Of all the various knights who appeared in different parts of the Empire immediately after 888, the strongest and most able was Arnulf, a bastard nephew of Charles the Fat, but a warrior of renown, who was raised on the East Frankish throne by the disgusted nobles in 888. A descendant of Charles the Great, he was, for a very brief period, looked upon as the head of the Carolingian Empire. Odo of Eudes, the Count of Paris, placed his royal crown in the hands of Arnulf and received it back as a royal vassal. Berengar of Italy also did homage to Arnulf and received his kingdom as a fief. Soon, however, local kings set up by the people arose and Arnulf restricted his rule to Germany and Italy.[387:1] He defeated the predatory Northmen, checked the inroads of the warlike Magyars, and by storming Rome compelled the Corsican Pope Formosus to crown him as Emperor (896).[387:2] Then he turned his attention to the boy Emperor in Italy, the Duke of Spoleto, but was smitten by disease and hastened back to Germany (d. 899).[387:3] Italy was thus left to sixty years of tumult and anarchy. With the death of his son, Louis the Child, in 911, the Carolingian dynasty passed away in Germany. In 987 the powerful French barons set aside the Carolingian heir and elected Hugh Capet, the Duke of France, as king of the feudal monarchy and the Archbishop of Rheims crowned him.[387:4] The Carolingian Empire was at an end. For more than half a century now the imperial crown was a reward in the Pope's hands to be bestowed upon this or that Italian noble for "value received."[388:1] The first half of the tenth century seemed to be the very nadir of political order and conscious culture. It is almost impossible for a modern mind to comprehend the torrents of barbaric destruction sweeping in over western Europe from all sides. As compared with the Teutonic invasion of the Roman Empire five centuries before, the onslaught was more sudden and fiercer while the internal resistance was much more poorly organised and consequently weaker. For several centuries these forces had been gathering. Charles the Great had held the torrent in check. But not long after the dissolution of his Empire the onslaught began. The merciless Saracens roamed the Mediterranean Sea as its masters, laid waste the Christian seacoast towns, and even sacked Rome itself, the seat of Empire and Christian rule. The Danes and Northmen swept the North Sea, the English Channel, the Atlantic coast, and pierced France and Germany by their rivers, almost to the heart, killing, robbing, and taking captives. They even boldly passed Gibraltar into the Mediterranean and fell upon Provence and Italy, where they left an indelible impression.