Title: Essential Charlemagne
Product review: Rather than a linear narrative, this book is more of a thematic analysis of Charlemagne and his times. Chapters correspond to different subjects, such as military (administration, recruitment, army size...), church (church-state relations, the deep integration between the 2 spheres), economy, and so on. The first few chapters function as a brief narrative history, although within the thematic arrangement, the author skips about considerably. Each topic is intended to buttress Barbero's convincing argument that Charlemagne's rule was fundamental to all of European history that followed. Unlike Ozymandias disappearing into the depths of history, Charlemagne's works endure to this day.The book is well-written and well-researched. Within the second or third chapters, either the translation or the original wording was awkward, but it did not affect the overall conveyance of the subject matter.
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