Charlemagne, the great founder of the Frankish Empire, in spite of his enthusiasm for the advancement of the Catholic faith and in defiance of the decrees of a Church which he adored, and by which he was afterwards honoured as a saint, considered it his duty to contribute to the progress of the Jewish colonies in France and Germany. If the Churchman saw in the Jews the enemies of Christ, the statesman saw in them useful subjects, through whose international connections the interests of his Empire might be served. Among other liberties, he allowed them to act as intermediaries in the slave trade. Exempt from the burdens as well as from the honours of chivalry on one hand, and from the degradation of the peasantry on the other, the Jews at this period devoted all their energies to commerce. But Charlemagne was more than an imperial shopkeeper. The spiritual needs of his subjects, Jewish no less than Christian, received as much attention from him as their material welfare. Though his own learning was of very late and limited growth, this great soldier was keenly alive to the value of scholarship, and he endeavoured to diffuse education by encouraging learned men of both creeds to bring their lights from Italy to the dark regions of the North. Under his long reign the Jews prospered and spread over many parts of Germany. In the ninth century great Jewish colonies were to be found in Magdeburg, Mersburg, and Ratisbon, whence they penetrated into the Slavonic lands of Bohemia and Poland. But even Charlemagne could not quite overlook the chasm which separated the Jew from the Christian. In deposing against a Christian, the Jewish witness was obliged to stand within a circle of thorns, to hold the Torah in his right hand, and to call down upon himself frightful curses if he spoke not the truth. The Jews were also forbidden to buy or sell sacred church vessels, to receive Christian hostages for debt, and to trade in wine and cereals. ♦814–840♦