OF THE KOMAN EMPIRE 273 refuge from the storm, shaved their heads after the Roman fashion, declared themselves the servants and subjects of St. Peter, and completed, by this voluntary surrender, the present circle of the ecclesiastical state. That mysterious circle was enlarged to an indefinite extent by the verbal or written dona- tion of Charlemagne,^ who, in the first transports of his victory, despoiled himself and the Greek emperor of the cities and islands which had formerly been annexed to the Exarchate. But, in the cooler moments of absence and reflection, he viewed, with an eye of jealousy and envy, the recent greatness of his ecclesiastical ally. The execution of his own and his father's promises was respectfully eluded ; the king of the Franks and Lombards asserted the inalienable rights of the empire ; and, in his life and death, Ravenna,*^"' as well as Rome, was numbered in the list of his metropolitan cities. The sovereignty of the Exarchate melted away in the hands of the popes ; they found in the archbishops of Ravenna a dangerous and domestic rival ; ^'"^ the nobles and priests disdained the yoke of a priest ; and, in the disorders of the times, they could only retain the memory of an ancient claim, which, in a more prosperous age, they have revived and realised. Fraud is the resource of weakness and cunning; and the Forgery of strong, though ignorant, barbarian was often entangled intheofcon- net of sacerdotal policy. The Vatican and Lateran were an^*°'°' arsenal and manufacture, which, according to the occasion, have produced or concealed a various collection of false or genuine, of corrupt or suspicious acts, as they tended to promote the in- terest of the Roman church. Before the end of the eighth s^ The policy and donations of Charlemagne are carefully examined by St. Marc (Abr6g6, torn. i. p. 390-408), who has well studied the Codex Carolinus. I believe, with him, that they were only verbal. The most ancient act of donation that pretends to be extant is that of the emperor Lewis the Pious (Sigonius, de Regno Italiae, 1. iv., Opera, torn. ii. p. 267-270). Its authenticity, or at least its integrity, are much questioned (Pagi, A.D. 817, No. 7, &c. , Muratori, Annali, torn. vi. p. 432, &c. ; Dissertat. Chorographica, p. 33, 34), but I see no reasonable objec- tion to these princes so freely disposing of what was not their own. [The genuine- ness of the Ludovicianum. a.d. 817, is now generally admitted. The mention of the islands Sardinia and Sicily may be an interpolation.] •^6 Charlemagne solicited and obtained from the proprietor, Hadrian I., the mosaics of the palace of Ravenna, for the decoration of Aix-la-Chapelle (Cod. Carolin. epist. 67, p. 223). [He built his palace on the model of Theodoric's, and his church (included in the present cathedral of Aachen) on the pattern of San Vitale, at Ravenna. His architect's name was Odo.] ti" The popes often complain of the usurpations of Leo of Ravenna (Codex Carolin. epist. 51, 52, 53, p. 200-205). Si corpus St. Andreas fratris germani St. Petri hie humasset, nequaquam nos Romani pontifices sic subjugassent (Agnellus, Liber Pontificalis, in Scriptores Rerum Ital. torn. ii. pars i. p. 107). VOL. V. 18
