Ermengarde of Hesbaye

When Louis the Pious lay on the ground and begged for forgiveness, he was not just asking for forgiveness from his family under duress, but also from what he considered the almighty power of the universe, God and Jesus Christ.

So how did it come to this? Well, Louis the Pious had four sons, as we know, three from his first marriage to the now dead Ermengarde, and one from his next wife, Judith, who was an influential and, for the three elder sons, a malign influence on the court of the emperor.

I see Judith as a fairly impressive person, however, clearly fighting the corner of her son Charles, while running a lot of the day-to-day operations of the court of her husband.

By the middle of the 820s, Lothair, Louis the Pious's eldest son, was a powerful man.