ABSTRACT
Even before King Charlemagne (768-814) arranged to have his Roman political ally, Pope Leo III (795-816), crown him emperor in Rome on Christmas Day 800,1 the king’s contemporaries might conceive of him as having “imperial” stature. In an oft-quoted letter that Pope Hadrian (772-795) sent to the Frankish court in May 778 the writer compared Charlemagne directly to the first Christian emperor, Constantine:
Et sicut temporibus beati Silvestri Romani pontificis a sanctae recordationis piissimo Contantino, magno imperatore, per eius largitatem sancta Dei catholica et apostolica Romana ecclesia elevata atque exaltata est et potestatem in his Hesperiae partibus largiri dignatus, ita et in his vestris felicissimis temporibus atque nostris sancta Dei ecclesia, id est beati Petri apostoli, germinet atque exultet et amplius quam amplius exaltata permaneat, ut omnes gentes, quae hec audierint, edicere valeant: ‘Domine, salvum fac regem, et exaudi nos in die, in qua invocaverimus te’ [Psalm 19:10]; quia ecce novus christianissimus Dei Constantinus imperator his temporibus surrexit, per quem omnia Deus sanctae suae ecclesiae beati apostolorum principis Petri largiri dignatus est.
