The Carolingian Transformation of Early Medieval Catalonia

Abstract

This paper presents a refl ection on how we can measure the intensity and quality of the Carolingian transformation of the Southwestern Iberian periphery of the Carolingian Empire during and after its existence from the ninth to the eleventh century. The view through the lens of a border region and its challenges of having always been a middle ground of knowledge transfer and identity – building between the political, religious and cultural centres of the Frankish Empire, the Northern Christian Iberian reigns and the Southern Muslim dominions of the Mediterranean world – can sharpen our instruments of describing Carolingian culture in its European centres and peripheries. By using established categories of the qualifi cation of cultural skills and knowledge, the paper discusses two central phenomena of Carolingian culture: 1) the development and use of a specifi c Carolingian minuscule and 2) the introduction and transformation of Carolingian texts of religious life in the rising transcultural society of early medieval Catalonia. In doing so, the paper shows that we must reconsider the attribute “Carolingian” from a double perspective – from the external Frankish-French and the internal Iberian-Visigothic-Catalan standpoint.