30. At the very end of his life, when old age and illness were already weighing heavily upon him, Charlemagne summoned to his presence Lewis, the King of Aquitaine, the only surviving son of Hildegard. A council of the Frankish leaders was duly convened from the whole realm. With the agree­ment of all who attended, Charlemagne gave Lewis a half-share in his kingship and made him heir to the imperial title. He placed the crown on Lewis’ head and ordered that he should be called Emperor and Augustus. This decision of Charlemagne’s was accepted with great enthusiasm by all who were there, for it seemed to have come to him as a divine inspiration for the welfare of the state. It in-creased Charlemagne’s authority at home and at the same time it struck no small terror into the minds of foreign peoples.

Charlemagne then sent his son back to Aquitaine. He him­self, although enfeebled by old age, went off hunting as usual, but without moving far from his palace at Aachen. He passed what remained of the Autumn in this way and then returned to Aachen towards the beginning of November. While he was spending the Winter there, he was attacked by a sharp fever at some time in January and so took to his bed. As he always did when he had a temperature, he immedi­ately cut down his diet, thinking that he could cure his fever by fasting, or at least alleviate it. He then developed a pain in the side called pleurisy the Greeks, in addition don to the temperature. He continued his dieting, taking liquids as his only nourishment, and those at rare intervals. On the seventh day after he had taken to his bed he received Holy Communion, and then he died, at nine o’clock in the morning on 28 January, this being the seventy-second year of his life and the forty-seventh year of his reign.

Back to Charlemagne