Saxon Wars
Encyclopedia
The Saxon Wars were the campaigns and insurrections of the more than thirty years from 772, when Charlemagne
first entered Saxony
with the intent to conquer, to 804, when the last rebellion of disaffected tribesmen
was crushed. In all, eighteen battles were fought in what is now northwestern Germany
. They resulted in the incorporation of Saxony into the Frankish
realm and their conversion from Germanic paganism
to Germanic Christianity
.
Despite repeated setbacks, the Saxons resisted steadfastly, forever returning to raid Charlemagne's domains as soon as he turned his attention elsewhere. Their main leader, Widukind
, was a resilient and resourceful opponent, and accepted a peace-offering from Charlemagne in a perilous situation not losing his face and preventing Charlemagne
continuing a bothersome war. This agreement saved the Saxons' leaders' exceptional rights in their homeland.
Widukind (ahd "Waldkind", engl: "Child of forest") was baptized in 785 and buried in the only German church without a spire.
The Saxons were divided into four subgroups in four regions. Nearest to the ancient Frankish kingdom of Austrasia
was Westphalia
and farthest away was Eastphalia
. In between these two kingdoms was that of Engria (or Engern) and north of these three, at the base of the Jutland
peninsula, was Nordalbingia
.
near Paderborn
in 772 or 773; at Eresburg. Irminsul may have been a hollow tree trunk, presumably representing the pillar supporting the skies—similar to the Nordic
tree Yggdrasil
. Charlemagne's campaign led all the way to the Weser river and destroyed several major Saxon strongholds. After negotiating with some Saxon nobles and obtaining hostages, Charlemagne turned his attention to his war against the Lombards
in northern Italy
. But Saxon free peasants, led by Widukind
, continued to resist and raided Frankish lands in the Rhine region. Armed confrontations continued unabated for years.
Charlemagne's second campaign came in the year 775. Then he marched through Westphalia, conquering the fort of Sigiburg, and crossed Engria, where he defeated the Saxons again. Finally, in Eastphalia, he defeated them and their leader Hessi converted to Christianity. He returned through Westphalia, leaving encampments at Sigiburg and Eresburg. All Saxony but Nordalbingia was under his control, but the recalcitrant Saxons would not submit for long.
After warring in Italy, he returned very rapidly to Saxony (making to Lippe
before the Saxons knew he left Italy) for the third time in 776, when a rebellion destroyed his fortress at Eresburg. The Saxons were once again brought to heel, though Widukind fled to the Danes. Charlemagne built a new camp at Karlstadt
. In 777, he called a national diet at Paderborn to integrate Saxony fully into the Frankish kingdom. Many Saxons were baptised
.
The chief purpose of the diet was to bring Saxony closer to Christianity. Missionaries, mainly Anglo-Saxons
from England
, were recruited to carry out this task. Charlemagne issued a number of decree
s designed to break Saxon resistance and to inflict capital punishment
on anyone observing heathen practices or disrespecting the king's peace. His severe and uncompromising position, which earned him the title butcher of Saxons, caused his close adviser Alcuin of York, later abbot
of Saint Martin's Abbey at Tours
, to urge leniency, as God
's word should be spread not by the sword but by persuasion. But the wars continued, as the Saxons fought ferociously for their freedom.
In Summer 779, Charlemagne again went into Saxony and conquered Eastphalia, Engria, and Westphalia. At a diet near Lippspringe, he divided the land into missionary districts and Frankish count
ships. He himself assisted in several mass baptisms (780). He then returned to Italy and, surprisingly, there was no Saxon revolt. From 780 to 782, the land had peace.
, a Germanic tribe already converted by Saint Boniface and firmly in Charlemagne's empire. Widukind annihilated a Frankish army at the Süntel
while Charles was campaigning against the Sorbs
. It was in response to this setback that Charlemagne at the Blood court of Verden ordered the beheading of 4,500 Saxons who had been caught practising paganism after converting to Christianity, while Widukind escaped to Denmark
again. Upon this Blutgericht
, some historians have tried to claim the massacre didn't happen, or that it was actually a battle, but none of these claims are credible. The massacre led to two straight years of constant warfare (783-785), with Charlemagne wintering in central Saxony, at Minden
. In 783, battles in Saxony saw Saxon women throw themselves bare breasted into battle. One of them was Fastrada
, daughter of a Saxon count, who, in 784, became Charlemagne's fourth wife. Gradually, the Franks gained the upper hand. The turning point came in 785, when Widukind had himself baptized and swore fealty
to Charlemagne. It was with the conclusion of this war that Charlemagne can have claimed to have conquered Saxony, the land had peace for the next seven years, though revolts continued sporadically until 804.
. The Eastphalians and Nordalbingians joined them in 793, but the insurrection did not catch on as previous ones and was completely put down by 794.
An Engrian rebellion followed closely in 796, but Charlemagne's personal presence and the presence of loyal Christian Saxons and Slav
s immediately crushed it. The last insurrection of the independently-minded people occurred in 804, more than thirty years after Charlemagne's first campaign against them. This time, the most unruly tribe of them all, the Nordalbingians, found themselves effectively disempowered to rebel. Charlemagne deported 10,000 of them to Neustria
and gave their now vacant lands to the loyal king of the Abotrites. It is constructive now to quote Einhard
, Charlemagne's biographer, on the closing of such a grand conflict:
Towards the end of the wars, Charlemagne had begun to place more emhasis on reconciliation. In 797, he eased the special laws that had been so incendiary, and in 802, Saxon common law
was codified as the Lex Saxonum. This was accompanied by the establishment of ecclesiastic structures (including bishopric
s in Paderborn, Münster
, Bremen, Minden
, Verden and Osnabrück
) which secured the initially brutal conversion of the Saxon people. The last Saxon uprising was the Stellinga
, which occurred between 841 and 845.
proclaimed it a war to convert the pagans of Saxony
to Christianity
, reminiscent of the later crusades
. Although it was never formally proclaimed a crusade, it has been suggested that the Saxon wars were the main inspiration for the later proclamation of crusades against Islam, and certainly against pagan states such as Lithuania
. The Saxon Wars also led to a domino effect
of pagan states in Central Europe
, such as Poland
converting to Christianity
Charlemagne
Charlemagne was King of the Franks from 768 and Emperor of the Romans from 800 to his death in 814. He expanded the Frankish kingdom into an empire that incorporated much of Western and Central Europe. During his reign, he conquered Italy and was crowned by Pope Leo III on 25 December 800...
first entered Saxony
Old Saxony
Old Saxony is the original homeland of the Saxons in the northwest corner of modern Germany and roughly corresponds today with the contemporary Lower Saxony, Westphalia and western Saxony-Anhalt....
with the intent to conquer, to 804, when the last rebellion of disaffected tribesmen
Germanic peoples
The Germanic peoples are an Indo-European ethno-linguistic group of Northern European origin, identified by their use of the Indo-European Germanic languages which diversified out of Proto-Germanic during the Pre-Roman Iron Age.Originating about 1800 BCE from the Corded Ware Culture on the North...
was crushed. In all, eighteen battles were fought in what is now northwestern Germany
Germany
Germany , officially the Federal Republic of Germany , is a federal parliamentary republic in Europe. The country consists of 16 states while the capital and largest city is Berlin. Germany covers an area of 357,021 km2 and has a largely temperate seasonal climate...
. They resulted in the incorporation of Saxony into the Frankish
Franks
The Franks were a confederation of Germanic tribes first attested in the third century AD as living north and east of the Lower Rhine River. From the third to fifth centuries some Franks raided Roman territory while other Franks joined the Roman troops in Gaul. Only the Salian Franks formed a...
realm and their conversion from Germanic paganism
Germanic paganism
Germanic paganism refers to the theology and religious practices of the Germanic peoples of north-western Europe from the Iron Age until their Christianization during the Medieval period...
to Germanic Christianity
Germanic Christianity
The Germanic people underwent gradual Christianization in the course of Late Antiquity and the Early Middle Ages. By the 8th century, England and the Frankish Empire were Christian, and by AD 1100 Germanic paganism had also ceased to have political influence in Scandinavia.-History:In the 4th...
.
Despite repeated setbacks, the Saxons resisted steadfastly, forever returning to raid Charlemagne's domains as soon as he turned his attention elsewhere. Their main leader, Widukind
Widukind
Widukind was a pagan Saxon leader and the chief opponent of Charlemagne during the Saxon Wars. Widukind was the leader of the Saxons against the Frankish king Charlemagne...
, was a resilient and resourceful opponent, and accepted a peace-offering from Charlemagne in a perilous situation not losing his face and preventing Charlemagne
continuing a bothersome war. This agreement saved the Saxons' leaders' exceptional rights in their homeland.
Widukind (ahd "Waldkind", engl: "Child of forest") was baptized in 785 and buried in the only German church without a spire.
The Saxons were divided into four subgroups in four regions. Nearest to the ancient Frankish kingdom of Austrasia
Austrasia
Austrasia formed the northeastern portion of the Kingdom of the Merovingian Franks, comprising parts of the territory of present-day eastern France, western Germany, Belgium, Luxembourg and the Netherlands. Metz served as its capital, although some Austrasian kings ruled from Rheims, Trier, and...
was Westphalia
Westphalia
Westphalia is a region in Germany, centred on the cities of Arnsberg, Bielefeld, Dortmund, Minden and Münster.Westphalia is roughly the region between the rivers Rhine and Weser, located north and south of the Ruhr River. No exact definition of borders can be given, because the name "Westphalia"...
and farthest away was Eastphalia
Eastphalia
Eastphalia is a historical region in northern Germany, encompassing the eastern part of the historic Duchy of Saxony, between the Elbe, Leine, Saale and Unstrut rivers. Today, it covers the southeastern part of the state of Lower Saxony and the western part of Saxony-Anhalt.-Etymology:The name...
. In between these two kingdoms was that of Engria (or Engern) and north of these three, at the base of the Jutland
Jutland
Jutland , historically also called Cimbria, is the name of the peninsula that juts out in Northern Europe toward the rest of Scandinavia, forming the mainland part of Denmark. It has the North Sea to its west, Kattegat and Skagerrak to its north, the Baltic Sea to its east, and the Danish–German...
peninsula, was Nordalbingia
Nordalbingia
Nordalbingia was one of the four administrative regions of the medieval Duchy of Saxony, the others being Angria, Eastphalia, and Westphalia....
.
First phase
The wars began with a Frankish invasion of Saxon territory and the subjugation of the Engrians and destruction of their sacred symbol IrminsulIrminsul
An Irminsul was a kind of pillar which is attested as playing an important role in the Germanic paganism of the Saxon people. The oldest chronicle describing an Irminsul refers to it as a tree trunk erected in the open air...
near Paderborn
Paderborn
Paderborn is a city in North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany, capital of the Paderborn district. The name of the city derives from the river Pader, which originates in more than 200 springs near Paderborn Cathedral, where St. Liborius is buried.-History:...
in 772 or 773; at Eresburg. Irminsul may have been a hollow tree trunk, presumably representing the pillar supporting the skies—similar to the Nordic
Nordic countries
The Nordic countries make up a region in Northern Europe and the North Atlantic which consists of Denmark, Finland, Iceland, Norway and Sweden and their associated territories, the Faroe Islands, Greenland and Åland...
tree Yggdrasil
Yggdrasil
In Norse mythology, Yggdrasil is an immense tree that is central in Norse cosmology. It was said to be the world tree around which the nine worlds existed...
. Charlemagne's campaign led all the way to the Weser river and destroyed several major Saxon strongholds. After negotiating with some Saxon nobles and obtaining hostages, Charlemagne turned his attention to his war against the Lombards
Lombards
The Lombards , also referred to as Longobards, were a Germanic tribe of Scandinavian origin, who from 568 to 774 ruled a Kingdom in Italy...
in northern Italy
Italy
Italy , officially the Italian Republic languages]] under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages. In each of these, Italy's official name is as follows:;;;;;;;;), is a unitary parliamentary republic in South-Central Europe. To the north it borders France, Switzerland, Austria and...
. But Saxon free peasants, led by Widukind
Widukind
Widukind was a pagan Saxon leader and the chief opponent of Charlemagne during the Saxon Wars. Widukind was the leader of the Saxons against the Frankish king Charlemagne...
, continued to resist and raided Frankish lands in the Rhine region. Armed confrontations continued unabated for years.
Charlemagne's second campaign came in the year 775. Then he marched through Westphalia, conquering the fort of Sigiburg, and crossed Engria, where he defeated the Saxons again. Finally, in Eastphalia, he defeated them and their leader Hessi converted to Christianity. He returned through Westphalia, leaving encampments at Sigiburg and Eresburg. All Saxony but Nordalbingia was under his control, but the recalcitrant Saxons would not submit for long.
After warring in Italy, he returned very rapidly to Saxony (making to Lippe
Lippe
Lippe is a Kreis in the east of North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany. Neighboring districts are Herford, Minden-Lübbecke, Höxter, Paderborn, Gütersloh, and district-free Bielefeld, which forms the region Ostwestfalen-Lippe....
before the Saxons knew he left Italy) for the third time in 776, when a rebellion destroyed his fortress at Eresburg. The Saxons were once again brought to heel, though Widukind fled to the Danes. Charlemagne built a new camp at Karlstadt
Karlstadt
Karlstadt can refer to places:* Karlstadt am Main, Germany* Karlovac, Croatia * Karlstad, Swedenor to:* Andreas Karlstadt, a contemporary of Martin Luther during the Reformation....
. In 777, he called a national diet at Paderborn to integrate Saxony fully into the Frankish kingdom. Many Saxons were baptised
Baptism
In Christianity, baptism is for the majority the rite of admission , almost invariably with the use of water, into the Christian Church generally and also membership of a particular church tradition...
.
The chief purpose of the diet was to bring Saxony closer to Christianity. Missionaries, mainly Anglo-Saxons
Anglo-Saxons
Anglo-Saxon is a term used by historians to designate the Germanic tribes who invaded and settled the south and east of Great Britain beginning in the early 5th century AD, and the period from their creation of the English nation to the Norman conquest. The Anglo-Saxon Era denotes the period of...
from England
England
England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Scotland to the north and Wales to the west; the Irish Sea is to the north west, the Celtic Sea to the south west, with the North Sea to the east and the English Channel to the south separating it from continental...
, were recruited to carry out this task. Charlemagne issued a number of decree
Decree
A decree is a rule of law issued by a head of state , according to certain procedures . It has the force of law...
s designed to break Saxon resistance and to inflict capital punishment
Capital punishment
Capital punishment, the death penalty, or execution is the sentence of death upon a person by the state as a punishment for an offence. Crimes that can result in a death penalty are known as capital crimes or capital offences. The term capital originates from the Latin capitalis, literally...
on anyone observing heathen practices or disrespecting the king's peace. His severe and uncompromising position, which earned him the title butcher of Saxons, caused his close adviser Alcuin of York, later abbot
Abbot
The word abbot, meaning father, is a title given to the head of a monastery in various traditions, including Christianity. The office may also be given as an honorary title to a clergyman who is not actually the head of a monastery...
of Saint Martin's Abbey at Tours
Tours
Tours is a city in central France, the capital of the Indre-et-Loire department.It is located on the lower reaches of the river Loire, between Orléans and the Atlantic coast. Touraine, the region around Tours, is known for its wines, the alleged perfection of its local spoken French, and for the...
, to urge leniency, as God
God
God is the English name given to a singular being in theistic and deistic religions who is either the sole deity in monotheism, or a single deity in polytheism....
's word should be spread not by the sword but by persuasion. But the wars continued, as the Saxons fought ferociously for their freedom.
In Summer 779, Charlemagne again went into Saxony and conquered Eastphalia, Engria, and Westphalia. At a diet near Lippspringe, he divided the land into missionary districts and Frankish count
Count
A count or countess is an aristocratic nobleman in European countries. The word count came into English from the French comte, itself from Latin comes—in its accusative comitem—meaning "companion", and later "companion of the emperor, delegate of the emperor". The adjective form of the word is...
ships. He himself assisted in several mass baptisms (780). He then returned to Italy and, surprisingly, there was no Saxon revolt. From 780 to 782, the land had peace.
Middle phase
Charlemagne returned in 782 to Saxony and instituted a code of law and appointed counts, both Saxon and Frank. The laws were Draconian on religious issues, and the native paganism was gravely threatened. This stirred a renewal of the old conflict. That year, in Autumn, Widukind returned and lead a revolt which resulted in many assaults on the church. The Saxons invaded the area of the ChattiChatti
The Chatti were an ancient Germanic tribe whose homeland was near the upper Weser. They settled in central and northern Hesse and southern Lower Saxony, along the upper reaches of the Weser River and in the valleys and mountains of the Eder, Fulda and Weser River regions, a district approximately...
, a Germanic tribe already converted by Saint Boniface and firmly in Charlemagne's empire. Widukind annihilated a Frankish army at the Süntel
Süntel
The Süntel is a massif in the German Central Uplands that is up to . It forms part of the Weser Uplands in Lower Saxony southwest of Hanover and north of Hamelin.-Geographical location:...
while Charles was campaigning against the Sorbs
Sorbs
Sorbs are a Western Slavic people of Central Europe living predominantly in Lusatia, a region on the territory of Germany and Poland. In Germany they live in the states of Brandenburg and Saxony. They speak the Sorbian languages - closely related to Polish and Czech - officially recognized and...
. It was in response to this setback that Charlemagne at the Blood court of Verden ordered the beheading of 4,500 Saxons who had been caught practising paganism after converting to Christianity, while Widukind escaped to Denmark
Denmark
Denmark is a Scandinavian country in Northern Europe. The countries of Denmark and Greenland, as well as the Faroe Islands, constitute the Kingdom of Denmark . It is the southernmost of the Nordic countries, southwest of Sweden and south of Norway, and bordered to the south by Germany. Denmark...
again. Upon this Blutgericht
Blutgericht
Blood Court or high justice in the Holy Roman Empire referred to the right of a Vogt to hold a criminal court inflicting bodily punishment, including the death penalty.Not every Vogt held the blood court...
, some historians have tried to claim the massacre didn't happen, or that it was actually a battle, but none of these claims are credible. The massacre led to two straight years of constant warfare (783-785), with Charlemagne wintering in central Saxony, at Minden
Minden
Minden is a town of about 83,000 inhabitants in the north-east of North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany. The town extends along both sides of the river Weser. It is the capital of the Kreis of Minden-Lübbecke, which is part of the region of Detmold. Minden is the historic political centre of the...
. In 783, battles in Saxony saw Saxon women throw themselves bare breasted into battle. One of them was Fastrada
Fastrada
Fastrada was an East Frankish noblewoman.* In 783, Fastrada, along with other Saxon women, entered barebreasted into battle against Charlemagne's forces.She became the third wife of Charlemagne, marrying him in 784. She bore him two children:...
, daughter of a Saxon count, who, in 784, became Charlemagne's fourth wife. Gradually, the Franks gained the upper hand. The turning point came in 785, when Widukind had himself baptized and swore fealty
Fealty
An oath of fealty, from the Latin fidelitas , is a pledge of allegiance of one person to another. Typically the oath is made upon a religious object such as a Bible or saint's relic, often contained within an altar, thus binding the oath-taker before God.In medieval Europe, fealty was sworn between...
to Charlemagne. It was with the conclusion of this war that Charlemagne can have claimed to have conquered Saxony, the land had peace for the next seven years, though revolts continued sporadically until 804.
Final phase
In 792, the Westphalians rose up against their masters in response to forcible recruitment for wars against the AvarsEurasian Avars
The Eurasian Avars or Ancient Avars were a highly organized nomadic confederacy of mixed origins. They were ruled by a khagan, who was surrounded by a tight-knit entourage of nomad warriors, an organization characteristic of Turko-Mongol groups...
. The Eastphalians and Nordalbingians joined them in 793, but the insurrection did not catch on as previous ones and was completely put down by 794.
An Engrian rebellion followed closely in 796, but Charlemagne's personal presence and the presence of loyal Christian Saxons and Slav
Slavic peoples
The Slavic people are an Indo-European panethnicity living in Eastern Europe, Southeast Europe, North Asia and Central Asia. The term Slavic represents a broad ethno-linguistic group of people, who speak languages belonging to the Slavic language family and share, to varying degrees, certain...
s immediately crushed it. The last insurrection of the independently-minded people occurred in 804, more than thirty years after Charlemagne's first campaign against them. This time, the most unruly tribe of them all, the Nordalbingians, found themselves effectively disempowered to rebel. Charlemagne deported 10,000 of them to Neustria
Neustria
The territory of Neustria or Neustrasia, meaning "new [western] land", originated in 511, made up of the regions from Aquitaine to the English Channel, approximating most of the north of present-day France, with Paris and Soissons as its main cities...
and gave their now vacant lands to the loyal king of the Abotrites. It is constructive now to quote Einhard
Einhard
Einhard was a Frankish scholar and courtier. Einhard was a dedicated servant of Charlemagne and his son Louis the Pious; his main work is a biography of Charlemagne, the Vita Karoli Magni, "one of the most precious literary bequests of the early Middle Ages."-Public life:Einhard was from the eastern...
, Charlemagne's biographer, on the closing of such a grand conflict:
The war that had lasted so many years was at length ended by their acceding to the terms offered by the King; which were renunciation of their national religious customs and the worship of devils, acceptance of the sacraments of the Christian faith and religion, and union with the Franks to form one people.
Towards the end of the wars, Charlemagne had begun to place more emhasis on reconciliation. In 797, he eased the special laws that had been so incendiary, and in 802, Saxon common law
Common law
Common law is law developed by judges through decisions of courts and similar tribunals rather than through legislative statutes or executive branch action...
was codified as the Lex Saxonum. This was accompanied by the establishment of ecclesiastic structures (including bishopric
Diocese
A diocese is the district or see under the supervision of a bishop. It is divided into parishes.An archdiocese is more significant than a diocese. An archdiocese is presided over by an archbishop whose see may have or had importance due to size or historical significance...
s in Paderborn, Münster
Münster
Münster is an independent city in North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany. It is located in the northern part of the state and is considered to be the cultural centre of the Westphalia region. It is also capital of the local government region Münsterland...
, Bremen, Minden
Minden
Minden is a town of about 83,000 inhabitants in the north-east of North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany. The town extends along both sides of the river Weser. It is the capital of the Kreis of Minden-Lübbecke, which is part of the region of Detmold. Minden is the historic political centre of the...
, Verden and Osnabrück
Osnabrück
Osnabrück is a city in Lower Saxony, Germany, some 80 km NNE of Dortmund, 45 km NE of Münster, and some 100 km due west of Hanover. It lies in a valley penned between the Wiehen Hills and the northern tip of the Teutoburg Forest...
) which secured the initially brutal conversion of the Saxon people. The last Saxon uprising was the Stellinga
Stellinga
The Stellinga was a movement of frilingi and lazzi, the lower two of the three Saxon non-slave castes, between 841 and 845. As its aim, it desired to recuperate those rights the two castes had had when practising Germanic paganism in the 770s...
, which occurred between 841 and 845.
Religious nature of the war
The Saxon Wars can be considered religious, in that CharlemagneCharlemagne
Charlemagne was King of the Franks from 768 and Emperor of the Romans from 800 to his death in 814. He expanded the Frankish kingdom into an empire that incorporated much of Western and Central Europe. During his reign, he conquered Italy and was crowned by Pope Leo III on 25 December 800...
proclaimed it a war to convert the pagans of Saxony
Saxony
The Free State of Saxony is a landlocked state of Germany, contingent with Brandenburg, Saxony Anhalt, Thuringia, Bavaria, the Czech Republic and Poland. It is the tenth-largest German state in area, with of Germany's sixteen states....
to Christianity
Christianity
Christianity is a monotheistic religion based on the life and teachings of Jesus as presented in canonical gospels and other New Testament writings...
, reminiscent of the later crusades
Crusades
The Crusades were a series of religious wars, blessed by the Pope and the Catholic Church with the main goal of restoring Christian access to the holy places in and near Jerusalem...
. Although it was never formally proclaimed a crusade, it has been suggested that the Saxon wars were the main inspiration for the later proclamation of crusades against Islam, and certainly against pagan states such as Lithuania
Lithuania
Lithuania , officially the Republic of Lithuania is a country in Northern Europe, the biggest of the three Baltic states. It is situated along the southeastern shore of the Baltic Sea, whereby to the west lie Sweden and Denmark...
. The Saxon Wars also led to a domino effect
Domino effect
The domino effect is a chain reaction that occurs when a small change causes a similar change nearby, which then will cause another similar change, and so on in linear sequence. The term is best known as a mechanical effect, and is used as an analogy to a falling row of dominoes...
of pagan states in Central Europe
Central Europe
Central Europe or alternatively Middle Europe is a region of the European continent lying between the variously defined areas of Eastern and Western Europe...
, such as Poland
Poland
Poland , officially the Republic of Poland , is a country in Central Europe bordered by Germany to the west; the Czech Republic and Slovakia to the south; Ukraine, Belarus and Lithuania to the east; and the Baltic Sea and Kaliningrad Oblast, a Russian exclave, to the north...
converting to Christianity
Christianity
Christianity is a monotheistic religion based on the life and teachings of Jesus as presented in canonical gospels and other New Testament writings...
Sources
- Reuter, TimothyTimothy ReuterTimothy Alan Reuter , grandson of the former mayor of Berlin Ernst Reuter, was a German-British historian who specialized in the study of medieval Germany, particularly the social, military and ecclesiastical institutions of the Ottonian and Salian periods .Reuter received his D.phil from Oxford in...
. Germany in the Early Middle Ages 800–1056. New York: Longman, 1991. - Oman, CharlesCharles OmanSir Charles William Chadwick Oman was a British military historian of the early 20th century. His reconstructions of medieval battles from the fragmentary and distorted accounts left by chroniclers were pioneering...
. The Dark Ages 476–918. London, 1914. - EinhardEinhardEinhard was a Frankish scholar and courtier. Einhard was a dedicated servant of Charlemagne and his son Louis the Pious; his main work is a biography of Charlemagne, the Vita Karoli Magni, "one of the most precious literary bequests of the early Middle Ages."-Public life:Einhard was from the eastern...
, translated by Samuel Epes Turner. The Life of Charlemagne. New York, 1880. - McGrath, Freddie. The Longevity of the Saxon Wars. at Leeds University