A comprehensive and accessible survey of the great Carolingian empire, which dominated western Europe in the eighth and ninth centuries.

1. Introduction; 2. The creation of Carolingian kingship to 800; 3. Belief and culture; 4. Inventing the Carolingian empire: politics and government, 800-840; 5. Villages and villagers, land and landowners; 6. Elite society; 7. Exchange and trade: the Carolingian economy; 8. Sustaining the Carolingian empire: politics and government, 840-888; 9. Epilogue.

Marios Costambeys is Senior Lecturer in the School of History at the University of Liverpool. His previous publications include Power and Patronage in Early Medieval Italy: Local Society, Italian Politics and the Abbey of Farfa, c.700-900 (Cambridge University Press, 2007).