Einhard ( also Eginhard or Einhart ; c. 775 – March 14, 840 ) was a Frankish scholar and courtier.

Einhard was from the eastern German-speaking part of the Frank Kingdom.

Einhard evidently was a talented builder and construction manager, because Charlemagne put him in charge of the completion of several palace complexes including Aachen and Ingelheim.

Despite the fact that Einhard was on intimate terms with Charlemagne, he never achieved office in his reign.

Einhard was married to Emma, of whom ( as of most laywomen of the period ) little is known.

Though he was undoubtedly devoted to her, Einhard wrote nothing of his wife until after her death on 13 December 835, when he wrote to a friend that he was reminded of her loss in ‘ every day, in every action, in every undertaking, in all the administration of the house and household, in everything needing to be decided upon and sorted out in my religious and earthly responsibilities ’.

Einhard and his wife were originally buried in one sarcophagus in the choir of the church in Seligenstadt, but in 1810 the sarcophagus was presented by the Grand Duke of Hesse to the count of Erbach, who claims descent from Einhard as the husband of Imma, the reputed daughter of Charlemagne.

830 and was not rediscovered until 1885, when Ernst Dümmler identified a text in a manuscript in Vienna as the missing Libellus de adoranda cruce, which Einhard had dedicated to his pupil Lupus Servatus.

Hedeby is first mentioned in the Frankish chronicles of Einhard ( 804 ) who was in the service of Charlemagne,

Louis was born while his father Charlemagne was on campaign in Spain, at the Carolingian villa of Cassinogilum, according to Einhard and the anonymous chronicler called Astronomus ; the place is usually identified with Chasseneuil, near Poitiers.

The total sum paid out is unknown, but it was without doubt raised through taxes, as Einhard in his Vita explicitly says: " And the victorious Danes imposed a tribute on the vanquished, by means of taxes one hundred pounds of silver from the Frisians is already released " ( Danosque victores tributum victis inposuisse, et vectigalis nomine centum libras argenti a Frisionibus iam esse solutas ).

Based on Merovingian ad hoc arrangements, using the form missus regis ( the " king's envoy ") and sending a layman and an ecclesiastic in pairs, the use of missi dominici was fully exploited by Charlemagne ( ruling 768 — 814 ), who made them a regular part of his administration, " a highly intelligent and plausible innovation in Carolingian government ", Norman F. Cantor observes, " and a tribute to the administrative skill of the ecclesiastics, such as Alcuin and Einhard ".

Bertrada lived at the court of her elder son Charles, and according to Einhard their relationship was excellent.

Einhard claims this was the only episode that ever strained relations between mother and son.

In particular, a revision of the annals was attributed to Frankish historian Einhard ( c. 775 – 840 ) ( therefore Annales qui dicuntur Einhardi ), though a really convincing argument for his authorship is wanting.

Einhard was also the one who built the Einhardsbasilika.

Charlemagne took a serious interest in scholarship, promoting the liberal arts at the court, ordering that his children and grandchildren be well-educated, and even studying himself under the tutelage of Paul the Deacon, from whom he learned grammar, Alcuin, with whom he studied rhetoric, dialect and astronomy ( he was particularly interested in the movements of the stars ), and Einhard, who assisted him in his studies of arithmetic.

The work thus contains an understandable degree of bias, Einhard taking care to exculpate Charlemagne in some matters, not mention others, and to gloss over certain issues which would be of embarrassment to Charlemagne, such as the morality of his daughters ; by contrast, other issues are curiously not glossed over, like his concubines.

Around 800 Louis the Pious, son of Charlemagne, appointed Einhard, the biographer of Charlemagne, as abbot of both abbeys.

The first documented use of the name Wiesbaden is by Einhard, the biographer of Charlemagne, whose writings mention " Wisabada " sometime between 828 and 830.

At the time of his death, he and his brother Charlemagne were close to outright war, which Charlemagne's biographer Einhard attributes to the miscounsel of Carloman's advisors.

Charlemagne had a keen interest in learning, according to his biographer Einhard:

Charlemagne's biographer Einhard calls her a " concubine " and Paulus Diaconus speaks of Pippin's birth " before legal marriage ", whereas a letter by Pope Stephen III refers to Charlemagne and his brother Carloman as being already married ( to Himiltrude and Gerberga ), and advises them not to dismiss their wives.

This 77 km-long hiking and cycling trail follows Charlemagne ’ s biographer Einhard ’ s footsteps, running from Bad König to Hanau.

* 828 First mentioned by Einhard, the biographer of Charlemagne.

Many of the Slavic tribes became dependencies of the Carolingian Empire and the Franks created the Sorbian March to defend against the Sorbs. Einhard in Vita Karoli Magni describe expedition into Slavic territory led by Charlemagne himself, in 798.

In recognition of his great merit as confidant at Charlemagne ’ s court, Einhard acquired the main town and all land within two leagues ( roughly 15 km ) from Charlemagne ’ s son, Louis the Pious, as a freehold.

These texts were not just copied but also known at the court of Charlemagne, since his historian, the bishop Einhard, asked for explanations of some technical terms at the visiting English churchman Alcuin.

Einhard made these claims in " Vita Karoli Magni " ( Life of Charles the Great ), a biography of Charlemagne, King of the Franks.

In 814, on Charlemagne's death his son Louis the Pious made Einhard his private secretary.

Einhard retired from court during the time of the disputes between Louis and his sons in the spring of 830.

) and to friends ( Einhard ; Grimald ; Rabanus Maurus ; Tatto ; Ebbo, Archbishop of Reims ; Drogo, bishop of Metz ; etc.

These events are recorded in the Annales regni Francorum and the Vita Karoli Magni, both works of Charlemagne's court historian, Einhard, and in the separate Reichsannalen called the Annales Mettenses and the Annales Maximiniani, as well as the work of the so-called " Poeta Saxo ".

It is said that in the later years of their marriage Emma and Einhard abstained from sexual relations, choosing instead to focus their attentions on their many religious commitments.

It is constructive now to quote Einhard, Charlemagne's biographer, on the closing of such a grand conflict:

He is at once the gigantic eater of Turpin, the huge warrior eight feet high, who could lift the armed knight standing on his open hand to a level with his head, the crusading conqueror of Jerusalem in days before the crusades, and yet with all this the temperate drinker and admirer of St Augustine, as his character had filtered down through various channels from the historical pages of Einhard.

There exists only one historical mention of a Frankish Roland, found in the section of Vita Karoli Magni on the Battle of Roncevaux Pass, written by Charlemagne's courtier and biographer Einhard.

During the 11th Century Adam of Bremen, citing Einhard ( who in the Vita Caroli Magni states " the Slavs and the Aisti live on the shores of the Eastern Sea "), denotes the coastal tribe as the Haisti and refers to today's Estonia as Aestland.

Local lore from Seligenstadt portrays Einhard as the lover of Emma, one of Charlemagne's daughters, and has the couple elope from court.

Born into a family of relatively low status, his parents sent him to be educated by the monks of Fulda-one of the most impressive centres of learning in the Frank lands-perhaps due to his small stature ( Einhard referred to himself as a " tiny manlet ") which restricted his riding and sword-fighting ability, Einhard concentrated his energies towards scholarship and especially to the mastering of Latin.

Monks like Einhard were the only readers of Tacitus for most of the Middle Ages.