A major new biography of one of the most extraordinary of all European rulers.
Janet L. Nelson DBE is Professor Emeritus of Medieval History at King's College London, where she taught for many years. She has written and translated widely on early medieval Europe, her books including- Charles the Bald (1992), The Frankish World (1996) and Courts, Elites, and Gendered Power in the Early Middle Ages (2007). She lives in London.
Nelson assembles an astonishingly rich picture from the most
unrewarding of texts. The way she puzzles out probable facts and
motivations is a joy to witness ... The narrative voice emerges as
that of a patient, inquisitive, incisive and helpful master
detective, with funny asides, a beautiful style and sensible
politics.
*Times Literary Supplement*
This is a terrific book ... It is lovely to read, in part because
it is so lightly written ... One leaves Jinty Nelson's book with
the sense that one does, yes, get from it a sense of what
Charlemagne was actually like. Which is what biographies are for,
and why this is one to read.
*History Today*
An immense achievement - brilliantly learned and profoundly wise,
it is as revelatory about the practise of history as it is about
the great man himself.
*BBC History Magazine*
An imaginative, deeply thoughtful, often provocative, always
important book.
*Geoffrey Koziol, Professor of History at UC Berkeley*
This is a remarkable book: at once the dramatic story of a truly
extraordinary man, and a masterclass in the practice of history
from a superlative historian. Janet Nelson's brilliant insight
illuminates a world that is both familiar and strange, and full of
resonances between past and present. Here - seen through
challenging sources, sifted and weighed with wisdom and wit - is
everything we can know, twelve centuries on, about the king and
emperor called Charlemagne.
*Helen Castor, author of SHE-WOLVES and JOAN OF ARC*
Christianity entered a new era in 800 when Charles, King of the
Franks, became the first Holy Roman Emperor, and entrenched the
faith in European civilisation. His story is told in Janet L
Nelson's outstanding King and Emperor.
*The Telegraph*
[The author is] a giant in the field, who knows that myths
concerning Charlemagne, which began before his corpse grew cold,
are difficult to lay to rest.
*H-France Review*
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