

The Codex epistolarisCarolinus preserves ninety-nine letters, dated between 739  and 791 and sent by the popes to the Frankishking Charlemagne and his predecessors. The compilation was commissioned byCharlemagne in 791, but the sole surviving medieval manuscript of the letterswas made at Cologne in the later ninth century and is now in Vienna(Österreichische Nationalbibliothek Cod. 449). The headings or lemmata provided for each letter by theFrankish compilers in 791 and faithfully preserved in the codex, add adistinctive Frankish commentary on events in Rome and Italy in the second halfof the eighth century. This book not only provides the first full Englishtranslation of the letters and lemmatain the Codex epistolaris Carolinusbut also re-creates the original Carolingian order of presentation of theletters according to the manuscript. A substantial introduction discusses thehistorical significance of the collection, the compilation and contexts of theVienna manuscript, especially the significance of the lemmata, the peculiarities of the Latin of the papal letters andthe biblical citations, and the historical context of the letters themselves.The lemmata and letter translationsare augmented with introductions to each letter and a comprehensive historicalcommentary and glossary.

'This volume will be welcomed equally by established scholars and should ensure that this valuable resource appears even more in future research.'Geoffrey D. Dunn, Journal of the Australian Early Medieval Association, ‘The volume under review presents excellent translations accompanied by helpful notes, a substantial introduction… and an Index that is full enough to be really valuable. Given its core text and all these resources and tools, this book will be immensely useful for years to come.’Thomas F. X. Noble, The Medieval Review

Rosamond McKitterick is Professor Emerita of Medieval History, University of Cambridge. Her most recent book is Rome and the Invention of the Papacy: The Liber Pontificalis (Cambridge 2020). Dorine van Espelo is Policy Advisor, Province of Gelderland, The Netherlands. She is co-editor of Religious Franks. Religion and Power in the Frankish Kingdoms: Studies in Honour of Mayke de Jong (Manchester 2016). Richard Pollard is Professor in the Department of History, Université du Québec à Montréal. He is the editor of Imagining the Medieval Afterlife (Cambridge 2020). Richard Price is Professor Emeritus of the History of Christianity, Heythrop College and Honorary Research Fellow, Royal Holloway, University of London. His many previous publications include The Acts of the Council of Constantinople of 553 (Liverpool 2009), The Acts of the Lateran Synod of 649 (with P. Booth & C. Cubitt, Liverpool 2014), The Acts of the Second Council of Nicaea (Liverpool 2018), The Council of Ephesus of 431 (with T. Graumann, Liverpool 2020) and Canons of the Quinisext Council (691/2) (Liverpool 2020).