Mertcan Bulak
@MBulak
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Ağustos 2020 tarihinde katıldı
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The vassal would join his hands and extend them. The feudal lord would clasp his hands around the vassal’s hands, pull him up, and kiss him. The vassal’s hands joined and extended have become the symbol and posture of prayer today, “praying hands.”
Charlemagne conquered the Bavarians and the Saxons, the last of the independent Germanic tribes. “It took thirty-two campaigns to subdue the staunchly pagan Saxons, who lived between the Rhine and Elbe rivers. Charlemagne divided Saxony into bishoprics, built monasteries, and proclaimed harsh laws against paganism. Eating meat during Lent, cremating the dead (an old pagan practice), and pretending to be baptized were offenses punishable by death.” His brutality in conquering and converting the Saxons was extreme by any measure.
In 751 the Lombards had conquered the imperial territory at Ravenna, the seat of Byzantine government in Italy, and were demanding tribute from the pope and threatening to take Rome. Following Pepin’s coronation, the pope secured his promise of armed intervention in Italy and his pledge to give the papacy the territory of Ravenna once it was conquered. In 756 a Frankish army forced the Lombard king to surrender his conquests, and Pepin officially conferred the Ravenna territory upon the pope. Known as the Donation of Pepin, the gift made the pope a temporal ruler over the Papal States, a strip of territory that extended diagonally across Italy from coast to coast.
In opposition to these high-sounding titles, Gregory called himself simply “the servant of the servants of God.” This became one of the standing titles of the popes, although it sounds like irony when linked with later astounding claims.
When church leaders decided to elect a monk named Gregory, he refused the office and even fled from the city, hiding in the forest, until he was found and dragged back to Rome. After notifying Constantinople, officials consecrated him St. Peter’s successor on September 3, 590.