ABSTRACT
I The stress which Charlemagne laid on Europe can be fully appreciated if it is set against the background of that Roman empire which was represented by its capital Constantinople. For his Roman empire was to represent the rebirth of the ancient pagan Roman empire in the guise and shape of a new Latin-Christian one which was for all practical purposes identical with the notion of Europe. In both concepts the essential ingredients were religious in subject-matter and ecclesiastical in institutionalized form.
