Founding of the Frankish state. Frankish Empire (Frankish State)

Chapter 7. State of the Franks

§ 1. The emergence of the state of the Franks

Gaul in the 5th century profound socio-economic transformations took place. In this richest province of Rome (a territory almost coinciding with present-day France), a deep crisis manifested itself that engulfed the empire. The performances of slaves, colonies, peasants, and the urban poor became more frequent. Rome could no longer protect the borders from invasions of foreign tribes and, above all, the Germans - the eastern neighbors of Gaul. As a result, most of the country was captured by the Visigoths, Burgundians, Franks (Salic and Ripuarian) and some other tribes. Of these Germanic tribes, the Salic Franks eventually proved to be the most powerful. It took them a little over 20 years to at the end of the 5th - beginning of the 6th centuries. take over most of the country.

The emergence of a class society among the Franks, which had been outlined by them even before their resettlement in Gaul, accelerated sharply in the process of its conquest. Each new campaign increased the wealth of the Frankish military-tribal nobility. When dividing the booty, she got the best lands, a significant number of columns, cattle. The nobility rose above the ordinary Franks, although the latter were still personally free and at first did not experience increased economic oppression. They settled in their new homeland in rural communities (marks). Mark was considered the owner of all the land of the community, which included forests, wastelands, meadows, arable land. The latter were divided into allotments, which quickly passed into the hereditary use of individual families.

The Gallo-Romans, outnumbering the Franks by several times, found themselves in the position of a dependent population. At the same time, the Gallo-Roman aristocracy partially retained their wealth. The unity of class interests marked the beginning of a gradual rapprochement between the Frankish and Gallo-Roman nobility, with the former becoming dominant. This manifested itself in the formation of a new government, which was supposed to save the occupied country, keep the colonies and slaves in obedience. The former tribal organization did not have the necessary forces and means for this. The institutions of the tribal system begin to give way to a new organization headed by a military leader - the king and a squad personally devoted to him. The king and his associates actually decided all the most important issues in the life of the country, although people's assemblies and other institutions of the former system of the Franks were still preserved. A new public authority was being formed, which no longer coincided directly with the population. It consisted not only of armed people who did not depend on ordinary freemen, but also of compulsory institutions, which did not exist under the tribal system. The establishment of a new public authority is connected with the division of the population. The lands inhabited by the Franks began to be divided into pagi (districts), which consisted of smaller units - hundreds. The management of the population, which lived in pagas and hundreds, was entrusted to special confidants of the king. In the southern regions of Gaul, where the Gallo-Romans repeatedly prevailed in numbers, at first the Roman administrative-territorial division was preserved. But here, too, the appointment of officials depended on the king.

The emergence of the state among the Franks is associated with the name of one of their military leaders - Clovis (486-511) from the Merovingian clan. Under his leadership, the main part of Gaul was conquered. The far-sighted political step of Clovis was the adoption by him and his squad of Christianity according to the Catholic model. By this he secured the support of the Gallo-Roman nobility and the Catholic Church that dominated Gaul.

The formation of the state of the Franks took place relatively quickly - within the life of one generation. In many ways, this process was facilitated by wars of conquest and, as a result, the rapid class differentiation of Frankish society.

§ 2. State of the Franks in the VI-IX centuries.

The main features of development. The main feature of the development of Frankish society was the emergence and development of feudalism in its depths. New relationships arose in both socio-ethnic groups - Frankish and Gallo-Roman. Each of them had its own main area of ​​​​settlement (the Frankish North and the Gallo-Roman South; the conditional boundary between the North and the South was the Loire River). But the formation of feudal relations among the Franks and the Gallo-Romans was far from the same, primarily because it began from different starting points: the Franks entered the era of feudalism in the process of the primitive communal system, the Gallo-Roman did not - in the course of the collapse of the slaveholding society.

In this regard, an important feature should be noted: the two main ways of the emergence of feudalism mutually influenced each other, objectively accelerating the formation of a new socio-economic formation. Here, two main stages can be traced in the development of feudalism: the first - the 6th-7th centuries, known in historiography as the time of the Merovingian monarchy; second - VIII - first half of the IX century. - Carolingian monarchy.

Merovingian monarchy. After the death of Clovis, his sons entered into a long bloody struggle for supreme power. Feudal strife continued with short breaks for more than 100 years. The kingdom broke up more than once into separate essentially independent states. Only at the beginning of the 7th century. there was some calm. But the events of the previous century had a significant impact on the socio-economic and state development of the country. The nobility was generously endowed with land. For the kings, this was the only way to win her over to their side.

The donated land became hereditary freely alienable property, the so-called allod. The result of such donations was a sharp increase in the objectively natural process of "settling the squad to the ground." The granting of estates to combatants, their transformation into feudal landowners took place in almost all countries of feudal Europe. A feature of the Merovingian monarchy was that here this process acquired an exceptionally large scale.

The church was rapidly enriched, the land holdings of which were constantly increasing.

Strengthening feudal dependence. Important socio-economic shifts were outlined among the Frankish peasantry. Private ownership of the land (allod) is approved - first on household plots, and then on arable plots. Since that time, the class division of the community has accelerated significantly. The number of landless peasants increased rapidly. The loss by the peasant of his land was accompanied by an attack on his personal freedom. Most often, the landless were enslaved through precaria agreements(from lat. - “request”). The earliest version of this deal involved the transfer to the peasant of a plot of the master's land for use on the terms of performing certain duties: working in the fields of the master, paying him part of the harvest, etc. A little later, another type of precarium became widespread - the so-called "provided precarium". The impoverished peasant gave his small plot (it was believed that he "gave" it) to the master, who returned it back, sometimes with an additional allotment, but already as a holding with the obligation to perform the agreed duties in his favor. Formally, the precarious contract did not establish personal dependence, but it created favorable conditions for this.

During this period there was patronage system("patronage"). In the conditions of growing oppression and abuses, the peasants were forced to resort to the protection of strong and influential persons. Often, the nobility itself imposed "patronage" on the peasants, as it was interested in this. Giving oneself under "protection" (commandation) has become a widespread phenomenon. Not only the weak and the landless were commanded, but sometimes the strong and the landless became even stronger under the arm. The commendation provided for: 1) the transfer to the master of the right of ownership of the land with its subsequent return in the form of a holding; 2) establishing the personal dependence of the “weak” on his patron; 3) performance in favor of the patron of a number of duties.

All this led to the gradual enslavement of the Frankish peasantry. After several generations, many peasants were already serfs (serfs). Moreover, much earlier, the vast majority of the columns and slaves of the South were among the serfs.

State system under the Merovingians. The intensification of the exploitation of the peasants and the inevitable intensification of the class struggle as a result of this determined the interest of the ruling class in strengthening the state mechanism of government.

The strengthening of feudal statehood was not accompanied, however, by an increase in the power of kings. Bloody strife of the VI century. proved fatal to the Merovingian dynasty. They were forced to give away almost all the land they owned. As the land fund of kings (the basis of military and political power in feudal society) decreased, the power of noble families grew. The entire 7th century, with a few exceptions, passed under the sign of the weakening of the power of kings. And at the end of the 7th century. they were completely out of business. The time has come, as they said then, "lazy" kings.

State power was concentrated in the hands of the nobility, who seized all the main posts and, above all, the post of mayor. Initially mayor(head of the house) headed the administration of the royal palace. However, gradually his powers are expanding so much that he actually becomes the head of state. At the turn of the 7th-8th centuries. this position became the hereditary property of a noble and wealthy family, which marked the beginning of the Carolingian dynasty.

Monarchy of the Carolingians. Reform of Charles Martel. The name of one of the representatives of this family, Charles Martel (first half of the 8th century), is associated with a very important transformation in the socio-political structure of Frankish society, known as the reform of Charles Martel. Mayordom sought to strengthen the central government. This goal was primarily to be served by the creation of a well-armed cavalry army, which was dependent on the head of state. The need for such an army was also dictated by foreign policy reasons - the threat of the invasion of the Arabs, whose main branch of the army was the cavalry.

The essence of the reform was as follows. The previous procedure for donating land to full ownership was cancelled. Instead, the lands that Charles Martell confiscated from the recalcitrant magnates and monasteries, together with the peasants who lived on them, were transferred to a conditional life holding - benefice(from lat. - "good deed"). The holder of the beneficiary was obliged to perform service, mainly military, in favor of the person who handed over the land. The volume of service was determined by the size of the beneficiation. But under all circumstances, the beneficiary, until reaching a certain age, had to participate as a heavily armed warrior (knight), equipped at his own expense. Refusal to serve deprived the right to beneficiaries.

The significance of the reform was not limited, however, to the purely military sphere. It entailed very important changes in the field of socio-political relations. The reform not only spurred the growth of feudal landownership and the resulting enslavement of the peasants, it gave impetus to the formation of a special system of subordination of feudal lords. Between the beneficiary and the person who handed over the land (they began to be called, respectively, the vassal and the seigneur), a contractual relationship was established, the main element of which was the obligation of military service. In addition to the head of state, the largest feudal lords began to distribute benefices, thus acquiring their own vassals.

Thus, relations of vassalage gradually began to take shape, embracing the entire class of feudal lords. The growth of feudal landownership was accompanied by the strengthening of the military and financial power of individual lords over the peasants who lived on their lands. This led to an increase in the so-called immunity rights seniors, which were established by the Merovingians and consisted in the fact that the activities of state officials did not extend to the possessions of the feudal lord who received the immunity letter of the king, and all state powers were transferred to the owner of the estate. Thus, the power of the feudal lord over the population living in his possessions, to an even greater extent, acquired a political, state character.

The reform of Charles Martel contributed to the temporary strengthening of the central government. With the help of the reorganized troops, the attacks of external enemies were repelled, and the resistance of the recalcitrant nobility was broken for a while. The main groups of feudal lords supported this policy. At that time they were interested in a relatively centralized state, with the help of which they took root in Gaul and enslaved the free Frankish peasants, as well as the population of neighboring countries.

Government under the Carolingians. In 751 a new dynasty was established on the throne. At a meeting of the secular and spiritual nobility, Pepin, the son of Charles Martel, who had real power as a major, was proclaimed king.

The monarchy reaches its highest peak under his son Charles, nicknamed the Great (second half of the 8th - beginning of the 9th century). As a result of large campaigns of conquest, the territory of the Frankish state included the territories that now make up West Germany, Northern Spain, and many other lands.

An indicator of the increased power of the state was the proclamation of Charles as emperor, significant power was concentrated in his hands. However, this did not mean the transformation of the emperor into an absolute monarch. The head of state actually had to share his power with the nobility, without the consent of which not a single important decision was made. The largest secular and spiritual feudal lords were part of the permanent council under the emperor. Almost every year a congress of all the nobility (the so-called Great Field) was convened.

At the same time, the relative strengthening of the central government led to the formation of state administration bodies. The features of these bodies were the following: 1) the officials who headed the economic management of the feudal lords' estates simultaneously exercised administrative and judicial power over the population living there. The non-separation of economic and state management functions reflected the most important principle of the feudal statehood of the era under consideration - political power was "an attribute of landed property"; 2) remuneration for service was land grants, as well as the right to withhold in their favor part of the dues from the population; 3) there was no consistent demarcation between the individual areas of public administration. Officials, as a rule, combined the functions of military, financial, judicial, etc. Only in the system of central administration there was some demarcation of competence. But even there there was no special apparatus.

Central government bodies. Since the retinue nobility turned into large landowners and did not permanently reside at the royal court, the importance of senior officials increased - ministerials. Initially, they were the chief administrators of the royal household. At that time, no distinction was made between state and personal royal property, national issues were considered as personal matters of the royal house. Because of this, ministerials actually headed the state administration and the court. Over time, they became the owners of large latifundia.

The most important ministerials included the following: mayor(the hereditary holders of this office abolished it after they themselves took the royal throne); count palatine- initially supervised the royal servants, and then headed the palace court; thesaurary- "keeper of treasures", who led the accounting of material values ​​that came at the disposal of the king. In fact, it was the state treasurer, since the state treasury was identified with the personal property of the monarch; marshal- once "senior of the royal stable", now the head of the cavalry, often military operations were conducted under his command; archica-pellan- confessor of the king, senior among the palace clergy, an indispensable member of the royal council.

Local government bodies. The traditional self-government of the free Franks, where they lived, was gradually replaced by a system of officials appointed initially from the center - authorized by the king.

The territory of the country was divided into districts - pagi (in the south, their borders basically coincided with the former administrative-territorial division of the times of Rome). The administration of the district was transferred graph, who had a military detachment at his disposal and commanded the Pagi militia.

Districts were divided into hundreds. They were initially led by elected officials. However, the Merovingians already managed to replace them with appointed persons - centenarians in the North and vicars on South. They obeyed the count and almost duplicated his power within a hundred.

The communities (brands) of the Franks, which were part of the hundreds, retained self-government.

On the border of the country, larger territorial associations were created - the duchies, which consisted of several districts. dukes, who headed their administration were primarily commanders of the local militia. They were tasked with defending the frontiers. Otherwise, they had the same powers as the counts. In the original German lands (eastern regions of the Frankish state), the ducal power was somewhat different. It has its roots in the past, in the days of the tribal leaders, whose descendants became the dukes of the Frankish kings.

At the beginning of the 7th century Another important trend emerged: the king's delegates, primarily dukes and counts, gradually turned into the largest local landowners (their holdings increased due to grants from the kings, as well as the appropriation of peasant lands by commandment, etc.). The edict of King Chlothar II (614) was an important legal basis that favored the development of this process. Even then, the order was established, according to which only the landowner of the corresponding pagi could become a count. Increasingly, positions were inherited, turning into the privilege of individual families. The title of office (Duke, Count) came to be regarded as a hereditary title of honor.

At the same time, the immunity rights of individual seniors were strengthened. A bizarre mosaic of the possessions of individual feudal lords, interconnected by relations of vassalage, gradually replaced the former administrative-territorial division.

Court. The supreme judicial power belonged to the monarch. He carried it out together with representatives of the nobility. The most serious offenses were under the jurisdiction of the royal council.

The main judicial institutions of the country, where the vast majority of cases were considered, were "hundred courts". Their form has not undergone major changes for several centuries. And this is no coincidence. More often in contact with the people, constantly and directly intervening in their lives, the courts had to have not only coercive power, but also proper authority. At first, the state power could not fully provide both of these. By retaining the old form of the court, the lords strove to take advantage of the respect that the court had among the people. Even then, apparently, they understood the power of tradition - the population got used to a certain form of dispute resolution.

Nevertheless, gradually, but steadily, judicial power was concentrated in the hands of the feudal lords. Initially, the count, centenary or vicar only convened malberg- a meeting of hundreds of free people who chose judges from their midst - rahinburgs. The trial was chaired by an elected chairman - tungi-on. As a rule, wealthy, respected people were chosen as members of the court. But hundreds of free and full-fledged residents (adult men) should have been present at the court session. Representatives of the king only monitored the correctness of legal proceedings.

Gradually, the people of the king (his representatives) become chairmen of the courts instead of the Tungins. The Carolingians completed this process. Their messengers missions- received the right to appoint members of the court, the so-called scabins, instead of the Rahinburgs. The duty of free men to attend court was abolished.

The subsequent development of feudalism led to a radical change in the entire judicial structure. The immunist seigneurs expanded their judicial rights in relation to the peasants living in their possessions. They acquired the features of immunity and judicial powers of officials, as well as the highest hierarchs of the church.

Army. The structure of the army slowly but steadily evolved from a squad organization, combined with the people's militia of free peasants-Franks, to a feudal knight's militia. The military reform of Charles Martel gave the Carolingians a relatively larger, well-armed cavalry knightly army, consisting of benefice holders. The need for the people's militia disappeared. The monarchy was able to wage successful wars of conquest. The reliability of the knightly troops in the fight against popular uprisings was also of great importance.

At the beginning of the ninth century The Frankish state was at the zenith of its power. Covering the territory of almost all of Western Europe, it seemed indestructible and unshakable; there was no enemy equal to him in strength. However, even then it carried elements of an approaching decline. Created by conquest, it was a conglomerate of nationalities, not connected by anything other than military force. Having broken for a while the mass resistance of the enslaved peasantry, the Frankish feudal lords lost their former interest in a single state. During this period, the economy of Frankish society was natural. Accordingly, there were no strong, stable economic ties between individual regions. There were no other factors that could contain the fragmentation of the country. The Frankish state was completing its path of development from the early feudal monarchy to the statehood of the period of feudal fragmentation.

In 843, the split of the state was legally fixed in an agreement in Verdun by the grandchildren of Charlemagne. Three kingdoms became the successors of the empire: West Frankish, East Frankish and Median (future France, Germany and partly Italy).

1. Central government bodies Since in the state of the Franks the distinction between national issues and the affairs of the royal palace had not yet been made, the chief administrators of the royal economy - the ministerials - began to acquire the importance of the highest officials of the state and actually headed the state administration and the court. The most important ministerials were the following:

· The ward mayor, or mayor, is the chief administrator of the royal palace, and then the head of the royal administration. The holders of this office abolished it after they themselves took the royal throne;

The palace count, or palatine count, - first observed the royal servants, later began to perform judicial functions (led judicial fights, execution of sentences), then headed the palace court;

· thesaurary - the state treasurer, who supervised the accounting of material values ​​that came at the disposal of the king;

marshal - head of the cavalry;

Archcapellan - spiritual mentor of the king, senior among the palace clergy, member of the royal council.

2. Local government system free francs was gradually replaced by a system of appointed officials - authorized by the king.

The main territorial unit of the country was the rural district (pagi), which included several hundred. The hundred included communities (brands), originally an association of free courts.

peasants on a neighborly basis and retained self-government: people's meetings of hundreds, chaired by an elected centurion, resolved military, administrative and other issues. The administration of the district was headed by the count, who had at his disposal a military detachment and commanded the pagi militia. Under the rule of the Merovingians, elected officials are replaced by appointed persons - centenaries in the North and vicars in the South. They obeyed the count and exercised his power within a hundred.

On the borders of the country, duchies were created, consisting of several districts. Their management was entrusted to the dukes, who were commanders of the local militia. They were tasked with defending the frontiers.

3. Supreme Judiciary carried out by the monarch together with representatives of the nobility. The most dangerous offenses were within the competence of the royal council.

The main judicial institutions of the country were local courts - "hundred courts". They considered the vast majority of cases, since at first the members of the hundred participated in administration and legal proceedings. The people's assembly of hundreds - malberg - chose from among its judges - rahinburgs, as a rule, wealthy, respected people. The court was held under the leadership of an elected chairman - tungin. All the free and full-fledged residents of the hundreds were present at the court session.

Under the Carolingians, general judicial assemblies were replaced by juries appointed from above: the envoys of the king - missions - received the right to appoint members of the court - skabins instead of rachinburgs. The duty of free men to attend court was abolished. Over time, judicial power was concentrated in the hands of the feudal lords. At first, the count, centenaries or vicar only convened the malberg and monitored the correctness of legal proceedings. Gradually, the king's delegates become chairmen of the courts instead of the Tungins. From subordination to the counts and margraves, only the possessions of the lords who enjoyed immunity were withdrawn. The votchinniki-immunists (seniors, as well as the highest hierarchs of the church) had full power in the area of ​​​​judging the peasants who lived on their lands.

4. Army In the course of feudalization, the structure of the army changed. The all-Frankish military gatherings of the people's militia of the free peasants-Franks were finally replaced by annual reviews of the feudal knightly militia. Participation in the militia of ordinary free people was also limited.

The reform of Charles Martell led to the formation of a large, well-armed cavalry knightly army, consisting of beneficiary holders, who also helped in the fight against popular uprisings.

V 843 d. the split of the state was legally fixed in treaty at Verdun grandchildren of Charlemagne. Three kingdoms became the successors of the empire: West Frankish, East Frankish and Middle (future France, Germany and partly Italy).

22. Salic truth as a monument of early feudal law.

General provisions In parallel with the formation of statehood among the Frankish tribes, the creation of law was going on. For this purpose, written fixation of ancient Germanic customs was carried out - a record of the customary law of the Germanic tribes. In this way, "barbarian truths" were recorded: Salic, Ripuarian, Burgundian, Allemann, etc.

Salic truth (Salic law) was created at the beginning of the 6th century, in the last years of the life and reign of King Clovis, and is one of the oldest collections of records of German customary law. It is divided into titles (chapters).

Salic truth is characterized by a casuistic character and the absence of general, abstract concepts; the legal actions and acts described in it are distinguished by their formalism. It reproduces the various stages of the archaic judicial procedure.

2. Commitment in the Salic truth they are poorly covered, which is explained by the underdevelopment of commodity-money relations, private property.

Such types of transactions are mentioned: purchase and sale, loan, loan, hire, exchange, donation.

The transfer of ownership in transactions was carried out publicly by simply transferring things.

Failure to fulfill obligations or delay in their fulfillment entailed. constitutes property liability. The collection of debt took place in a strictly prescribed form.

3. Marriage and family relations Salic truth describes in general terms.

Marriage was in the form of buying a bride by the groom. The kidnapping of a girl for the purpose of marriage was punishable by a fine. The following circumstances served as obstacles to marriage:

the existence of a legal marriage;

Declaring a person outside the law;

The presence of a close consanguinity;

The unfree state of a person.

The Salic truth does not mention the dissolution of the marriage.

The position of a woman in the family was determined by the remnants of the matriarchal system.

4. Salic truth provides for inheritance by law and by will.

Inheritance by law was carried out differently in relation to movable and immovable property. When inheriting movable property, children were the first priority, then mother, brothers and sisters, mother's sisters, father's sisters, next of kin. Women were excluded from the number of heirs of real estate, land was transferred only through the male line.

Inheritance by will was carried out by way of donation (affatomia), which was made publicly in the people's assembly in a strictly prescribed form: property was transferred to a third party, who was obliged to transfer this property to the specified person no later than a year after the death of the donor.

5. Crime definitions Salic truth does not. From the meaning of the articles devoted to crimes, it follows that this concept included infliction of harm to a person or property and violation of the royal peace.

Types of crime according to the Salic truth can be divided into four groups:

• crimes against a person - murder, self-mutilation, slander, insult, rape;

Crimes against property - theft, arson, robbery;

• crimes against the administration of justice - failure to appear in court, perjury;

violation of the orders of the king.

Salic truth knows the concept of aggravating circumstances, which are considered a group murder, murder on a campaign, an attempt to hide the traces of a crime, as well as the concept of incitement - to theft or murder.

The subjects of the crime could be free Franks, Litas and slaves. The purpose of punishment is to compensate the victim and pay a fine to the king for violating the royal peace.

6. Litigation Salic truth endowed with a competitive character. The process was oral, public, distinguished by strict formalism. The case was initiated only at the initiative of the plaintiff. The parties had equal rights.

Criminal and civil proceedings were carried out in the same forms.

Salicheskaya Pravda admits the following as evidence at the trial:

• joint juries - the accused were his relatives, friends or neighbors as "witnesses of the good reputation" of the accused;

· testimonies of eyewitnesses;

· ordeals.

23. Senior monarchy in France. Reforms of Saint Louis IX.

The seigneurial monarchy in France usually dates from the 9th-13th centuries.

During this period, in conditions of political decentralization, which led to deep territorial fragmentation, royal power lost its former significance. The king was considered by the feudal lords as “first among equals” (rp "ggshz t (er pares). In fact, his power extended only to the royal domain. In 987, with the election of Hugo Capet (Count of Paris) as king, the Carolingian dynasty ceases. Under the first Capetians the election of the king is preserved, but the future successor was elected during the lifetime of the reigning king, in the XII century, the procedure for the transfer of the royal throne by inheritance is approved.

The royal court, which exercised the rule, consisted of noble feudal lords and palace servants (ministerials), the main role in the royal administration until the end of the 12th century. the sene-chal played, the constable (head of the royal cavalry), the royal treasurer, and the royal chancellor were also influential courtiers. The development of feudal relations was reflected in the assembly of royal vassals - the curia of the king (sipa Ked15). Bodies of local royal government (prevost - performed administrative functions, balls - judicial) were created only in the royal domain, in large seignories, their own system of local government operated, closed to the corresponding feudal lord (duke, count, baron).

The reforms of King Louis IX Capet (1226-1270) significantly increased the efficiency of royal power:

1. Military reform - the feudal militia was largely replaced by detachments of mercenaries and city militia.

2. A significant restriction (actually a ban) on private wars between the king's vassals.

3. Specialized central departments are separated from the royal curia (for example, the Accounts Chamber, which was in charge of royal finances). In 1260, on the basis of the royal curia, the highest judicial body was created - the Parlement of Paris.

4. The introduction of a single money throughout France (before that, every major feudal lord minted his own coin).

The transformation of a seigneurial monarchy into a representative one in France is usually dated to 1302, when King Philip IV convened the Estates General (although the name of this supreme French estate-representative body appeared later).

24. Early feudal and seigneurial monarchy in England.

The first early feudal states in England began to form as a result of the decomposition of tribal relations among the Anglo-Saxon tribes. During the IX-XI centuries. in England, feudal relations finally win: the entire free population bears various burdens in favor of the state, dependent and serfs in favor of the feudal lords, who have judicial and personal power over them.

All power in the state is concentrated in the hands of the king and the nobility, which forms the royal council - uantagemot ("meeting of the wise"). It is uantagemot that becomes the highest organ of state power. Without his consent, the king had no right to legislate or carry out any other important state activities.

A new stage in the history of English feudal statehood is associated with the conquest of the country in 1066 by the Norman Duke William the Conqueror, who became King William I of England.

After the Norman conquest in England, a centralized state with strong royal power was formed.

The king owned the supreme rights to all the lands of the country, which provided him with power over the feudal lords. Legislative, judicial and military power was concentrated in the hands of the king.

Under the king, the so-called Royal Curia operated - an advisory body from the nobility and close associates of the king. The highest officials were: marshal, commander of the army; the camerlein, who manages the lands and property of the king; chancellor, head of the royal chancellery; jurist, first assistant to the king, replacing him during his absence.

At the beginning of the XII century. a special body was allocated from the Royal Curia, which was in charge exclusively of financial matters - the Chamber of the Chessboard.

1. Milestones of development the English feudal state are:

The period of the Anglo-Saxon early feudal monarchy (IX - XI centuries);

· period of centralized seigneurial monarchy (XI - XII centuries);

· the period of estate-representative monarchy (the second half of the XIII century - XV century);

The period of absolute monarchy (the end of the 15th century - the middle of the 17th century).

2. The main features of the social order In the 1st century n. e. Britain was one of the outlying provinces of the Roman Empire.

At the beginning of the 5th century n. e. Roman rule ended here. The conquest of Britain by the Anglo-Saxons began - the North Germanic tribes of the Angles, Saxons and Jutes, who pushed the Celtic population (Britons) to the outskirts of the island.

By the end of the VI century. on the territory of Britain, seven early feudal kingdoms were formed (Wessex, Sussex, Kent, Mercia, etc.), which in the 9th century. under the leadership of Wessex united in the Anglo-Saxon state - England.

The main feature of the formation of feudalism among the Anglo-Saxons is the preservation of a free rural community for a long time.

In the first century after the conquest, the society was based on free communal peasants (kerls) and noble people (erls). The clan nobility at first occupied a special position, but was gradually pushed aside by the warriors, on whom the king relied, asserting his power, and to whom he distributed land grants - communal lands along with the peasants who lived on them. The peasants bore duties in favor of the landowners and became personally dependent on their masters. Those peasants who remained free performed duties in favor of the state.

With the growth of social inequality and the decomposition of the community, the earls turned into large landowners.

By the 11th century thanks to the support of both the royal authorities and the church, which encouraged the development of feudal ownership of land and justified the enslavement of peasants, communal relations were replaced by feudal ones.

3. Characteristics of the political system In the Anglo-Saxon era, the need for defense in the fight against the raids of the Normans and the need to rally all the forces of the ruling class in order to overcome the resistance of the peasants to enslavement created the prerequisites for the rise and strengthening of royal power. Despite the fact that the attitude towards the king as a military leader and the principle of elections when replacing the throne were still preserved, the monarch gradually approved:

· their right of supreme ownership of the land;

· monopoly right to mint coins, duties;

· the right to receive in-kind supplies from the entire free population;

The right to military service on the part of the free.

The royal court became the center of government of the country, and the royal confidants became officials of the state. The highest state body was the witanagemot - the council of the witans, which included the king, the highest clergy, and the secular nobility. The main functions of the Witani council were the election of kings and the highest court. Local government in England retained the principles of territorial self-government.

The main territorial units of the country in the X century. 32 districts became counties, the centers of which were fortified cities. The most important local matters were discussed twice a year at a county meeting. All the free people of the district were to participate in it. Cities and ports had their own collections, which eventually turned into city and merchant courts. There were also assemblies of villages.

The county was headed by an ealdorman, appointed by the king with the consent of the vita-nagemot from among the representatives of the local nobility, and who led the county assembly, as well as its armed forces.

By the X century. the personal representative of the king - geref (appointed by the king from the middle layer of the service nobility), who oversees the timely receipt of taxes and court fines to the treasury, acquires police and judicial powers.

Period of centralized senior monarchy During the period of centralized seigneurial monarchy (XI - XII centuries) in England, the formation of the feudal system was completed. After the Norman Conquest (1066), a characteristic feature of English feudalism was consolidated - the political unification of the country and the centralization of state power.

The kings of the Norman dynasty found strong support in the layer of medium and small feudal lords; the support of large feudal lords was of a relative and temporary nature, since they themselves strove for independence. Nevertheless, during the formation of the feudal-hierarchical ladder, a direct vassal dependence of all feudal lords on the king was established, which distinguishes England from other European countries. In 1086, a general land census ("The Book of the Last Judgment") was carried out, which fixed for each feudal lord his land holdings and his place in the feudal hierarchy.

Free peasants for the most part were recorded in it as serfs - villans; the rest - as freeholders.

English villans are characterized by duties "at the will of the lord", heavy corvée, strict restriction of the right to leave the allotment, jurisdiction only to the court of their lord (seigneurial justice);

Freeholding assumed free holding, opposed to Villanian holding, on the terms of payment of rent (comparatively low). Freeholder peasants were characterized by personal freedom, fixed rent, the right to a free will, division and alienation of holdings, as well as the right to defend themselves in royal courts. As a result of the reforms of Henry (ruled in 1154 - 1189), the judicial, military and financial powers of the royal power were strengthened.

The main directions of these reforms are the creation of a system of central financial and judicial institutions, as well as the reorganization of the army. The emergence (since the 10th century) and the growth of cities as centers of crafts and trade also contributed to the strengthening of the monarchy. Cities usually received the right to self-government and annually paid the king (for the most part they were located on royal land) a certain sum of money.

Citizens and freeholders needed protection from the royal power and supported it, which also strengthened the monarchy. In view of the development of commodity-money relations and the growth of market relations, taxes and duties increasingly acquired a monetary character:

Knights, obliged to the overlord for military service, already in the XII century. often replaced it with a cash contribution - the so-called "shield money";

Peasants also often made cash payments in return for the performance of their duties.

25. The Magna Carta of 1215 and the formation of a class-representative monarchy in England.

In the XIII century. An acute political struggle unfolded in England, which determined its subsequent political development. Strong royal power was opposed by the established estates. It was the heyday of the feudal system. The centralization of feudal relations in England reached a level unknown to Western European feudalism at that time. The royal power exercised political dominance over a large majority of the population. Opponents of strong royal power were the feudal magnates, who, although they did not have such power in England as in continental countries, nevertheless could successfully resist royal power. Under John the Landless (1199-1216), the struggle of the barons acquired a national character and received the support of other active political forces in the country - the nobility and the urban elite. A common anti-royal front was formed in the country, headed by the barons and the higher clergy.

The situation escalated due to unsuccessful domestic and foreign policy. John waged a hopeless war in France and came into conflict with the powerful pope, which ended in the victory of the latter. Dissatisfaction was also caused by numerous requisitions levied contrary to feudal customs. In such conditions, the barons, together with the knights and the London elite, forced John the Landless on July 15, 1215 to sign the Magna Carta. The Magna Carta of Henry I served as a model for it, however, in its content, the Charter of 1215 is richer and wider. The central place in the Charter is occupied by articles expressing the interests of the barons who led the movement. Baronial fiefs were declared freely inheritable possessions. The king did not have the right to demand from the young baron who entered into the inheritance more than the payment - relief established from the old days in the feudal contract - and promised not to abuse the right of guardianship over minor vassals. The charter restored some of the seigneurial rights of the barons, infringed as a result of the expansion of royal jurisdiction. Thus, it was forbidden to transfer, by royal order, claims for property from the baron's curia to the royal curia. The king promised to eliminate all arbitrariness in the imposition of monetary duties on the barons. Only in three cases were the barons obliged to give the king moderate monetary assistance: when the king was redeemed from captivity, when his eldest son was knighted, and at the wedding of his eldest daughter from his first marriage. At the same time, some provisions of the Charter protected the interests of other participants in the movement. Thus, the previously existing privileges and freedoms of the church and clergy, in particular the freedom of church elections, were confirmed. With regard to the knights, the Charter provided for the promise of the barons not to take any fees from their vassals without their consent, except for the usual feudal benefits, and also not to force them to perform duties in a larger amount than that which follows according to custom. The charter confirmed the ancient liberties of London and other cities, as well as the right of merchants, including foreign ones, to freely leave and enter England, to trade without any restrictions. The Charter established the unity of weights and measures necessary for trade. Free peasants were promised not to be burdened with unbearable requisitions, not to ruin with fines. Certain provisions of the Charter have played a significant role in the political evolution of England. First of all, we are talking about articles 12 and 14. Article 12 states: "Neither shield money, nor (any other) allowance should be collected in our kingdom except by the general advice of our kingdom." Article 14 determines the composition of this council: "And in order to have a general council of the kingdom in the taxation of benefits in other cases than the above, or for the taxation of "shield money", we will order to call archbishops, bishops, abbots, earls and senior barons by our letters each separately and, in addition, we will order to call indiscriminately, through our sheriffs and bailiffs, all those who keep from us directly.

Thus, the council of the realm is the assembly of all the royal vassals, which can be seen as the prototype of the House of Lords. If to this assembly of royal vassals we add representatives from the counties and cities, then we have an English medieval parliament. Thus Magna Carta was a prologue in the history of the English Parliament. Articles 39 and 40 of the Charter deserve great attention. The first of these reads: "No free man shall be detained, or imprisoned, or dispossessed, or outlawed, or exiled, or in any other otherwise than by the lawful verdict of his equals (his peers) and by the law of the land. At that time, the concept of "free man" denoted the feudal lord. However, in the future, under the "free man" formally began to understand any free inhabitant of England. The content of Article 39 of the Charter was subsequently developed in the Petition of Right of 1628. and in the Habeas Corpus Act of 1679. Article 40 of the Charter, which states: "Let us sell justice and justice to no one, deny it to no one, or drag it out," is closely related in essence to article 39.

John the Landless, yielding to the armed force of his subjects, subsequently abandoned the Charter. Armed struggle began again, but the death of John (1216) prevented it from being brought to any definite result.

At the beginning of the XIII century. the royal power failed in foreign policy (in particular, in the crusades), so it really needed the money that it tried to get from its subjects. But royal arbitrariness ran into resistance from the barons, who were supported by knights and freeholders (free holders of land plots). King John Landless in 1215 was forced under their pressure to accept the Magna Carta, which is considered the first English constitutional act.

Most of the articles of the Charter deal with the vassal-fief relations of the king and the barons and seek to limit the king's arbitrariness in the use of his seigneurial rights related to land holdings. These articles regulate the procedure for guardianship, obtaining relief (payment for entering into an inheritance), debt collection, etc. (Art. 2-11, etc.).

At the same time, among the purely "baronial" articles of the Charter, those that had a general political character stand out. The barony's most openly political claims are expressed in Art. 61 of the Charter. It traces the desire to create a baronial oligarchy by establishing a committee of 25 barons with control functions in relation to the king. Art. 12, 14 provided for the creation of a council of the kingdom, limiting the power of the king on one of the important financial issues - the collection of "shield money". Articles 21, 34 were. aimed at weakening the judicial prerogatives of the king (also in favor of the barons).

A much more modest place in the Charter is occupied by articles reflecting the interests of other participants in the conflict (knights, townspeople, merchants). So, for example, Art. 41 of the Charter allows all merchants free and safe movement and trade within the country without imposing illegal duties on them.

Of great importance was the numerous group of articles of the Charter, aimed at streamlining the activities of the royal, judicial and administrative apparatus. Yes, Art. 40 prohibited the collection of arbitrary and disproportionate court fees, and Art. 39 prohibited the arrest, imprisonment, dispossession, outlawing, expulsion, or "deprivation in any way" of free people except by the lawful judgment of equals and by the law of the land.

The Magna Carta reflected the balance of socio-political forces in England at the beginning of the 13th century, and above all the temporary compromise between the king and the barons. The political articles of the Charter testify that the barons sought to preserve some of their immunities and privileges by placing the exercise of certain prerogatives of the central government under their control or by limiting their use in relation to the feudal elite.

The fate of the Charter clearly demonstrated the futility of baronial claims and the irreversibility of the processes of state centralization in England. A few months after the end of the conflict with the barons, King John Landless, relying on the support of the Pope, refused to comply with the Charter. Subsequently, the kings repeatedly confirmed the Charter (1216, 1217, 1225, 1297), but more than 20 articles were withdrawn from it.

Of the political institutions provided for by the "baronial" articles of the Charter, the Grand Council of the kingdom, which had advisory functions and consisted of large feudal magnates, more or less established itself. In the middle of the XIII century. it was often referred to as "parliament". However, such a "parliament" was neither an estate nor a representative institution. A real parliament appeared in England a little later.

Initially, there was no electoral qualification for parliamentary elections. The statute of 1430 established that freeholders who received at least 40 shillings of annual income could participate in county assemblies that elected representatives to parliament.

Transition to a new form of state - to a class-representative monarchy (second half of the 13th century - 15th century) - realized as a result of the civil war of 1263 - 1267.

From the end of the XII century. royal power began to damage the interests of a significant part of the population: confiscations of land were carried out, large landowners were oppressed, new monetary requisitions and duties were introduced. The country responded to this with a number of opposition speeches, and at the beginning of the 13th century, after the uprising of the barons, supported by knights and townspeople, King John Landless signed the Magna Carta (1215), which is considered the first constitutional act of England. The main content of the Charter is a compromise between the king and the barons; requirements of knights, townspeople, merchants paid much less attention.

After a new political conflict in 1258, King Henry III approved the Provisions of Oxford, which established the regime of the baronial oligarchy. In response, dissatisfied knights, with the support of the townspeople and some barons, demanded that the king sign the Provisions of Westminster, which protected chivalry and free peasants from the arbitrariness of large feudal lords and the royal administration. In 1263 a civil war began, which lasted until 1267. Its result was the creation of the first English parliament, which was finally established under Edward I. In the XIV century. Parliament became bicameral:

the upper house - the House of Lords, where the barons and the higher clergy sat;

· the lower chamber - the House of Commons, where the knights and the city elite sat together with the lower clergy.

Their strong union provided the House of Commons with greater political influence than estate-representative assemblies in other countries.

Initially, Parliament only determined the amount of property taxes and filed collective petitions in the name of the king, but gradually consolidated its competence in the following matters:

the right to participate in the making of laws;

· the right to resolve issues of extortion from the population in favor of the state treasury;

the right to control senior officials;

The right to act as the highest judicial authority.

Local administration was carried out by a sheriff with an assistant - bailiff, as well as coroners and constables elected in local assemblies.

Justices of the peace appointed by the king were vested with police and judicial powers.

The highest courts during this period were the Court of King's Bench, the Court of Common Pleas and the Court of the Treasury.

The first real English estate-representative parliament was convened in 1265 as a result of the struggle of three groups: supporters of the king, barons and chivalry. In 1295 a "model" parliament was convened, the composition of which served as a model for subsequent English parliaments. In addition to the large secular and spiritual feudal lords personally invited by the king, it included two representatives from 37 counties (knights) and two representatives from the most important cities.

The creation of parliament led to a change in the form of the feudal state, the emergence of a monarchy with estate representation. Until the middle of the XIV century. the English estates sat together, and then divided into two chambers. At the same time, the knights from the counties began to sit together with representatives of the cities in one chamber (the House of Commons) and separated from the largest secular and spiritual magnates, who formed the upper house (the House of Lords).

Initially, there was no electoral qualification for parliamentary elections. The statute of 1430 established that freeholders who received at least 40 shillings of annual income could participate in county assemblies that elected representatives to parliament.

Political system. The state of the Franks cannot be called united. After a short unity during the reign of Clovis, Neustria (New Western Kingdom), Burgundy and Austrasia (Eastern Kingdom) and Aquitaine (southern part) stand apart on the territory of the state. The period of Merovingian rule is characterized, firstly, by the gradual degeneration of the organs of the tribal organization into the organs of the state, secondly, the decline in the role of local government bodies, and, thirdly, the formation of the state in the form of an early feudal monarchy.

Immunity letters, which the king issued to his vassals, provided the latter with a number of powers in the territory under his control.

The formulas were samples of documents that were kept in the offices of secular and spiritual institutions and served as a kind of standard for making various kinds of transactions: purchase and sale, loans, etc.

Among the written sources, the Salic truth is of the greatest interest for research, since it revealed the features of the social and state system, transitional from a tribal community to a state.

Salic truth. The original text of the Salic truth, the formation of which took place during the reign of Clovis, has not reached us. The most ancient manuscripts date back to the times of Pepin the Short and Charlemagne. Salic truth played the role of a judge, that is, it served as a source that guided state officials, in particular judges, in the administration of justice. It was an unsystematic record of disparate legal customs that reflected the remnants of the tribal system, such as expulsion from the community for committing a crime, etc.

The norms of the legal monument are characterized by formalism and casuistry. Formalism can be traced in the establishment of a strict order of legal actions associated with symbols and rituals. Violation of these actions, non-observance of the rituals established by the norms of law led to the nullity (invalidity) of this or that action. So, the law demanded in one case to pronounce strictly defined words, in the other - to break the branches "by the measure of a cubit". The casuistry of the norms of criminal law, fixed by the Salic truth, is beyond doubt, because they dealt not with general concepts, but with specific incidents (cases).

Although the Salic truth includes the norms of all legal institutions, it is characterized by incompleteness and fragmentation. At the same time, the Salic truth reflects the significant role that religious institutions played in society, adjacent to legal norms (the use of oaths, ordeals in legal proceedings to remove charges from a person), shows the process of decomposition of tribal relations, which is associated with the property stratification of society, gives an idea of the social system of the Franks at the beginning of the 6th century.

Property relations. The norms of the Salic truth fixed two types of land ownership: communal (collective) and family-wide. Pasture lands and lands occupied by forest lands were collectively owned by the community, household plots and arable lands were in the common family property. The existence of communal property among the Franks is evidenced by the title "On Settlers". The stranger could stay in the village only with the consent of every single villager. The execution of the decision of the community court on the eviction of a stranger was carried out by the count. However, if a newcomer managed to live without protest from members of the community for one year and one day, he acquired the right to settle by prescription. The existence of family property is evidenced by the strict liability of the perpetrators for arson or destruction of the fence of the land allotted to the family. The land plot was not subject to sale and purchase. The law allowed only its inheritance by children through the male line. At the end of the VI century. it became possible to transfer land to other relatives, including the daughters and sisters of the deceased. This was enshrined in the edict of King Chilperic. At the beginning of the 7th century the Franks already, no doubt, received the right to dispose of both household and arable land.

Movable property was in personal ownership. It was freely alienated and passed on by inheritance.

Commitment relationship. The institution of contract law was in its infancy due to the underdevelopment of commodity-money relations. The Code of Law did not contain general conditions for the validity of contracts, but only fixed the need to reach an agreement between the parties when concluding certain types of contracts. In case of non-performance of the contract, the property liability of the debtor occurred. If the debtor refused to repay the debt (return the thing), the court obligated him not only to fulfill the contract, but also to pay a fine. The law also provided for the personal liability of the debtor in the form of debt slavery.

Sudebnik fixed such types of contracts as purchase and sale, loan, loan, exchange and donation. The conclusion of the contract, as a rule, took place publicly.

Salic truth contains norms concerning the emergence of obligations as a result of causing harm as a result of a crime.

Inheritance. The Franks had two types of inheritance: by law and by will.

Land property, when inherited by law, first passed to males. In the VI century. the law allowed daughters to inherit in the absence of sons; in their absence, the father, mother, brother, sister and other relatives on the paternal side became heirs.

The Salic truth secured inheritance by will in the form of the so-called affatomy (donation). It consisted in the fact that the testator transferred the property belonging to him to a trustee (intermediary) and obligated him to transfer the property to the heir (heirs) no later than a year later. The procedure of affatomy was carried out publicly in the people's assembly with the observance of formalities and a special procedure.

Marriage and family law. The norms of marriage and family law, reflected in the Salic Truth, revealed issues related to the conclusion and dissolution of marriage, as well as family relations.

The form of marriage was the purchase of a bride by the groom. This was preceded by the consent of the parents of the bride and groom. Bride kidnapping was punishable by a fine. Marriages between relatives and marriages between freemen and slaves were forbidden. The marriage of a slave and a free man entailed the loss of freedom for the latter.

The man in the family occupied a dominant place. The husband exercised custody of his wife and children: boys - up to 12 years of age, girls - before marriage. After the death of her husband, the widow fell under the guardianship of adult sons or other heirs of the deceased. Although the wife had her own property (dowry), she could not dispose of it without the permission of her husband.

Divorce was originally allowed only at the initiative of the husband. A husband could divorce only if his wife was unfaithful or committed certain crimes. A wife who left her husband was subject to the death penalty. In the 8th century Charlemagne established the indissolubility of marriage.

Criminal law. This legal institution was not developed, bore the imprints of the tribal system. This is evidenced by the casuistic nature of legal norms, the high amounts of fines, the consolidation of objective imputation (responsibility without fault), and the persistence of the remnants of blood feud. So, the judge gave the victim the opportunity to deal with the guilty, if the latter was caught at the scene of the crime.

In addition, the Salic truth reinforces the prevailing social inequality and, when determining sanctions for a crime, proceeds from the class position of the victim, and sometimes from the class position of the offender.

The Franks understood the crime as the infliction of harm to the person and property and the violation of the royal "peace". All the crimes described in the Salic truth can be grouped into five groups: 1) violation of the king's instructions; 2) crimes against a person (murder, bodily harm, etc.); crimes against property (theft, breaking someone else's fence, etc.); 4) crimes against morality (violence against a free girl); 5) crimes against justice (perjury, failure to appear in court).

The norms of the Salic truth contain provisions regarding aggravating circumstances, such as complicity, murder in a campaign, an attempt to hide the traces of a crime. There is the concept of incitement to theft and murder.

The Franks understood punishment as compensation for harm to the victim or members of his family and the payment of a fine to the king for violating the royal “peace”. Instead of blood feud, the Salic truth begins to provide for the payment of a fine. For the murder, a fine was imposed in favor of the relatives of the murdered, the so-called wergeld (the price of a person). The size of the wergeld was determined by the social position of the slain. Different punishments were applied to freemen and slaves. The free were sentenced to pay a fine and be expelled from the community (outlawing). When committing property crimes, the perpetrator, in addition, recovered losses, and when causing harm to health - funds for the treatment of the victim. When expelled from the community, the guilty, as a rule, had their property confiscated. Slaves were subjected to the death penalty, mutilation and corporal punishment.

The trial on the Salic truth was of an accusatory nature. The evidence of the fact of the commission of a crime was the detention of the perpetrator at the scene of the crime, the confession of the accused himself, and testimonies.

To remove the accusation, such evidence as swearing, oaths, ordeals were used; Judicial fights In case of concurrency, several persons (as a rule, 12 relatives, acquaintances of the accused) could confirm his good reputation and thereby certify that he could not commit a crime. Ordeals ("God's judgment") were used among the Franks most often in the form of a "pot test", that is, with the help of boiling water. Ordeals could be paid off by paying a fine in favor of the victim and the treasury. Judicial fights were held in the presence of judges. The feudal lords fought on horseback and in full armor, ordinary people used sticks as weapons. The one who won the duel was considered to have won the case. Torture was used against slaves to confess their guilt.

The trial proceeded as follows. At the hearing, the victim brought charges against the guilty party. The accused either admitted the charge brought against him or denied it. If found guilty, the court ruled on the merits. Otherwise, the judge proceeded to examine the evidence.

If the court recognized the guilt of the accused, the latter had to comply with the decision of the court. In case of non-execution of the court decision, the victim applied to the Rakhinburg court, which, in order to ensure the execution of the court decision, confiscated the property of the guilty person in the amount of the debt. If the convict did not agree with the decision of the Rakhinburg court, he was summoned to the court of a hundred after 40 days. In case of refusal this time to comply with the decision of the court, the victim summoned the condemned king to the court. Refusal to appear in the royal court or to comply with its decisions entailed the declaration of the guilty person. In this case, both the perpetrator and his property became the property of the victim.

Introduction.. 2

The emergence of the state among the Franks .. 2

Formation of a feudal society and the state of the Franks. 4

State structure of the Franks. 10

Frankish Empire in the VIII-IX centuries. 14

Conclusion.. 16

Many barbarian tribes were scattered over the vast territory of the Roman Empire: Goths, Franks, Burgundians, Alamanni, Anglo-Saxons, etc.

The Romans increasingly used the Germans as mercenary soldiers and settled them on their frontiers. In the 5th century the highest ranks of the Roman magistrates began to be worn by the leaders of the barbarian tribes, who led the allied armies of Rome, which concluded an agreement on the transition under the rule of Rome.

The decline of imperial power, the ever-increasing unpopularity of Roman rule created favorable conditions for the allied kings of Rome to expand their powers, to satisfy their political claims. They often, with reference to the imperial order, appropriated full power, levied taxes from the local population, etc.

The Visigoths, for example, settled by Rome as their federates in 412 in Aquitaine (Southern France), subsequently expanded the territory of their kingdom of Toulouse through territorial conquests recognized in 475 by the Roman emperor. In 507, this kingdom was conquered by the Franks. In 476, power in the Western Roman Empire was seized by one of the barbarian commanders Odoacer. He was killed in 493 by Theodoric I, the founder of the Ostrogothic kingdom, who established his sole rule over all of Italy. This kingdom fell in 555. Other "tribal states" of the barbarians arose and were absorbed as a result of bloody wars, internecine strife.

But a special role in Western Europe was destined to be played by the Salic (coastal) Franks, who were part of the union of Germanic tribes that took shape in the 3rd century. on the northeastern border of Gaul, a province of the Roman Empire.

The Salic Franks, led by their leader Clovis (481-511), as a result of victorious wars in Gaul, sometimes in confrontation, sometimes in alliance with Rome, create a vast kingdom that stretched by 510 from the middle reaches of the Rhine to the Pyrenees. Clovis, having established himself as a representative of the Roman emperor, becomes the ruler of the lands, the ruler of a single, no longer tribal, but territorial kingdom. He acquires the right to dictate his own laws, collect taxes from the local population, etc.

Gaul, however, remained under the shadow of the Eastern Roman Empire (Byzantium) for a long time. Only in the 8th century the title of Roman emperor was given to the Frankish king Charlemagne. Thanks to the influence of Rome and the Roman Christian Church, Gaul, in spite of geographical fragmentation, maintained a kind of unity over the centuries, turning in the course of a long evolutionary process into that Franconia, which became the progenitor of the future France and Germany, as well as the territorial foundation of the development of Western Christian civilization.

For Gaul, the fifth century was a time of profound socio-economic transformation. In this richest province of Rome (a territory almost coinciding with present-day France), a deep crisis that engulfed the empire found its manifestation. The performances of slaves, columns, peasants, and the urban poor became more frequent. Rome could no longer protect the borders from invasions of foreign tribes and, above all, the Germans - the eastern neighbors of Gaul. As a result, most of the country was captured by the Visigoths, Burgundians, Franks (Salic and Ripuarian) and some other tribes. Of these Germanic tribes, in the final south, the Salic Franks turned out to be the most powerful (perhaps one of the rivers of present-day Holland was called from Sala in ancient times). It took them a little over 20 years to at the end of the 5th - beginning of the 6th century. take over most of the country.

The emergence of a class society among the Franks, which had been outlined for them even before moving to a new homeland, accelerated sharply in the process of conquering Gaul.

Each new campaign increased the wealth of the Frankish military-tribal nobility. When dividing the spoils of war, she got the best lands, a significant number of columns, cattle, etc. The nobility rose above the ordinary Franks, although the latter continued to remain personally free and did not even experience increased economic oppression at first. They settled in their new homeland in rural communities (marks). Mark was considered the owner of all the land of the community, which included forests, wastelands, meadows, arable land. The latter were divided into allotments, and rather quickly passed into the hereditary use of individual families.

The Gallo-Romans found themselves in the position of a dependent population, several times larger than the Franks. At the same time, the Gallo-Roman aristocracy partially retained their wealth. The unity of class interests marked the beginning of a gradual rapprochement between the Frankish and Gallo-Roman nobility, with the former becoming dominant. And this especially made itself felt during the formation of a new government, with the help of which it would be possible to keep the occupied country in their hands, to keep the colonies and slaves in obedience. The former tribal organization of the necessary forces and means for this could not provide. The institutions of the tribal system begin to give way to a new organization with a military leader - the king and a squad personally devoted to him at the head. The king and his entourage actually decide the most important questions of the life of the country, although popular assemblies and some other institutions of the former system of the Franks are still preserved. A new "public authority" is being formed, which no longer coincides directly with the population. It consists not only of armed people who do not depend on the rank and file of the free, but also of all kinds of compulsory institutions, which did not exist under the tribal system. The approval of the new public authority was associated with the introduction of the territorial division of the population. The lands inhabited by the Franks began to be divided into "pagi" (districts), which consisted of smaller units - "hundreds". The management of the population, which lived in pagas and hundreds, is handed over to special trustees of the king. In the southern regions of Gaul, where the former population repeatedly prevailed at first, the Roman administrative-territorial division is preserved. But even here the appointment of officials depends on the king.

The emergence of the state among the Franks is associated with the name of one of their military leaders - Clovis (486-511) from the Merovingian clan. Under his leadership, the main part of Gaul was conquered. The far-sighted political step of Clovis was the adoption by him and his squad of Christianity according to the Catholic model. By this he secured the support of the Gallo-Roman nobility and the dominant Gaul, catholic church.

The Frankish wars of conquest accelerated the process of creating the Frankish state. The deepest reasons for the formation of the Frankish statehood were rooted in the decomposition of the Frankish free community, in its class stratification, which began in the first centuries of the new era.

The state of the Franks in its form was early feudal monarchy. It arose in a transitional society from communal to feudal society, which in its development passed the stage of slavery. This society is characterized by a multiform structure (a combination of slave-owning, tribal, communal, feudal relations), and the incompleteness of the process of creating the main classes of feudal society. Because of this, the early feudal state bears a significant imprint of the old communal organization, the institutions of tribal democracy.

The state of the Franks went through two main periods in its development (from the end of the 5th to the 7th century and from the 8th to the middle of the 9th century). The line separating these periods is characterized not only by the change of ruling dynasties (the Merovingians were replaced by the Carolingians). It marked the beginning of a new stage in the deep socio-economic and political restructuring of Frankish society, during which a feudal state proper was gradually taking shape in the form of a seigneurial monarchy.

In the second period, the creation of large feudal landed property, the two main classes of feudal society, is basically completed: the closed, hierarchically subordinate class of feudal lords, bound by vassal ties, on the one hand, and the dependent peasantry exploited by it, on the other. The relative centralization of the early feudal state was replaced by feudal fragmentation.

In the V-VI centuries. the Franks still retained communal, tribal ties, relations of exploitation among the Franks themselves were not developed, and the Frankish service nobility, which formed into the ruling elite during the military campaigns of Clovis, was not numerous.

The social and class differences in the early class society of the Franks, as evidenced by the Salic truth, the legal monument of the Franks, dating back to the 5th century, manifested themselves most clearly in the position of slaves. Slave labor, however, was not widespread. A slave, in contrast to a free community-franc, was considered a thing. His theft was equivalent to the theft of an animal. The marriage of a slave to a free man entailed the loss of freedom by the latter.

Salic truth also points to the presence of other social groups among the Franks: serving nobility, free francs(community) and semi-free litas. The differences between them were not so much economic as socio-legal. They were mainly related to the origin and legal status of a person or the social group to which this person belonged. An important factor influencing the legal differences of the Franks was belonging to the royal service, the royal squad, to the emerging state apparatus. These differences were most clearly expressed in the system of monetary compensation, which served to protect the life, property and other rights of individuals.

Along with slaves, there was a special category of persons - semi-free litas, whose life was estimated by half a free wergeld, at 100 solidi. Lit was an inferior resident of the Frankish community, who was personally and materially dependent on his master. Litas could enter into contractual relations, defend their interests in court, participate in military campaigns together with their master. Lit, like a slave, could be freed by his master, who, however, had his property. For a crime, the litu was supposed, as a rule, the same punishment as a slave, for example, the death penalty for kidnapping a free person.

The law of the Franks also testifies to the beginning of the property stratification of Frankish society. The Salic Truth speaks of the master's servants or yard servants-slaves (vine growers, grooms, swineherds and even goldsmiths) serving the master's economy.

At the same time, the Salic truth testifies to the sufficient strength of the communal order, to communal ownership of fields, meadows, forests, wastelands, to the equal rights of communal peasants to communal land allotment. The very concept of private ownership of land in the Salic truth is absent. It only fixes the origin of the allod, providing for the right to transfer the allotment by inheritance through the male line. The further deepening of social class differences among the Franks was directly related to the transformation of the allod into the original form of private feudal land ownership. Allod - the alienable, inheritable land ownership of the free Franks - took shape in the process of decomposition of communal ownership of land. It underlay the emergence, on the one hand, of the patrimonial land tenure of feudal lords, and on the other hand, the land holding of peasants dependent on them.

The processes of feudalization among the Franks receive a powerful impetus during the wars of conquest of the 6th-7th centuries, when a significant part of the Gallo-Roman estates in Northern Gaul passes into the hands of the Frankish kings, the serving aristocracy, and royal warriors. Serving nobility, bound to some extent by vassal dependence on the king, who seized the right to dispose of the conquered land, becomes a major owner of land, livestock, slaves, colonies. It is replenished with a part of the Gallo-Roman aristocracy, which goes into the service of the Frankish kings.

The clash of the communal orders of the Franks and the late Roman private property orders of the Gallo-Romans, the coexistence and interaction of social structures so different in nature, accelerated the creation of new, feudal relations. Already in the middle of the 7th century. in Northern Gaul, a feudal patrimony begins to take shape with its characteristic division of land into master (domain) and peasant (hold). The stratification of the "ordinary freemen" during the period of the conquest of Gaul also occurred due to the transformation of the communal elite into petty estates due to the appropriation of communal land.

The processes of feudalization in the VI-VII centuries. in the south of Gaul did not receive such rapid development as in the north. At this time, the size of the Frankish colonization here was insignificant, the vast estates of the Gallo-Roman nobility remained, the labor of slaves and columns continued to be widely used, but profound social changes took place here, mainly due to the widespread growth of large church land ownership.

5th-6th centuries in Western Europe were marked by the beginning of a powerful ideological offensive of the Christian church. The ministers of dozens of newly emerging monasteries and churches preached about human brotherhood, about helping the poor and suffering, about other moral values.

The population of Gaul, under the spiritual influence of the clergy, headed by bishops, began to perceive more and more Christian dogmas, the idea of ​​redemption, relying on the intercession of the holy fathers for the sake of gaining forgiveness during the transition to another world. In the era of endless wars, destruction, widespread violence, disease, under the dominance of religious consciousness, people's attention naturally focused on such issues as death, posthumous judgment, retribution, hell and heaven. The church began to use the fear of purgatory and hell for its own selfish interests, collecting and accumulating numerous donations, including land donations, at the expense of both rulers and ordinary people. The growth of church landownership began with the land waivers of the church from Clovis.

The growing ideological and economic role of the church could not fail to manifest itself sooner or later in its power claims. However, the church at that time was not yet a political entity, did not have a single organization, representing a kind of spiritual community of people led by bishops, of which, according to tradition, the most important was considered the bishop of Rome, who later received the title of pope.

In the activities of the church as "Christ's governors" on earth, kings also increasingly interfered, who, in order to strengthen their extremely unstable power, appointed bishops from their close associates, convened church councils, presided over them, sometimes speaking on theological problems. In 511, at the Orleans church council convened by Clovis, it was decided that not a single layman could be inducted into the church without royal permission. The subsequent decision of the Orleans Church Council in 549 finally secured the right of kings to control the appointment of bishops.

It was a time of increasingly close intertwining of secular and religious power, when bishops and other religious figures sat in government bodies, and local civil administration was carried out by diocesan administrations.

Under Dagobert I at the beginning of the 7th century. the administration of church functions has become an integral part of the path to honor, having passed which, the king's associates became local rulers - counts and bishops at the same time; it was not uncommon for bishops to rule cities and the surrounding rural settlements, mint money, collect taxes from taxable lands, control market trade, etc.

The bishops themselves, owning large church holdings, began to occupy an increasingly higher place in the emerging feudal hierarchy, which was facilitated by the unforbidden marriages of priests with laity, representatives of the feudal elite.

The rapid growth of feudal relations is characterized by the 7th-9th centuries. At this time, in Frankish society there is agricultural revolution, which led to the widespread establishment of large-scale feudal land ownership, to the loss of land and freedom by the community, to the growth of the private power of feudal magnates. This was facilitated by the action of a number of historical factors. Started from the VI-VII centuries. the growth of large landownership, accompanied by strife among landowners, revealed the fragility of the Merovingian kingdom, in which internal borders arose here and there as a result of the disobedience of the local nobility or the resistance of the population to the collection of taxes. Moreover, by the end of the 7th c. the Franks lost a number of lands and actually occupied the territory between the Loire and the Rhine.

One of the attempts to solve the problem of strengthening state unity in the face of widespread disobedience to the central authorities was the church council of "prelates and noble people", held in Paris in 614. The edict adopted by the council called for "severe suppression of rebellions and arrogant attacks by malefactors", threatened with punishment for "embezzlement and abuse of power by officials, tax collectors in trading places", but at the same time limited the right of civil judges and tax collectors on church lands, laying thus the statutory basis of their immunity. Bishops, moreover, according to the decision of the council, were to henceforth be elected "by the clergy and the people" while retaining the king's only right to approve the results of the elections.

The weakening of the power of the Frankish kings was primarily due to the depletion of their land resources. Only on the basis of new grants, the granting of new rights to landowners, the establishment of new lordship-vassal ties, could the strengthening of royal power and the restoration of the unity of the Frankish state take place at this time. Such a policy was pursued by the Carolingians, who actually ruled the country even before the transfer of the royal crown to them in 751.

Charles reform Martella

Mayor Charles Martell (715-741) began his work by pacifying internal unrest in the country, by confiscating the lands of his political opponents, and by partially secularizing church lands. At the same time, he took advantage of the right of kings to fill the highest church positions. At the expense of the land fund created in this way, land grants began to be distributed to the new nobility for life conditional holding - beneficiaries(from lat. beneficium - beneficence, mercy) when performing one or another service (most often equestrian military). The land was given to those who could serve the king and bring an army with them. Refusal to serve or betrayal of the king entailed the loss of an award. The beneficiary received land with dependent people who carried corvee in his favor or paid dues. The use of the same form of grants by other large landowners led to the formation of relations of suzerainty-vassalage between large and small feudal lords.

Expansion of feudal landownership in the VIII century. contributed to the new wars of conquest, accompanied by a new wave of Frankish colonization. Moreover, if in the Frankish colonization of the VI-VII centuries. Since the top of the Frankish society took part mainly, then the wealthy allodists were attracted to the colonization of the 7th-9th centuries, which took place on a much larger scale, due to which the class of feudal lords was replenished at that time with equestrian chivalry.

From the middle of the 8th century the period begins prior to the completion of the process of stratification of Frankish society into a class of feudal landowners and a class of peasants dependent on them, relations of patronage, domination and subordination, arising on the basis of special agreements, become widespread commendations, precaria, self-enslavement. The development of patronage relations was greatly influenced by the Roman institution - clientella, patronage. The relations of patronage and patronage among the Franks were brought to life by the collapse of old tribal ties, the impossibility of the economic independence of the small-peasant economy, ruined by wars, robberies of feudal lords. Patronage entailed the establishment of the personal and property dependence of the peasants on the landowners-tycoons, since the peasants transferred to them the ownership of their land plots, receiving them back on the terms of performing certain duties, paying dues, etc.

In the processes of establishing the power of large landowners over the peasants in Western Europe, the Christian Church, which itself became a large landowner, played an enormous role. The stronghold of the dominant position of the church was the monasteries, and the secular nobility - fortified castles, which became patrimonial centers, a place for collecting rent from the peasants, a symbol of the power of the lords.

Treaties of commendation (patronage) arose primarily in the relations of peasants with the church and monasteries. They were not always directly related to the loss of freedom and property rights to the land plot of the commandee, as was the case in the case of the self-enslavement agreement. But once under such patronage, the free peasants gradually lost their personal freedom and after a few generations, most of them became serfs.

The contract of precaria was directly related to the transfer of land. It entailed the emergence of a conditional holding of land transferred for temporary use, was accompanied by the emergence of certain duties of a precarist in favor of a large landowner (to work on the fields of the master, give him part of the crop). In the face of the precarists, a transitional layer was created from free allodists to dependent peasants. There were three forms of precaria: precaria data ("given precaria") - a kind of land lease, on the basis of which a landless or land-poor peasant received a plot of land for temporary use. Under the contract precaria remuniratoria ("reimbursed precaria"), the precarist initially gave his plot of land to the landowner and received it back into possession. This type of precaria arose, as a rule, as a result of the pledge of land as security for a debt. Under the agreement precaria oblata (“precaria donated”), the precarist (most often under the direct pressure of the landowner), who had already become economically dependent, gave his plot to the master, and then received from him his and an additional plot of land, but already as a holding.

The owner of the precaria had the right of judicial protection against third parties, but not against the landowner. The precarium could be taken back by the landowner at any moment. As the number of people subject to the magnate (precarists, commandees) grew, he gained more and more power over them.

The state did everything possible to strengthen this power. In the capitulary of 787, for example, it was forbidden for anyone to take under the protection of people who left the lord without his permission. Gradually, vassal ties, or relations of dependence, cover all the free. In 808 they were ordered to go to war with their lord or with the count.

Later "barbarian truths" also testify to other changes in the social structure of barbarian societies, taking place in connection with the development of new feudal relations. In the Alaman and Bavarian truths (VIII century), the figure of a column is increasingly mentioned. The column or slave planted on the ground was also known to Roman law, which deprived him of economic independence, the right to conclude contracts, sign documents, etc.

Visigoths in the V-VI centuries. adopted these prohibitions from Rome. But the Ostrogoths began to move away from them. According to Art. 121 of the Ostrogothic Truth, for example, "if someone lent money to a colonel or a slave, without the knowledge of the master, then he could repay the debt from the peculium," that is, from the property that he owned.

A new feudal form of the colony arose, differing from the previous one in that not only a slave or a landless tenant, but also a free peasant could become a colony. According to the Alaman Pravda (22, 3), the colon is self-employed, but must pay taxes in kind to the church or work off corvée 3 days a week.

There are also changes in the legal status of slaves. Weakened, for example, strict prohibitions on the marriage of slaves with the free. If, according to Roman law, a free woman was enslaved for having a relationship with a slave, and according to the Salic truth, she could be killed with impunity, then the Alamannic truth gave such a woman the right to object to the "slave work of a servant" (18.2).

And finally, in the ninth century. large beneficiaries seek the right to transfer beneficiaries by inheritance. Benefits are being replaced fief(Hereditary, in contrast to beneficiation, feudal land ownership, granted by the lord to his vassal for service). Large feudal lords are turning into sovereigns with political power in their domains.

In the processes of formation and development of the state apparatus of the Franks, three main directions can be identified. The first direction, especially characteristic of the initial stage (5th-7th centuries), manifested itself in the degeneration of the organs of the tribal democracy of the Franks into the organs of a new, public authority, into the proper state organs. The second - was determined by the development of patrimonial administration, the third - was associated with the gradual transformation of the state power of the Frankish monarchs into the "private" power of sovereign sovereigns with the formation of a seigneurial monarchy, which was fully revealed at the final stage of the development of Frankish society (VIII-IX centuries) .

The conquest of Gaul served as a powerful impetus for the creation of a new state apparatus among the Franks, for it required the organization of the administration of the conquered regions and their protection. Clovis was the first Frankish king to establish his exclusive position as sole ruler. From a simple commander, he turns into a monarch, achieving this position by all means: treachery, cunning, the destruction of relatives, other tribal leaders. One of the most important political actions of Clovis, which strengthened the position of the Frankish state through the support of the Gallo-Roman clergy, was the adoption of Christianity.

With the adoption of Christianity by Clovis, the church becomes a powerful factor in strengthening royal power. It was the church that gave into the hands of the Frankish kings such a justification for the wars of conquest as a reference to the "true faith", the unification in the faith of many peoples under the auspices of a single king as the supreme, not only secular, but also the spiritual head of their peoples.

The gradual transition of the Gallic elite to the Christian faith also becomes an important historical factor in the unification of Gaul, the development of a special regional feudal Christian, Western European (Romano-Germanic) civilization.

Socio-economic, religious, ideological, ethnographic and other changes in Gallic society had a direct impact on the processes of folding and development of specific features of the state apparatus of the Frankish empire, which absorbed in the VIII-IX centuries. most of the barbarian states of Western Europe. Already in the 5th century among the Franks, the place of the old tribal community finally comes to the territorial community (mark), and with it the territorial division into districts (pagi), hundreds. Salic truth already speaks of the existence of officials of the kingdom: counts, satsebarons, etc. At the same time, it testifies to the significant role of communal administration. At that time, the Franks no longer had a tribal people's assembly. It was replaced by a review of the troops - first in March ("March fields"), then (under the Carolingians) in May ("May fields"). But on the ground, hundreds of meetings ("malus") continued to exist, performing judicial functions under the chairmanship of tungins, which, together with rahinburgs, connoisseurs of law ("sentencing"), were representatives of the community.

The role of the community in court cases was exceptionally great. The community was responsible for the murder committed on its territory, exhibited jurors, testifying to the good name of its member; the relatives themselves brought their relative to the court, together with him they paid the wergeld.

The king acted primarily as a "guardian of the world", as an executor of the court decisions of the community. His counts, satsebarons performed mainly police and fiscal functions. Salic truth provided punishment for royal officials who refused to meet the demand of a free man and apply power to offenders. At the same time, protecting to a certain extent the independence of the community on the part of the royal officials, the Salic Truth forbade, for example, that more than three satsebarons attend one community meeting.

Royal prescriptions, according to the Salic truth, relate to an insignificant range of state affairs - conscription into the army, summons to court. But Salic truth also testifies to the strengthening of the power of kings. Thus, for example, the performance of royal service justifies the failure of the accused to appear in the communal court. Moreover, the king directly intrudes into the internal affairs of the community, into its land relations, and allows a stranger to settle on the communal land.

The power of the Frankish kings began to be inherited. "In the 6th-7th centuries, under the direct influence of the late Roman orders, the legislative powers of the kings were strengthened, and in the capitularies, not without the influence of the church, they already speak of the sacred nature of royal power, of the unlimitedness of its legislative powers. It is significant that there the concept of treason to the king appears, attributable to serious crimes.

However, the king at this time is first of all a military leader, a military leader, whose main concern is "order" in the kingdom, the pacification of the local nobility that is out of obedience. The lack of effective bodies of the central administration, the treasury, independent royal courts with appellate functions was also associated with the limited royal functions.

The emerging state apparatus is still distinguished by its extreme amorphousness, the absence of clearly delineated official powers, subordination, and organization of office work. The threads of state administration are concentrated in the hands of royal servants and associates. Among them are the palace count, the referendary, the cameraman. Palace Count performs mainly judicial functions, directs judicial fights, oversees the execution of sentences. referendary(speaker), keeper of the royal seal, in charge of royal documents, draws up acts, orders of the king, etc. Camerarius monitors the receipts to the royal treasury, the safety of the property of the palace.

In the VI-VII centuries. the chief administrator of the royal palace, and then the head of the royal administration, was the ward mayor, or majordomo, whose power was strengthened in every possible way in the conditions of the incessant campaigns of the king, who ruled his territories "from the saddle".

The formation of local authorities takes place at this time under the significant influence of the late Roman orders. Merovingian counts begin to rule the districts as Roman governors. They have police, military and judicial functions. In the capitularies, the tungin is almost never mentioned as a judge. The concepts of "count" and "judge" become unambiguous, their appointment falls within the exclusive competence of the royal power.

At the same time, the newly emerging bodies of the state apparatus of the Franks, copying some of the late Roman state orders, had a different character and social purpose. These were authorities expressing the interests primarily of the German service nobility and large Gallo-Roman landowners. They were built on other organizational foundations. So, for example, the king's combatants were widely used in the public service. Initially, the retinue, which consisted of the royal military detachment of free Franks, and, consequently, the state apparatus, was subsequently replenished not only by Romanized Gauls, who were distinguished by their education, knowledge of local law, but also by slaves, freedmen who made up the royal court staff. All of them were interested in strengthening royal power, in destroying the old tribal separatism, in strengthening the new order, which promised them enrichment and social prestige.

In the second half of the 7th c. a new system of political domination and administration is taking shape, a kind of "democracy of the nobility", which involves the direct participation of the top of the emerging class of feudal lords in government.

The expansion of the participation of the feudalizing nobility in government, the "seignorization" of state positions led to the loss of the royal power of the relative independence that it had previously enjoyed. This did not happen immediately, but precisely in the period when large-scale landownership had already acquired significant proportions. At this time, the previously created royal council, consisting of representatives of the service nobility and the higher clergy. Without the consent of the Council, the king could not actually take a single serious decision. The nobility is gradually transferred to key positions in management, not only in the center, but also in the field. Together with the weakening of the power of kings, counts, dukes, bishops, and abbots, who became large landowners, acquire more and more independence, administrative and judicial functions. They begin to appropriate taxes, duties, court fines.

As early as 614, the aforementioned edict (art. 12) forbade the appointment of "an official (judex - probably a duke or count), as well as a person subordinate to him", unless they were local landowners. In 673, the secular nobility achieved the confirmation of this article of the edict by Chilperic II. Management functions, thus, were assigned to large local feudal lords.

In later truths, local rulers - dukes and counts - are given no less attention than the king. A fine under the Alaman Pravda threatens anyone for failing to comply with the requirements of a duke or count, for "neglecting their agenda with a seal" A special title of the 2nd Bavarian Pravda is dedicated to dukes "whom the people appointed or elected"; it testifies to the breadth of those cases "which concern them." It provides for punishment in the form of a significant fine not only for non-compliance, but also for "negligence" in carrying out their orders (2, 13), in particular, it refers to impunity in the event that the duke's order to kill a person is carried out (2, 6), probably "acting against the law" (2, 2).

Moreover, according to the Alaman truth, the position of duke is inherited by his son, who, however, is threatened with "exile and disinheritance" for trying to "seize it extortionately" (25, 1-2), however, the king could "forgive his son ... and transfer his inheritance" (34, 4). Over time, all the most important positions in the state apparatus became hereditary.

The obedience of the local nobility to the king, which was preserved to one degree or another, began to be increasingly determined by its personal relations with the royal court, vassal dependence on the king as a lord.

From the middle of the 7th century, in the era of the so-called lazy kings, the nobility directly takes the reins of government into their own hands, removing the king. First, this is done by increasing the role and importance of the post of mayordom, and then by directly removing the king. A vivid example of this is the very change of the royal dynasty among the Franks. Back in the 7th century with their power, land wealth, the Pipinid family of majordoms began to stand out. One of them, Charles Martel, actually already ruled the country. Thanks to the reforms, he managed for a certain time to strengthen the unity of the Frankish state, which was going through a long period of political destabilization and dismemberment. The son and successor of Charles Martel, not even wanting to formally recognize the king, carried out a coup d'etat, imprisoned the last reigning Merovingian in a monastery and took his throne.

Agrarian revolution of the 8th century. contributed to the further development of the feudal state, the administrative system in which the patrimonial administration began to play the main role. The new restructuring of the administrative apparatus was facilitated by the widespread use of immunity certificates, by virtue of which the territory belonging to the owner of immunity was withdrawn (partially or completely) from the jurisdiction of state authorities in judicial, tax, administrative cases. The votchinnik thus gained political power over his peasants. Immunity letters, as a rule, sanctioned the already existing relations of political dependence of the peasants on their lords-patrimonials.

The system of immunities was bound to lead to increased fragmentation and local separatism. But under Charlemagne (768-814), the state of the Franks reaches its highest power, covering a vast territory. Moreover, Charles in 800 was crowned by the pope in Rome with the imperial crown, which emphasized his strength as a successor to the power of the Roman emperors. Charles and the church supporting him needed the coronation as a political and ideological means of strengthening royal power at the expense of the attributes of the Roman Empire.

Long before his coronation, Charles began to be called the guardian of the "Christian Empire" (imperium christianum). In 794, he himself convened an Ecumenical Church Council in Frankurt, at which he announced important changes in theological doctrine and church law. Fighting for the "purity of the faith," he sent missionaries to all corners of the country, published capitulary, providing for the death penalty for insulting the priests and the Christian faith.

Despite all the efforts of Charles I and the church, the empire did not become a single territorial entity. The chronicle testifies to continuous wars, rebellions in the empire. Many clans, tribal, feudal semi-autonomous state units in the Frankish Empire were held together by the personal power of the emperor, which provided him with the subordination of local armies, which were called upon to protect it from Scandinavian, Arab, Slavic and other raids.

The rapid process of enslavement of the peasants at that time also contributed to the strengthening of the personal power of the emperor. In the conditions of predatory seizure of land in the VIII-IX centuries. the king (emperor) acts as the highest lord, the highest manager of the land, securing the land holdings of spiritual and secular feudal lords, communities, but invariably at the expense of the communities, in the interests of large land ownership.

Under the Merovingians, the free peasant was the mainstay of royal power. The people's militia consisted of free community members-Franks, they participated in the court, in the protection of order. So long as this support was maintained, the royal power could resist the claims to power of the landed magnates. The real power of the Carolingians relied on other forces, on their direct vassals, beneficiaries. These were the social strata that were under their direct patronage. The power of the Carolingians became more and more senior, private, it was taken away by local lords, counts, bishops.

In the hands of Charlemagne remained only a certain part of the nationwide powers. These real powers still included "protection of the world", protection of borders, certain coordination of the actions of the central government and the patrimonial authorities.

The capitulary, added to the Bavaria Pravda by Charles I, indicated that the emperor "as the guardian of the world" should stop "violation of power", ensure "the right peace for the church, widows, orphans and the weak", pay "special attention" to the punishment of "robbers, murderers , adulterers and incest", to strictly protect the "rights of the church and its property". Formally, the emperor also had the highest appellate power. "If anyone declares that he was wrongly judged," it is written in the same capitulary, "then let him appear before us." But it was immediately indicated that all property disputes should "receive a final decision with the help of counts and local judges."

The imperial administrative apparatus was also adapted to perform these functions. The council, consisting of the highest representatives of the spiritual and secular nobility, decided all matters "related to the good of the king and kingdom." This aristocratic body ensured the obedience of subjects to Charlemagne. Under his weak successors, he directly imposed his will on them.

The local administration was headed by large landowners, governors and counts, who shared power with the bishops. "Bishops together with counts and counts with bishops," prescribed the capitulary of Charles I, "must be in such a position that each of them has the opportunity to perform his office." played an important role margraves, military commanders in the border counties who monitor the security of the state's borders.

Charles ruled not through the imperial bureaucracy, he did not even have a capital city, but through the administrative-judicial apparatus of "sovereign envoys" scattered throughout the empire, who were called upon to carry out royal orders. The sovereign's envoys, consisting of one secular and one clergyman, annually traveled around the districts, including several counties. Their competence included, first of all, monitoring the management of royal estates, the correctness of religious rites, royal judges, and consideration of appeals against decisions of local courts on serious crimes. They could demand the extradition of a criminal who was in the territory of a spiritual or secular lord. The disobedience of the bishop, abbot and others threatened them with a fine. The controlling tandem of secular and ecclesiastical envoys of the king is another evidence of the weakness and inefficiency of the central government, which has no local support.

At the beginning of the 9th century, the Frankish state was at the zenith of its power. Covering the territory of almost all of Western Europe and not having an enemy on its borders equal in strength, it seemed indestructible and unshakable. However, even then it carried elements of the approaching decline and decay. Created by conquest, it was a conglomerate of nationalities, not connected by anything other than military force. Having broken for a while the mass resistance of the enslaved peasantry, the Frankish feudal lords lost their former interest in a single state. At this time, the economy of Frankish society was natural. Accordingly, there were no strong stable economic ties between individual regions. There were no other factors capable of restraining the fragmentation of the country. The Frankish state was completing its path of development from the early feudal monarchy to the statehood of the period of feudal fragmentation.

In 843, the split of the state was legally fixed in an agreement concluded in Verdun by the grandchildren of Charlemagne. Three kingdoms became the successors of the empire: West Frankish, East Frankish and Middle (future France, Germany and partly Italy).

Louis V, the last Carolingian king, died in 987 and was succeeded by Hugh Capet. The title of emperor passed to the leader of the Eastern Franks, who inhabited the territory that many centuries later was called Germany.

The Capetians only maintained power by controlling the vassals in the king's ancestral domain. So, along with the transformation of the power of the monarch-leader into the power of the sovereign-seigneur, the early feudal monarchy was gradually replaced by a new feudal state form - senior monarchy.

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2. General history of state and law / ed. Batyra K.I. - M., 1993

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5. Reader on the history of the Middle Ages. / ed. Gratsiansky and Skazkin. - M., 1993

The Frankish state occupied vast territories in Central and Western Europe, until the 5th century. were part of the Western Roman Empire. The chronological framework for the existence of Frankia is 481-843. Over the 4 centuries of its existence, the country has gone from a barbarian kingdom to a centralized empire.

Three cities were the capitals of the state at different times:

• Tour;
• Paris;
• Aachen.

The country was ruled by representatives of two dynasties:

• From 481 to 751 - Merovingians;
• From 751 to 843 - Carolingians (the dynasty itself appeared earlier - in 714).

The most prominent rulers under whom the Frankish state reached the peak of its power were Charles Martell, Pepin the Short and.

The rise of Frankia under Clovis

In the middle of the 3rd century, the Frankish tribes invaded the Roman Empire for the first time. They twice made attempts to occupy Roman Gaul, but both times they were expelled. In the 4th-5th century. The Roman Empire began to be increasingly attacked by barbarians, which included the Franks.

By the end of the 5th c. part of the Franks settled on the coast of the Rhine - within the modern city of Cologne (at that time it was the settlement of Colonia). They began to be called Rhenish or Ripuarian francs. Another part of the Frankish tribes lived north of the Rhine, so they were called northern or salic. They were ruled by the Merovingian family, whose representatives founded the first Frankish state.

In 481, the Merovingians were led by Clovis, the son of the deceased King Childeric. Clovis was greedy for power, mercenary and sought to expand the borders of the kingdom through conquest at all costs. From 486, Clovis began to subjugate the outlying Roman cities, the population of which voluntarily passed under the authority of the Frankish ruler. As a result, he got the opportunity to bestow property and land on his close associates. Thus began the formation of the Frankish nobility, who recognized themselves as vassals of the king.

At the beginning of the 490s. Clovis married Chrodechild, who was the daughter of the king of Burgundy. The wife had a huge influence on the actions of the king of Frankia. Chrodechild considered her main task to be the spread of Christianity in the kingdom. On this basis, disputes constantly occurred between her and the king. The children of Chrodechild and Clovis were baptized, but the king himself remained a staunch pagan. However, he understood that the baptism of the Franks would strengthen the prestige of the kingdom in the international arena. The approach of the war with the Alamanni forced Clovis to radically change his views. After the Battle of Tolbiac in 496, in which the Franks defeated the Alamanni, Clovis decided to convert to Christianity. At that time, in Western Europe, in addition to the classical Western Roman version of Christianity, the Arian heresy also dominated. Clovis wisely opted for the first creed.

The rite of baptism was performed by the bishop of Reims, Remigius, who converted the king and his soldiers to the new faith. To enhance the significance of the event for the country, the whole of Reims was decorated with ribbons and flowers, a font was installed in the church, and a huge number of candles burned. The baptism of Frankia elevated Clovis above other Germanic rulers who disputed their right to supremacy in Gaul.

The main opponent of Clovis in this region were the Goths, led by Alaric II. The decisive battle of the Franks and the Goths took place in 507 at Vuille (or Poitiers). The Franks won a major victory, but they failed to completely subjugate the Gothic kingdom. At the last moment, the ruler of the Ostrogoths, Theodoric, came to the aid of Alaric.

At the beginning of the 6th c. the Byzantine emperor honored the Frankish king with the titles of proconsul and patrician, which elevated Clovis as a Christian ruler.

Throughout his reign, Clovis asserted his rights to Gaul. An important step in this direction was the transfer of the royal court from Tournai to Lutetia (modern Paris). Lutetia was not only a well-fortified and developed city, but also the center of all Gaul.

Clovis had many more ambitious plans, but they were not destined to be realized. The last great deed of the Frankish king was the unification of the Salian and Ripuarian Franks.

Frankish state in the 6th-7th centuries.

Clovis had four sons - Theodoric, Childerbert, Chlodomer and Chlothar, who, unlike their wise father, did not see the point in creating a single centralized state. Immediately after his death, the kingdom was divided into four parts with capitals in:

• Reims (Theodoric);
• Orleans (Chlodomer);
• Paris (Hilderbert);
• Soissons (Chlothar).

This division weakened the kingdom, but did not prevent the Franks from conducting successful military campaigns. The most significant victories for the Frankish kingdom include successful campaigns against the Thuringian and Burgundian kingdoms. They were conquered and incorporated into Frankia.

After Khdodvig's death, the kingdom plunged into internecine wars for two hundred years. Twice the country was under the rule of one ruler. The first time this happened was in 558, when the youngest son of Clovis Chlothar the First was able to unite all parts of the kingdom. But his reign lasted only three years, and civil strife again swept the country. The second time to unite the Frankish kingdom was only in 613, Chlothar the Second, who ruled the country until 628.

The results of long civil strife were:

• Constant change of internal borders;
• Confrontation between relatives;
• Murders;
• Drawing combatants and ordinary peasants into the political confrontation;
• Political rivalry;
• Lack of central authority;
• Cruelty and promiscuity;
• Trample of Christian values;
• Reducing the authority of the church;
• Enrichment of the military estate due to constant campaigns and robberies.

Socio-economic development under the Merovingians

Despite the political fragmentation of the 6th-7th centuries, it was at this time that Frankish society experienced a rapid development of social ties. The basis of the social structure was feudalism, which arose even under Clovis. The king of the Franks was the supreme suzerain, granting land to his vassals-rescuemen in exchange for faithful service. Thus, two main forms of land ownership arose:

• hereditary;
• Alienable.

The combatants, receiving land for their service, gradually grew rich and became large feudal landowners.

There was a separation from the general mass and the strengthening of noble families. Their power undermined the power of the king, which resulted in the gradual strengthening of the positions of mayordoms - administrators at the royal court.

The changes also affected the peasant community-brand. The peasants received land in private ownership, which caused an acceleration of the processes of property and social stratification. Some people got fabulously rich, while others lost everything. Landless peasants quickly fell into dependence on the feudal lords. There were two forms of peasant enslavement in the early medieval kingdom of the Franks:

1. Through comments. The impoverished peasant asked the feudal lord to establish patronage over him and transferred his lands to him for this, recognizing his personal dependence on the patron. In addition to the transfer of the land allotment, the poor man was obliged to follow any instructions of the seigneur;
2. Through the baker - a special agreement between the feudal lord and the peasant, according to which the latter received a plot of land for use in exchange for the performance of duties;

In most cases, the impoverishment of the peasant inevitably led to the loss of personal freedom. In a matter of decades, most of the population of Frankia was enslaved.

Board of mayordoms

By the end of the 7th c. royal power was no longer an authority in the Frankish kingdom. All the levers of power were concentrated at the mayors, whose position in the late 7th - early 8th centuries. became hereditary. This led to the fact that the rulers of the Merovingian dynasty lost control of the country.

At the beginning of the 8th c. legislative and executive power passed to the noble Frankish family of the Martells. Then the position of the royal mayor was taken by Karl Martell, who carried out a number of important reforms:

• On his initiative, a new form of ownership arose - beneficiaries. All lands and peasants included in the beneficiaries became conditional own vassals. The right to hold a beneficiary had only persons who performed military service. Leaving the service also meant the loss of benefits. The right to distribute benefices belonged to large landowners and the mayor. The result of this reform was the formation of a strong vassal-fief system;
• The army was reformed, within the framework of which a mobile cavalry army was created;
• The vertical of power was strengthened;
• The entire territory of the state was divided into districts, headed by counts appointed directly by the king. Judicial, military and administrative power was concentrated in the hands of each count.

The results of the reforms of Charles Martel were:

• Rapid growth and strengthening of the feudal system;
• Strengthening the judicial and financial systems;
• The growth of the power and power of the feudal lords;
• Increasing the rights of landowners, especially large ones. At that time, in the Frankish kingdom, there was a practice of distributing immunity letters, which could only be issued by the head of state. Having received such a document, the feudal lord became a full owner in the subject territories;
• Destruction of the property donation system;
• Confiscation of property from churches and monasteries.

Martel was succeeded by his son Pepin (751), who, unlike his father, was crowned. And already his son - Charles, nicknamed the Great, in 809 became the first emperor of the Franks.

During the reign of the mayordoms, the state became much stronger. The new state system was characterized by two phenomena:

• The complete liquidation of local authorities that existed until the middle of the 8th century;
• Strengthening the power of the king.

The kings received wide powers of authority. First, they had the right to call a people's assembly. Secondly, they formed a militia, a squad and an army. Thirdly, they issued orders that applied to all residents of the country. Fourthly, they had the right to hold the post of supreme commander in chief. Fifthly, the kings administered justice. And finally, sixthly, they collected taxes. All orders of the sovereign were binding. If this did not happen, the violator was expected to have a huge fine, corporal punishment or the death penalty.

The judicial system in the country looked like this:

• The king has the highest judicial power;
• In the localities, cases were first dealt with by the courts of the communities, and then by the feudal lords.

Thus, Charles Martell not only changed the country, but created all the conditions for the further centralization of the state, its political unity and the strengthening of royal power.

Carolingian rule

In 751, King Pepin the Short ascended the throne from a new dynasty, which was called the Carolingians (after Charlemagne, son of Pepin). The new ruler was not tall, for which he went down in history under the nickname "Short". He succeeded Hillderic the Third, the last representative of the Merovingian family, on the throne. Pepin received a blessing from the Pope, who consecrated his ascension to the royal throne. For this, the new ruler of the Frankish kingdom provided the Vatican with military assistance as soon as the Pope asked for it. In addition, Pepin was a zealous Catholic, supported the church, strengthened its positions, and gave extensive possessions. As a result, the Pope recognized the Carolingian family as the legitimate heirs to the throne of the Franks. The head of the Vatican declared that any attempt to overthrow the king would be punishable by excommunication.

The administration of the state after the death of Pepin passed to his two sons Charles and Carloman, who died soon after. All power was concentrated in the hands of the eldest son, Pepin the Short. The new ruler received a remarkable education for his time, knew the Bible perfectly, went in for several sports, was well versed in politics, spoke classical and folk Latin, as well as his native Germanic language. Carl studied all his life, because he was naturally inquisitive. This hobby led to the fact that the sovereign founded a system of educational institutions throughout the country. So the population began to gradually learn to read, count, write and study the sciences.

But the most significant successes of Charles were the reforms aimed at the unification of France. First, the king improved the administrative division of the country: he defined the boundaries of the regions and planted in each of his governors.

Then the ruler began to expand the borders of his state:

• In the early 770s. conducted a series of successful campaigns against the Saxons and Italian states. Then he received a blessing from the Pope and went on a campaign against Lombardy. Having broken the resistance of local residents, he annexed the country to France. At the same time, the Vatican repeatedly used the services of Charles's troops to pacify their recalcitrant subjects, who from time to time raised uprisings;
• In the second half of the 770s. continued the fight against the Saxons;
• Fought with the Arabs in Spain, where he tried to protect the Christian population. In the late 770s - early 780s. founded a number of kingdoms in the Pyrenees - Aquitaine, Toulouse, Septimania, which were to become springboards for the fight against the Arabs;
• In 781 he created the Italian kingdom;
• In the 780s and 790s, he defeated the Avars, thanks to which the borders of the state were expanded to the east. In the same period, he broke the resistance of Bavaria, including the duchy in the empire;
• Karl had problems with the Slavs who lived on the borders of the state. In different periods of government, the tribes of the Sorbs and Luticians offered stiff resistance to Frankish domination. The future emperor managed not only to break them, but also to force them to recognize themselves as his vassals.

When the borders of the state were expanded to the maximum, the king took up the pacification of the recalcitrant peoples. In different regions of the empire, uprisings constantly broke out. The Saxons and Avars caused the most problems. Wars with them were accompanied by great loss of life, destruction, hostage-taking and migration.

In the last years of his reign, Charles faced new problems - the attacks of the Danes and Vikings.

In the domestic policy of Charles, the following points are worth noting:

• Establishing a clear procedure for the collection of the people's militia;
• Strengthening the borders of the state by creating border areas - marks;
• Destruction of the power of the dukes who claimed the power of the sovereign;
• Convocation of Diets twice a year. In the spring, all people endowed with personal freedom were invited to such a meeting, and in the fall, representatives of the higher clergy, administration and nobility came to the court;
• Development of agriculture;
• The erection of monasteries and new cities;
• Support for Christianity. Especially for the needs of the church in the country, a tax was introduced - tithe.

In 800 Charles was proclaimed emperor. This great warrior and ruler died of a fever in 814. The remains of Charlemagne were buried in Aachen. From now on, the late emperor began to be considered the patron of the city.

After the death of his father, the imperial throne passed to his eldest son, Louis the First Pious. This was the beginning of a new tradition, which meant the onset of a new period in the history of France. The power of the father, like the territory of the country, was no longer to be divided between the sons, but passed on by seniority - from father to son. But this caused a new wave of internecine wars already for the right to own the imperial title among the descendants of Charlemagne. This weakened the state so much that the Vikings, who reappeared in France in 843, easily captured Paris. They were driven out only after the payment of a huge ransom. The Vikings left France for a while. But in the mid-880s. they reappeared near Paris. The siege of the city lasted more than a year, but the French capital withstood.

Representatives of the Carolingian dynasty were removed from power in 987. The last ruler of the Charlemagne family was Louis V. Then the highest aristocracy chose a new ruler for themselves - Hugo Capet, who founded the Capetian dynasty.

The Frankish state was the greatest country of the medieval world. Under the rule of his kings were vast territories, many peoples and even other sovereigns who became vassals of the Merovingians and Carolingians. The heritage of the Franks can still be found in the history, culture and traditions of the modern French, Italian and German nations. The formation of the country and the flowering of its power is associated with the names of prominent political figures who forever left their traces in the history of Europe.