Editing Charles Martel (section)

== Reputation and historiography ==

[[File:Carolus-Martell.jpg|thumb|Charles depicted in ''[[Promptuarium Iconum Insigniorum|Promptuarii Iconum Insigniorum]]'' by [[Guillaume Rouillé]], published in 1553]]

=== Military victories ===

For early medieval authors, Charles was famous for his military victories. [[Paul the Deacon]] for instance attributed a victory against the [[Saracen]]s actually won by Odo of Aquitaine to Charles.<ref>{{Cite book|title=The Age of Charles Martel|last=Fouracre|first=Paul|date=2000|publisher=Longman|isbn=0582064759|location=Harlow, England|page=85|oclc=43634337}}</ref> However, alongside this there soon developed a darker reputation, for his alleged abuse of church property. A ninth-century text, the ''Visio Eucherii'', possibly written by [[Hincmar|Hincmar of Reims]], portrayed Charles as suffering in [[hell]] for this reason.<ref>{{Cite book|title=The Merovingian kingdoms, 450–751|last=Wood|first=I. N.|date=1994|publisher=Longman|isbn=0582218780|location=London|oclc=27172340}} pp. 275–276</ref> According to British medieval historian [[Paul Fouracre]], this was "the single most important text in the construction of Charles's reputation as a seculariser or despoiler of church lands".<ref>{{Cite book|title=The Age of Charles Martel|last=Fouracre|first=Paul|date=2000|publisher=Longman|isbn=0582064759|location=Harlow, England|page=124|oclc=43634337}}</ref>

By the eighteenth century, historians such as [[Edward Gibbon]] had begun to portray the Frankish leader as the saviour of Christian Europe from a full-scale Islamic invasion.<ref>{{Cite book|last1=Gibbon|first1=Edward|chapter-url=https://www.ccel.org/g/gibbon/decline/volume2/chap52.htm|chapter=Chapter 52|title=The History of the Decline And Fall of the Roman Empire}}</ref>

In the nineteenth century, the German historian [[Heinrich Brunner]] argued that Charles had confiscated church lands in order to fund military reforms that allowed him to defeat the Arab conquests, in this way brilliantly combining two traditions about the ruler. However, Fouracre argued that "...there is not enough evidence to show that there was a decisive change either in the way in which the Franks fought, or in the way in which they organised the resources needed to support their warriors."<ref>{{Cite book|title=The Age of Charles Martel|last=Fouracre|first=Paul|date=2000|publisher=Longman|isbn=0582064759|location=Harlow, England|page=149|oclc=43634337}}</ref>

Many twentieth-century European historians continued to develop Gibbon's perspectives, such as French medievalist [[Christian Pfister]], who wrote in 1911 that

{{blockquote|"Besides establishing a certain unity in Gaul, Charles saved it from a great peril. In 711 the Arabs had conquered Spain. In 720 they crossed the Pyrenees, seized Narbonensis, a dependency of the kingdom of the Visigoths, and advanced on Gaul. By his able policy Odo succeeded in arresting their progress for some years; but a new vali, [[Abdul Rahman Al Ghafiqi|Abdur Rahman]], a member of an extremely fanatical sect, resumed the attack, reached Poitiers, and advanced on Tours, the holy town of Gaul. In October 732—just 100 years after the death of [[Muhammad|Mahomet]]—Charles gained a brilliant victory over [[Abdul Rahman Al Ghafiqi|Abdur Rahman]], who was called back to Africa by revolts of the Berbers and had to give up the struggle. ...After his victory, Charles took the offensive".<ref name="EB1911"/>|sign=|source=}}

Similarly, [[William E. Watson]], who wrote of the battle's importance in Frankish and world history in 1993, suggested that

{{blockquote|"Had Charles Martel suffered at Tours-Poitiers the fate of King Roderick at the Rio Barbate, it is doubtful that a "do-nothing" sovereign of the Merovingian realm could have later succeeded where his talented major domus had failed. Indeed, as Charles was the progenitor of the Carolingian line of Frankish rulers and grandfather of Charlemagne, one can even say with a degree of certainty that the subsequent history of the West would have proceeded along vastly different currents had 'Abd al-Rahman been victorious at Tours-Poitiers in 732."<ref>{{Cite journal|last=Watson|first=William|date=1993|title=The Battle of Tours-Poitiers Revisited|journal=Providence: Studies in Western Civilization|volume=2}}</ref>|sign=|source=}}

And in 1993, the influential political scientist [[Samuel P. Huntington|Samuel Huntington]] saw the battle of Tours as marking the end of the "Arab and Moorish surge west and north".<ref>{{Cite journal |last=Huntington |first=Samuel P. |date=1993 |title=The Clash of Civilizations? |url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/20045621 |journal=Foreign Affairs |volume=72 |issue=3 |pages=22–49 |doi=10.2307/20045621 |jstor=20045621 |issn=0015-7120}}</ref>

Other recent historians, however, argue that the importance of the battle is dramatically overstated, both for European history in general and for Charles's reign in particular. This view is typified by [[Alessandro Barbero]], who in 2004 wrote,

{{blockquote|"Today, historians tend to play down the significance of the battle of Poitiers, pointing out that the purpose of the Arab force defeated by Charles Martel was not to conquer the Frankish kingdom, but simply to pillage the wealthy monastery of St-Martin of Tours".<ref>{{Cite book|title=Charlemagne : father of a continent|first=Alessandro|last=Barbero|date=2004|publisher=University of California Press|isbn=0520239431|location=Berkeley|oclc=52773483|page=10}}</ref>|sign=|source=}}

Similarly, in 2002 Tomaž Mastnak wrote:
{{blockquote|"The continuators of Fredegar's chronicle, who probably wrote in the mid-eighth century, pictured the battle as just one of many military encounters between Christians and Saracens—moreover, as only one in a series of wars fought by Frankish princes for booty and territory... One of Fredegar's continuators presented the battle of Poitiers as what it really was: an episode in the struggle between Christian princes as the Carolingians strove to bring Aquitaine under their rule."<ref>{{Cite book|title=Crusading peace : Christendom, the Muslim world, and Western political order|first=Tomaž|last=Mastnak|date=2002|publisher=University of California Press|isbn=9780520925991|location=Berkeley|oclc=52861403|page= }}</ref>}}

More recently, the memory of Charles has been appropriated by [[Far-right politics|far right]] and [[White nationalism|white nationalist]] groups, such as the '[[Charles Martel Group]]' in France, and by the perpetrator of the [[Christchurch mosque shootings]] at [[Al Noor Mosque, Christchurch|Al Noor Mosque]] and [[Linwood Islamic Centre]] in [[Christchurch]], New Zealand, in 2019.<ref>{{Cite news|url=https://www.washingtonpost.com/outlook/2019/03/18/fake-history-that-fueled-accused-christchurch-shooter/|title=Perspective {{!}} The fake history that fueled the accused Christchurch shooter|newspaper=Washington Post|language=en|access-date=2019-06-04}}</ref> The memory of Charles is a topic of debate in contemporary French politics on both the right and the left.<ref>{{Cite book |last=Blanc |first=William |title=Charles Martel et la Bataille de Poitiers |year=2022 |publisher=Libertalia |isbn=9782377292356}}</ref>

=== Order of the Genet ===
In the seventeenth century, a legend emerged that Charles had formed the first regular order of knights in France. In 1620, Andre Favyn stated (without providing a source) that among the spoils Charles's forces captured after the Battle of Tours were many [[Genet (animal)|genets]] (raised for their fur) and several of their pelts.<ref>{{Cite book |last=Favyn |first=Andre |title=Le Theatre d'honneur et de chevalerie |year=1620}}</ref> Charles gave these furs to leaders amongst his army, forming the first order of knighthood, the Order of the Genet. Favyn's claim was then repeated and elaborated in later works in English, for instance by [[Elias Ashmole]] in 1672,<ref>{{Cite book |last=Ashmole |first=Elias |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=woFlAAAAcAAJ&pg=PA97 |title=The Institution, Laws and Ceremonies of the Most Noble Order of the Garter |year=1672 |pages=97|publisher=J. Macock }}</ref> and James Coats in 1725.<ref>{{cite book |author=James Coats |title=A New Dictionary of Heraldry |date=1725 |publisher=Jer. Batley |pages=163–164}}</ref>