Meerssen Treaty
The Treaty of Meerssen was signed on August 8, 870 in Meerssen near Maastricht (in what is now the province of Limburg , Netherlands ) between the West Franconian King Charles the Bald and the East Franconian King Ludwig the German . He regulated the division of Lotharingiens ("that which belongs to Lothar"), the empire of King Lothar II , who died in 869 without a legitimate heir , under his two uncles Karl the Bald and Ludwig the German.
The politically and economically important cities and areas of Aachen , Holland and Alsace came to Eastern France. The newly acquired eastern part of Lothar's empire became the part of Ludwig III. , a son of Ludwig the German and nephew of Charles the Bald. The dividing line of Lotharingia ran roughly along the rivers Maas , Ourthe , Moselle , Marne , Saône and then through the Jura Mountains .
Charles the Bald acquired Northern Italy including Burgundy in 875 and was crowned Roman Emperor .
Ten years later, the division of the empire was revised again in the Treaty of Ribemont in 880.
Web links
- Latin treaty text in the Monumenta Germaniae Historica , Capit. II, pp. 193-195.
literature
- Rudolf Schieffer : The Carolingians. 5th updated edition. Kohlhammer, Stuttgart 2014, ISBN 978-3-17-023383-6 .
- Rudolf Schieffer: The time of the Carolingian empire 714-887 (Gebhardt - Handbook of German history, 10th completely revised edition). Klett-Cotta, Stuttgart 2005, ISBN 3-608-60002-7 .
- Julian Schulz: Reflections on the Treaty of Meerssen (870). In: Francia . Volume 43, 2016, pp. 333-351.