Adalbero of Reims
Adalbero of Reims ended the Carolingian dynasty with an argument about what a king is. He came from the Ardennes nobility, was educated at Gorze in the middle of the monastic reform, and became archbishop of Reims in 969 - the see whose holder crowned the kings of the Franks, which made him the most politically placed churchman in the kingdom. He rebuilt his cathedral, reformed the chapter, and brought Gerbert of Aurillac - later Pope Sylvester II, and the best mathematician in Latin Europe - to teach at the school there. His politics were imperial: he worked with the Ottonians against the Carolingian kings' attempts to take Lotharingia, and was tried for treason for it in 985, the trial collapsing when the king died. When Louis V was killed in a hunting accident in 987 the Carolingian claimant was Charles of Lorraine, the late king's uncle. He put the case against him to the assembly at Senlis, and the argument recorded by Richer is the interesting part: the throne is not acquired by hereditary right but conferred on the man whose birth and character recommend him, and Charles had made himself a duke's vassal and married beneath him. The assembly elected Hugh Capet, whose family had provided kings before and had long been the crown's chief rival. He crowned him at Noyon. The dynasty he founded held France for eight hundred years, and Charles of Lorraine was taken by treachery at Laon and died a prisoner. He died in 989 without seeing whether it would hold, and his pupil Gerbert was elected to succeed him at Reims in a disputed election that occupied the papacy for years.
- Lived: 920 CE – 989 CE
- Nationality: Frankish
- Roles: archbishop, politician
