CHARLEMAGNE GOES HOME

Bay of Plenty Beacon, Volume 9, Issue 38, 11 January 1946, Page 3

CHARLEMAGNE GOES HOME

REMAINS REMOVED FROM TOMB In an American truck driven by an American GI, Charles the Great Emperor of the Holy Roman Empire has been brought back to liis last resting place at Aachen. The. Germans had removed Charlemagne’s remains from his famous tomb in the city where they were laid in the year 814 to a place of safety in Westphalia. ,

Aachen was Charlemagne’s favourite residence and there he built his own mausoleum, and there lie was buried under an enormous slab which hore the words “Carolo Magno.” The great church was built on a model of the church of the Holy Sepulchre in Jerusalem and long after its erection it remained one of the wonders of the western world to the varied peoples over whom the

Kmperor reigned. The return of Charlemagne’s body symbolises for Europe a sense of her tradition and history over a thousand years. It was the great Emperor who joined the old Empire rich in ancient tradition, with tine vital new life of the young nations of the north and so helped to lay the foundations of European culture and civilisation to which the world owes so much.