Seeing Europe with Famous Authors, Volume 5 - Germany, Austria-Hungary, and Switzerland, Part 1 by Various
page 122 of 182 (67%)
page 122 of 182 (67%)
![]() | ![]() |
|
in length.
It is evident that some other monument had been erected to Charlemagne. There is nothing to convince us that this marble, bordered with brass, is of antiquity. As to the letters, "Carolo Magno," they are not of a late date than 1730. Charlemagne is no longer under this stone. In 1166 Frederick Barbarossa--whose gift, magnificent tho it was, does by no means compensate for this sacrilege--caused the remains of that great emperor to be untombed. The Church claimed the imperial skeleton, and, separating the bones, made each a holy relic. In the adjoining sacristy, a vicar shows the people--for three francs seventy-five centimes--the fixt price--"the arm of Charlemagne"--that arm which held for a time the reins of the world. Venerable relic! which has the following inscription, written by some scribe of the twelfth century: "Arm of the Sainted Charles the Great." After that I saw the skull of Charlemagne, that cranium which may be said to have been the mold of Europe, and which a beadle had the effrontery to strike with his finger. All were kept in a wooden armory, with a few angels, similar to those I have just mentioned, on the top. Such is the tomb of the man whose memory has outlived ten ages, and who, by his greatness, has shed the rays of immortality around his name. "Sainted, Great," belong to him--two of the most august epithets which this earth could bestow upon a human being. |
|