The Emperor and the Elephant: Christians and Muslims in the Age of Charlemagne by Sam Ottewill-Soulsby (review)

Reviewed by: The Emperor and the Elephant: Christians and Muslims in the Age of Charlemagne by Sam Ottewill-Soulsby James Muldoon The Emperor and the Elephant: Christians and Muslims in the Age of Charlemagne. By sam ottewill-soulsby. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2023. xviii + 363 pp. $39.95 (hardcover). The image of the Emperor Charlemagne as the stalwart defender of Christendom against the advancing Muslims is quite old. It is the theme of the Song of Roland, the eleventh century epic honoring the heroic figure killed by Muslims as he commanded the rearguard defending Charlemagne's army as it was withdrawing from Muslim Spain after a campaign there. As Sam Ottewill-Soulsby points out, this image of Charlemagne remains widespread, even appearing in recent American political debate when "a white nationalist radio host" compared Donald Trump to Charlemagne and "a journalist writing for the Washington Post" explained to his readers that Charlemagne was "the Holy Roman Emperor who tried to drive Muslims out of Europe" (p. 1), an image that reduced relations between Christians and Muslims in the Carolingian era to a simple Us versus Them situation, a conflict between two well-organized societies. As Ottewill-Soulsby points out, however, "Charlemagne the fighter of Muslims was only a part of a much more complicated historical reality" (p. 2). The complexity of Carolingian relations with Muslims is illustrated by two events. In the first place, Roland was not killed by Muslims but by Christian Basques with whom Charlemagne had also fought. In the second place, as the title of this book indicates, there was a famous exchange of gifts between Charlemagne and Hārūn al-Rashīd, [End Page 333] the Abbāsid Caliph who sent an elephant that reached Charlemagne at Aachen in 802. The response was a delegation that brought gold and cloth to the Caliph. Furthermore, neither Christian nor Muslim society formed a structured state. As author points out, the Carolingians encountered, "a multipolar Islamic world" (p. 20) divided between the Abbāsids and Umayyads and then subdivided into the various elements devoted to the interests of the dynasties of lesser ruling families within their jurisdictions. The famous dynastic problems that Charlemagne's son and successor, Louis the Pious, faced with his sons can be found in both Christian and Muslim societies. Given the numerous conflicting forces within the Christian and the Muslim societies, it is no wonder that there were diplomatic contact, treaties, and even alliances between Christians and Muslims, especially along the various frontiers. Both the Carolingians and their Muslim opposite numbers were expansionist, so that they confronted one another at various points around the Mediterranean, leading to negotiations for exchanging prisoners or for the transfer of the remains of local saints whose graves were now in Islamic hands to Christian lands. Furthermore, it is clear that those engaged in dynastic quarrels sought support from anyone who would provide it, sometimes resulting in Christians supporting one side in Muslim dynastic quarrels. One might ask at this point whether or not the contacts with Muslim societies might have led to better relations over the long term. The author suggests that was not likely because of the "contingent nature of Carolingian contact with the Umayyads and the Abbāsids. Proximity did not make diplomacy automatic" (p. 281). Such contacts were tactical arrangements involving specific limited goals and based on the principle that the enemy of my enemy is my friend, a reason for cooperation does not necessarily lead to long term peaceful relations. The great strength of his volume is the author's use of Islamic sources along with extensive examination of the Carolingian sources. Read in conjunction with Tomaž Mastnak's Crusading Peace: The Muslim World and Western Political Order (2002) and Ian Almond's Two Faiths, One Banner: When Muslims Marched With Christians across Europe's Battlegrounds (2011), it provides a fuller picture of the complex relations between Christians and Muslims than is commonly found. Will the record of Carolingian treaties and contacts with Muslims damage Charlemagne's reputation as their dedicated enemy? That it is not likely. As a newspaper editor says in a famous film about reputation: "when the legend become fact, print...