Luigi Andrea Berto 
Italian Carolingian Historical Texts 

When Charlemagne conquered the Lombard kingdom in 774, Italy became part of a vast dominion that encompassed most of Western Europe. For the first time since the disintegration of the Roman Empire, this part of the European continent was united again and a renewed sense of unity found expression in various realms of life, from economy to culture. Italy wasno longer the center of political power, as it had been during the Roman Empire. But the fact that the pope, the head of all western Christendom, resided in Rome, and that the Italian peninsula was still one of the richest areas in Europe ensured that Italy was not considered a region of secondary importance in the context of the new empire. The four texts that are brought together in this volume—the only two chronicles written in Carolingian Italy and two short historical works in verse—give us a glimpse of Carolingian rule in Italy. The different contexts and dates in which these works were producedallow us to focus on various aspects of this period and to highlight the various ways Carolingianrule was remembered