The king of the Franks, Charlemagne carried a sword known as the Joyeuse (French: l’épée de Charlemagne) or the Sword of Charlemagne. Joyeuse also means “joyful” or “rainbow” and this sword had been used during the crowning of French kings and queens since the reign of Charlemagne. The Louvre Museum is now displaying the Sword of Charlemagne with the main title “Sword of the coronation of the kings of France“. According to tradition, the village of Joyeuse in the Ardèche of Southeastern France was named after this sword. Also, a street in Caen bears this name.
The Legends of the Sword of Charlemagne
Legend has it that Charlemagne’s personal sword was called Joyeuse. It is up there among the world’s most renowned weapons, rivaling the sword of Archangel Michael. Ancient myths and tales have ascribed mystical powers to the Sword of Charlemagne because of its association with the reign of the Frank King, who reigned around 1200 years ago.
Myths have it that the Sword of Charlemagne shares its metal composition with Edward the Confessor’s (d. 1066) Curtana and Roland’s (d. 778) Durendal.
According to alternative accounts, the sword’s blade originated from the spear tip (the Holy Lance) used by Longinus, the Roman legionary who pierced the body of Jesus during his crucifixion.
The Matter of France is a collection of medieval literary works that include fictionalized versions of historical figures like Charlemagne and members of his court like Count Roland. In these texts, Charlemagne’s personal sword is called Joyeuse.
The most famous 11th-century knightly epic, Song of Roland by Turoldus (verse CLXXXII) mentions this event and also describes how this sword changed its color 30 times a day:
Si ad vestut sun blanc osberc sasfret,
Laciet sun elme, ki est a or gemmet,
Ceinte Joiuse, unches ne fut sa per,
Ki cascun jur muet .XXX. clartez.
Asez savum de la lance parler
Dunt Nostre Sire fut en la cruiz nasfret:
Carles en ad la mure, mercit Deu;
en l’oret punt l’ad faite manuvrer.
Pur ceste honur e pur ceste bontet,
Li nums Joiuse l’espee fut dunet.
He’s donned his white hauberk, with broidery,
The Song of Roland, verse CLXXXIII (Reference: Orbilat.com)
Has laced his helm, jewelled with golden beads,
Girt on Joyeuse, there never was its peer,
Whereon each day thirty fresh hues appear.
All of us know that lance, and well may speak
Whereby Our Lord was wounded on the Tree:
Charles, by God’s grace, possessed its point of steel!
His golden hilt he enshrined it underneath.
By that honor and by that sanctity
The name Joyeuse was for that sword decreed.
In order to avoid seeming like an underling to Charlemagne, Baligant, the Saracens’ commander and the Emir of Babylon, gave his sword the name Précieuse according to The Song of Roland.
According to another legend, when one of Charlemagne’s knights found Joyeuse after it had been lost in combat, the King honored him by bestowing upon him the feudal dominion over a tract of land that he named Joyeuse.
Was the Sword of Charlemagne Real?
The First Crusade was famously split down the middle between those who believed in the legitimacy of an acquired spear with which the flesh of the already-dead Jesus was pierced and those who did not. These events occurred in 1096–1099, long after Charlemagne’s death in 814.
Therefore, it is impossible for Charlemagne, the king of the united kingdom of the Franks, to have had this spear that killed Jesus, because the Joyeuse has been dated to the 11th century using modern scientific techniques such as radiocarbon research. This also reflects the fact that Charlemagne did not actually own the Joyeuse sword.
For the Louvre Museum of France, the pommel is dated to the 10th or 11th, the crossguard to the 12th, and the scabbard to the 13th century.
Despite not being the real sword owned by Charlemagne, this weapon represented the continuity between the French monarchy and that of the great Carolingian ruler.
Counter Arguments
According to the Oakeshott typology, British arms historian Ewart Oakeshott reached some surprising findings. The author referred to Joyeuse as Charlemagne’s sword. For that, he did not even use the English form of the name of the emperor, Charles the Great, but the well-established French form, Charlemagne.
Oakeshott disagreed with the scholars who dated the Sword of Charlemagne to the 13th century. For him, the Joyeuse’s hilt was of a design common in the 9th century, the cross-guard was not unusually long for Frankish swords, and the pommel’s cap in the shape of a “teapot cover” placed the weapon closer to the 9th century than the 13th.
Nonetheless, the sword’s weight percentage of gold, as shown by the hallmark on the cross-guard, still suggests that it was made in the 13th century. Oakeshott, however, claimed that the Sword of Charlemagne was reconstructed many times and embellished each time, which might have included the branding of newer gold plating.
Historical Evidence Regarding This Sword
Probably starting with Philip II of France (1165–1223) in 1179, the French kings during their coronations wielded this sword now known as the Sword of Charlemagne or Joyeuse. However, the 1270 coronation festivities of Philip III the Bold (1245–1285) are the first to be confirmed in writing as such a coronation event.
Charles X (1757–1836) was the final member of the Bourbon dynasty to sit atop the French throne on May 29, 1825. This year, Charles X once again used the Sword of Charlemagne as a part of a peaceful transition of power. However, this was the last of the French coronation events that featured the Joyeuse.
Before the French Revolution (1793), it was housed in the Abbey of Saint-Denis until at least 1505, among other royal treasures. After that, the sword was transferred to the newly founded Louvre Museum. The French monarchs were traditionally buried in the same abbey church. Along with the sword, the monks also maintained the royal regalia and the French flag of battle, the Oriflamme.
Reims was the location of the coronation rituals. The first element of the coronation event was the presentation of spurs and swords to the king as emblems of chivalry. The constable of France held the sword with the blade facing up throughout the duration of the ritual.
Size and Weight
Charlemagne was described as “with a single blow of his sword, Joyeuse, he split a knight in arms” in the Great Chronicles of France, an illuminated book from the 15th century written by Jean Fouquet.
Charlemagne is said to have had one sword and one saber. The Louvre in Paris (catalog number MS 84) houses the Joyeuse sword, while the Imperial Treasury Vienna in Austria houses the saber.
The entire length of the Sword of Charlemagne is 39.6 in (100.5 cm), with an impressive blade length of 32.6 in (82.8 cm). It was much larger than the average one-handed sword designed for battle. At its widest point, the cross-guard measures 8.9 in (22.6 cm).
This extraordinary sword’s broad base measures 1.77 in (4.5 cm) in width, while its formidable blade (of Oakeshott type XII) boasts a thickness of 0.87 in (2.2 cm). With a weight of 2.53 lb (1.15 kg) the Sword of Charlemagne carried a significant presence. The embellished scabbard weighed 1.87 lb (850 g).
Design Features of the Sword of Charlemagne
This sword was formerly thought to have belonged to Charlemagne, the greatest French ruler of the Middle Ages, by monks and others. However, modern study has indicated a later date for the Sword of Charlemagne, owing to the discordance between the artistic features, dimensions, and stated age. The lack of a counterpart for the sword also creates difficulties for historians.
The present iteration of the Sword of Charlemagne has ornamentation that dates back to many eras. Embossed decorations—crafted with the repoussé technique—representing birds adorn both sides of the handle, evoking the style of Scandinavian ornaments from the 10th and 11th centuries.
The cross-guard’s two halves, which take the form of stylized winged dragons, are believed to date back to the 12th century. The golden hilt’s diamond inlays date back to the Middle Ages, during the 13th and 14th centuries.
For the coronation of Napoleon Bonaparte, Ewart Oakeshott was convinced that the Sword of Charlemagne had been dismantled, cleaned, and given a new handle.
The 1825 coronation of Charles X likely necessitated a near-total refurbishment of the scabbard. The velvet scabbard has lilies (to represent the Fleur-de-lis, the heraldry of France) stitched into a large portion of its surface. It was added much later for the coronation of Charles X of France in 1824.
A big gold plate set with a variety of precious stones and a gold belt buckle fashioned in the same way are two of the scabbard’s original components that have survived to the present day.
The Sword of Charlemagne is a superb piece of royal regalia, yet it has been altered and improved upon so much that it hardly resembles the original.
Did The Sword of Charlemagne Originally Belong to Attila the Hun?
Legends subsequently connected the Sword of Charlemagne in Vienna to the Turkish Hunnic commander Attila the Hun, albeit it was previously thought to have belonged to Charlemagne. Attila the Hun was said to have carried the mythical Sword of Attila, often called the Sword of Mars or the Sword of God.
And the royal coronations in France have included Charlemagne’s personal sword, Joyeuse, since the 13th century This theory seems to be from the early 9th century and maybe of Hungarian provenance; however, there is no evidence to substantiate these assertions.
According to one theory, before the Miholjanec legend, Attila’s sword in Vienna was actually known as the Sword of Charlemagne. Prior to the discovery of the Sword of Attila’s likely origin in the Miholjanec area, it was thought that the Sword of Attila was Joyeuse.
