The capital of the Carolingian empire was not Rome, but Aachen in what is now Germany. Charlemagne's son Louis "the Pious" then held this empire together from 814-840, but when he died his three sons fought with each other. They split the empire three ways in the Treaty of Verdun in 843. Western Europe was just too vast and diverse for a single ruler, and a new system was needed. That new system was feudalism. | The capital of the Carolingian empire was not Rome, but Aachen in what is now Germany. Charlemagne's son Louis "the Pious" then held this empire together from 814-840, but when he died his three sons fought with each other. They split the empire three ways in the Treaty of Verdun in 843. Western Europe was just too vast and diverse for a single ruler, and a new system was needed. That new system was feudalism. |