1 The Life of Charlemagne Notker the Stammerer the monk of St Gall ca 883 884 In addition to Einhard s Life of Charlemagne written in imitation of the Roman author Suetonius there is another Life of Charlemagne written by the Monk of St Gall identified with Notker the Stammerer This anecdotal life was composed for Charles the Fat and covers many subjects other than Charlemagne Book I Concerning the Piety of Charles and His Care of the Church This answer filled the king with a great joy and first he kept both of them prominent clergymen with him for a short time But soon when he must needs go to war he made one of them named Clement reside in Gaul and to him he sent many boys both of noble middle and humble birth and he ordered as much food to be given them as they required and he set aside for them buildings suitable for study But he sent the second scholar into Italy and gave him the monastery of Saint Augustine near Pavia that all who wished might gather there to learn from him But when Albinus Alcuin an Englishman heard that the most religious Emperor Charles gladly entertained wise men he entered into a ship and came to him Now Albinus was skilled in all learning beyond all others of our times for he was the disciple of that most learned priest Bede who next to Saint Gregory was the most skillful interpreter of the scriptures And Charles received Albinus kindly and kept him at his side to the end of his life except when he marched with his armies to his vast wars nay Charles would even call himself Albinus s disciple and Albinus he would call his master He appointed him to rule over the abbey of Saint Martin near to the city of Tours so that when he himself was absent Albinus might rest there and 62 teach those who had recourse to him And his teaching bore such fruit among his pupils that the modern Gauls or Franks came to equal the ancient Romans or Athenians Then when Charles came back after a long absence crowned with victory into Gaul he ordered the boys whom he had entrusted to Clement to come before him and present to him letters and verses of their own composition Now the boys of middle or low birth presented him with writings garnished with the sweet savors of wisdom beyond all that he could have hoped while those of the children of noble parents were silly and tasteless Then the most wise Charles imitating the judgment of the eternal Judge gathered together those who had done well upon his right hand and addressed them in these words My children you have found much favor with me because you have tried with all your strength to carry out my orders and win advantage for yourselves Wherefore now study to attain to perfection and I will give you bishoprics and splendid monasteries and you shall be always honorable in my eyes Then he turned severely to those who were gathered on his left and smiting their consciences with the fire of his eyes he flung at them in scorn these terrible words which seemed thunder rather 63 than human speech You nobles you sons of my chiefs you superfine dandies you have trusted to your birth and your possessions and have set at naught my orders to your own advancement you have neglected the pursuit of learning and you have given yourselves over to luxury and sport to idleness and profitless pastimes Then solemnly he raised his august head and his unconquered 2 right hand to the heavens and thus thundered against them By the King of Heaven I take no account of your noble birth and your fine looks though others may admire you for them Know this for certain that unless you make up for your former sloth by vigorous study you will never get any favor from Charles But I must not seem to forget or to neglect Alcuin and will therefore make this true statement about his energy and his deserts all his pupils without exception distinguished themselves by becoming either holy abbots or bishops My master Grimald studied the literal arts under him first in Gaul and then in Italy But those who are learned in these matters may charge me with falsehood for saying all his pupils without exception when the fact is that there were in his schools two young men sons of a miller in the service of the monastery of Saint Columban who did not seem fit and proper persons for promotion to the command of bishoprics or monasteries but even these men were by the influence probably of their teacher advanced one after the other to the office of minister in the monastery of Bobbio in which they displayed the greatest energy So the most glorious Charles saw the study of letters flourishing throughout this whole realm but still he was grieved to find that it did not reach the ripeness of the earlier fathers and so after super human labors he broke out one day with this expression of his sorrow Would that I had twelve clerks so learned in all wisdom and so perfectly trained as were Jerome and Augustine Then the learned Alcuin feeling himself ignorant indeed in comparison with these great names rose to a height of daring that no man else attained to in the presence of the terrible Charles and said with deep indignation in his mind but none in his countenance The Maker of heaven and earth has not many like to those men and do you expect to have twelve Here I must report something which the men of our time will find it difficult to believe for I myself who write it could hardly believe it so great is the difference between our method of chanting and the Roman were it not that we must trust rather the accuracy of our fathers than the false suggestions of modern sloth Well then Charles that never wearied lover of the service of God when he could congratulate himself that all possible progress had been made in the knowledge of letters was grieved to observe how widely the different provinces nay not the provinces only but districts and cities differed in the praise of God that is to say in their method of chanting He therefore asked of Pope Stephen of blessed memory the same who after Hilderich King of the Franks had been deposed and tonsured had anointed Charles to be ruler of the kingdom after the ancestral custom of the people he asked of Pope Stephen I say that he should provide him with twelve clerks deeply learned in divine song The Pope yielded assent to his virtuous wish and his divinely inspired design and sent to him in Frankland from the apostolic see clerks skilled in divine song and twelve in number according to the number of the twelve apostles Source A J Grant ed and
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