歌词
As the fallen trunks of those headless Saxons slain shed their saps onto the grasses and plains near the river Aller, engorging ground and river alike with new growths and giving birth to myriad new forms of life; even as the tumbleweeds fell about the tombstone, an epitaph of those 4000 Saxon men, so Charlemagne had returned to business as usual… or so it seemed…
The horrors of that day in Verden were to loom over Charlemagne for the rest of his life; yet it appeared to many, that his actions had become increasingly savage in his harsh treatment of the Saxons. As his wise scholar friend Alcuin of York was to comment: "Sire, be ye advised that the Saxon are a proud and defiant race, not to be cowed by force. 'Tis all too evident a truth that violence doth beget more violence".
The blood-steeped King consoled himself with the idea that he was genuinely out to save souls, even participating in mass baptisms of Saxon noble and serf alike, in river and pure water sources. In the eyes of some, however, not least the rebellious Saxons themselves, the Frankish King and his Church was viewed, hated and feared as a mechanism of control; his God was not a kindly or forgiving one, but a ruthless and vindictive God, imposing His will on the people of Saxony by violent and coercive means.
But Charlemagne was not easily perturbed. Aware that many great rulers and leaders were also great killers, Charlemagne barely paused to reflect on his deeds been and passed. Whether driven by a furious and pragmatic sense of destiny and a quasi-fanatical duty to his Lord, or by a fatalistic belief that he would one day come to meet and make peace with his Maker, Charlemagne pressed on in the business of extending his empire and reinforcing his rule over his newly conquered subjects.
专辑信息