"Charlemagne remains one of the most compelling figures in European history. In this lively, vivid portrait of an extraordinary monarch and his achievements, Roger Collins profiles the most powerful and significant ruler in Western Europe between the end of the Roman Empire and the Italian Renaissance. While his achievements were in some ways ephemeral (after all, his great empire soon broke up), he can still clearly be seen as the figure who transformed the nature of Europe and ushered in a period which has an explicit and comprehensible connection with our own."--[book jacket].