A Fragment of the Lorsch Annals

A Fragment of the Lorsch Annals

Despite their brevity, the Lorsch Annals (or Annales Laureshamenses) are a significant testament to historiography during the Carolingian period and an important primary source for the period between 703 and 803. The text, preserved in only a few manuscripts, comprises annual reports on key events of each of the 100 years—initially recorded in a rather note-like manner, later reported in greater detail. It contains political news from the Frankish Empire, reports on the deaths of important clergymen, but also, time and again, brief mentions of particularly bountiful or meager harvests.

Charlemagne Becomes Roman Emperor

The great significance of the Lorsch Annals can be attributed above all to one event described therein that was to have a lasting impact on the course of history: the coronation of Charlemagne as emperor in Rome on Christmas Day 800. The Annals are the only contemporary source that states that Charlemagne did not initially refuse the coronation by Pope Leo III, as his biographer and confidant Einhard describes in the Vita Einhardi, but rather acknowledged its “necessity”, for which the entry in the Lorsch Annals also argues, humbly but willingly.

A Manuscript on the Move

The history of the origins of the Lorsch Annals is a topic that continues to keep researchers busy to this day. It was once assumed that the extant fragment, Cod. Vindob. 515, from the Austrian National Library, was the autograph. This theory has since been refuted. The autograph, which was produced in several stages, has not survived. It was likely begun in northern France, in the Cambrai area, continued until 777 at the Gorze monastery in the Diocese of Metz, and finally completed at Lorsch Abbey in southern Hesse by Abbot Richbod.

Rare Writings from the Early Middle Ages

The fact that Cod. Vindob. 515 is not the autograph does not make the fragment any less valuable. It was once part of an early medieval compilation manuscript from Swabia, of which only the eight leaves from the Austrian National Library remain, which alone were written by four different scribes. In addition to the annals of the years 794–803, they also include a poem based on the Gospel story of Christ and the Samaritan woman, written in Old Alemannic, an Old High German dialect, making it an extremely rare source of early German-language literature. The final pages also contain a fragment of the Instructio ad competentes by Nicetas of Remesiana, a contemporary of the Church Father Ambrose, whose works are nearly completely lost. The fragment is thus not only an early copy of the Lorsch Annals, but also, overall, an extremely rare textual witness from the 9th century.