Romanæ febres stabili sunt iure fideles.'
[158] There was a separate chancellor for Italy, as afterwards for the kingdom of Burgundy.
[159] Liudprand, Legatio Constantinopolitana.
[160] 'Sancti imperii nostri olim servos principes, Beneventanum scilicet, tradat,' &c. The epithet is worth noticing.
[161] Liudprand calls the Eastern Franks 'Franci Teutonici' to distinguish them from the Romanized Franks of Gaul or 'Francigenæ,' as they were frequently called. The name 'Frank' seems even so early as the tenth century to have been used in the East as a general name for the Western peoples of Europe. Liudprand says that the Greek Emperor included 'sub Francorum nomine tam Latinos quam Teutonicos.' Probably this use dates from the time of Charles.
[162] Conring, De Finibus Imperii.
[163] Basileus was a favourite title of the English kings before the Conquest. Titles like this used in these early English charters prove, it need hardly be said, absolutely nothing as to the real existence of any rights or powers of the English king beyond his own borders. What they do prove (over and above the taste for florid rhetoric in the royal clerks) is the impression produced by the imperial style, and by the idea of the emperor's throne as supported by the thrones of kings and other lesser potentates.
[164] The coins of Crescentius are said to exhibit the insignia of the old Empire.—Palgrave, Normandy and England, i. 715. But probably some at least of them are forgeries.
[165] Proclamation in Pertz, M. G. H. ii.
[166] 'Imperator antiquam Romanorum consuetudinem iam ex magna parte deletam suis cupiens renovare temporibus multa faciebat quæ diversi diverse sentiebant.'—Thietmar, Chron. ix.; ap. Pertz, M. G. H. t. iii.