In so doing, the pope effectively nullified the legitimacy of Empress Irene of Constantinople. At Mass, on Christmas Day (December 25), when Charlemagne knelt at the altar to pray, the pope crowned him Imperator Romanorum (“Emperor of the Romans”) in Saint Peter’s Basilica. On December 23, Leo swore an oath of innocence. Charlemagne, advised by scholar Alcuin of York, travelled to Rome in November 800 and held a council on December 1. In 799, after Pope Leo III was abused by Romans who tried to put out his eyes and tear out his tongue, he escaped and fled to Charlemagne at Paderborn. Holy Roman Empire: A multi-ethnic complex of territories in central Europe that developed during the Early Middle Ages and continued until its dissolution in 1806 founded by the coronation of Charlemagne by Pope Leo III.Byzantine Empire: Sometimes referred to as the Eastern Roman Empire, was the continuation of the Roman Empire in the East during Late Antiquity and the Middle Ages, when its capital city was Constantinople.
Empress Irene: A Byzantine empress who ruled from 797–802, during the time of Charlemagne’s coronation.The Pope’s motivation for crowning Charlemagne was to give the papacy and the church implicit authority over the empire, since with this act Leo set a precedent for crowning emperors, which subsequent popes would do throughout the reign of the Holy Roman Empire.Although one of the aims was ostensibly to reunite the entire Roman Empire, given that many at the time (including the pope) did not recognize Empress Irene of the Byzantine Empire as a legitimate ruler, the two empires remained independent and continued to fight for sovereignty throughout the Middle Ages.Nonetheless, Charlemagne used these circumstances to claim that he was the renewer of the Roman Empire, which would remain in continuous existence for nearly a millennium, as the Holy Roman Empire.Some historians believe that Charlemagne was surprised by the coronation and would not have gone into the church that day had he known the pope’s plan.In 800, Pope Leo III crowned Charlemagne the Emperor of the Romans, thereby extending Charlemagne’s power and authority.
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