Charlemagne, also known as Charles the Great, was the first born son to the King of the Franks, Pepin the Short in 742. The sudden end of his brother Carloman I in 771, made him the acknowledged ruler of the Frankish realm. On Christmas Day, as an approach to recognize his rule and strengthen his association with the church, Charlemagne was crowned by Pope Leo III to become the new Roman Emperor. Charlemagne had a huge impact on the religious and educational system we now use. During his reign, Charlemagne established schools, revolutionized writing, and prepared important religious texts. He changed what would take the Dark Ages to illumination. Accordingly, Charlemagne started with the education systems. Charlemagne saw the societal damages done with being untaught; lack of Latin literacy caused problems for the ruler and society. He saw this as a drawback to the Empire and his quest of spreading Christianity throughout it. Lack of literacy resulted in the limitation of the number of court scribes and church priests. They were unable to …show more content…
He realized that many of the texts in religious services were in very bad shape. He also realized that they had become distorted because they had been copied by hand. "Charlemagne achieved his objective of reforming good, accurate, and uniform Latin texts of the Bible."(Sparks) He also achieved reforms to the Rule of Saint Benedict, and of prayer books. After Charlemagne's court school became active, he worked towards fixing the errors of texts. He also sought monasteries and libraries across Europe in search of new texts. Around fifty thousand hand-made master copies were made in the 9th century. In 801, Alcuin gifted Charlemagne a new edition of the Latin Bible. "The last eight years of Alcuin's life were dedicated to producing the corrected version of the Latin Vulgate Bible."(328) This version would later become the standard text throughout the Middle