Charles, who stands out as an administrator…
March 814 CE
Charles, who stands out as an administrator for his many reforms—monetary, governmental, military, cultural, and ecclesiastical—is the main protagonist of the "Carolingian Renaissance."
At the death of Charles on January 814, his son Louis the Pious, hurrying to Aachen, he crowns himself and is proclaimed by the nobles with shouts of Vivat Imperator Ludovicus.
Louis assumes sole control of the entire Frankish empire, now extending from Catalonia in the west to Saxony in the east (with the sole exception of Italy, which remains within Louis's empire, but under the direct rule of Bernard, Pepin's son).
Louis also inherits his father’s troubles with invading Vikings, raiding Muslims, and an avaricious nobility.
The Carolingian empire will last only another generation in its entirety; its division, according to custom, between Louis's own sons after their father's death will lay the foundation for the modern state of Germany.
In his first coinage type, minted from the start of his reign, he imitates his father's portrait coinage, giving an image of imperial power and prestige in an echo of Roman glory.
He quickly enacts a "moral purge", in which he sends all of his unmarried sisters to nunneries, forgoing their diplomatic use as hostage brides in favor of the security of avoiding the entanglements that powerful brothers-in-law might bring.
He spares his illegitimate half-brothers and tonsures his father's cousins, Adalard and Wala, shutting them up in Noirmoutier and Corbie, respectively, despite the latter's initial loyalty.