ABSTRACT
SEEN FROM THE purely intellectual angle the advance made by the papacy in the early ninth century coincided with the completion of the process of amalgamating Roman, Christian and Germanic elements in the West. The inextricable fusion of these three disparate strains resulted in the elimination of the harsh and abrasive contrasts which divided them, and in the emergence of a more or less homogeneous synthesis. The consequence was the great civilizing effect which the close connexions between the North, West and South of Europe brought about. The papacy itself through its intimate contact especially with the peoples north of the Alps came in course of time to absorb a good many non-Roman, purely Germanic features into its own system. This was particularly noticeable in the realms of liturgy, symbolism and also in questions relating to property of land. On the other hand, this pronouncedly Western orientation of the papacy also affected its relations with Constantinople. For in addition to the constitutional and ‘political’ that is, legal independence from the empire at Constantinople which the papacy had indubitably achieved, the cultural and intellectual estrangement already noticeable for a long time, rapidly increased. One could speak of a severance of the bonds which had hitherto linked papal Rome and imperial Constantinople. It was this twofold detachment of the papacy from Constantinople which contributed a great deal to the acceleration of the process of creating Latin Europe as a viable unit. It is advisable to keep these mutual Western influences in perspective if one wishes to understand the strong and resilient ties which joined the papacy with the virile Northern nations.
