LUDOVICO IL PIO, KING OF THE FRANKS, EMPEROR — Genealogical table of the Carolingians who granted privileges to the Abbey of St Gall, appended to the Life of Charlemagne written by Einhard — Vatican Library, cod. Reg. lat. 339 f. 7°.
1643
LUDOVICO IL PIO — LUDOVICO IV OF BAVARIA
Frutaz. VI, nn. 219-90; G. Calmette, *L'effondrement d'un Empire et la naissance d'une Europe*, Paris 1941; L. Halphen, *Charlemagne et l'Empire carolingien*, ibid. 1947 (with bibliography); H. Fichtenau, *Das Karolingische Imperium. Soziale und geistige Problematik des Grossreiches*, Zurich 1949; L. Halphen, *A travers l'histoire du moyen âge*, Paris 1950, pp. 58-74.
Law — Under Charlemagne there had been a blending of civil and religious powers with the civil predominating over the religious. Under L. the situation is reversed: it is the Church that seeks to achieve supremacy and to place the authority of the State at its service. L. cooperated in this endeavour by promoting the religious and moral progress of Christendom through a general reform intended to suppress abuses that had long been festering in the Church. His legislative activity is preserved in capitularies that include both religious and civil matters; some capitularies also remain under the title *Mysterium* and a capitulary for the monastery of Santa Croce del Poetto founded by the Blessed Radegund. Two have been transmitted under the name *Capitula*, since one contains canons drawn from various councils and the other fragments drawn from Roman law. Some of these capitularies also concern Italy. In L.’s legislation the following principal reforms are proposed: the administration of ecclesiastical goods is henceforth to belong exclusively to the Church; bishops are to be freely elected; monasteries are authorised to choose their own regular abbots, thereby ceasing—at least provisionally—from the regime of commendation; abbots are bound only to those military services that are sanctioned by law. In the moral sphere, various reforms are also promoted, especially regarding the chastity of bishops and the dowries of virgins (cf. Cap. I, pp. 275-85). The same spirit, which is sometimes expressed in the very same words, is evident in the *Admonitio ad omnes regni ordines* (ibid., pp. 303-307).