Oathbreakers: The War of Brothers That Shattered an Empire and Made Medieval Europe is a recent work of history by Matthew Gabriele and David M. Perry. The book primarily documents the Carolingian Civil War, which was a bloody conflict among Charlemagne's descendants that fractured the vast empire built by Charlemagne with much blood and treasure. Buy it on Amazon: https://amzn.to/4vDjvka The story starts earlier with Charlemagne’s immediate predecessors, his grandfather and father, who successfully took power from the Merovingians. The authors then summarize and provide insights into familial conflicts and power plays that had already started in the time of Charlemagne. Essentially, the signs of civil war were already starting to show by the end of Charlemagne’s reign. We then visit the reign of Louis the Pious who was Charlemagne’s sole surviving son. Has their been a number of heirs, one suspects that outright war between the Franks may have started earlier. Ho...
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