FEW manifestations of the Charlemagne legend in Latin sources written before c. 1100 focus on the man himself. Particularly in tenthand eleventh-century texts, Charlemagne was there but wasn't there; he was the eye of the hurricane, the stable focal point around which the real action swirled. Sometimes he was directly invoked in order to make a larger point about the claims of a religious house or political dynasty. Other times he was an allusive presence, with his reign serving as the backdrop for a more important cast of characters. In other words, early manifestations of the legend tended to be about projecting the great Frankish ruler as an archetype of remembered Frankish identity, one tied to militant Christian empire, and a font from which religious, political and cultural legitimacy flowed. The image of Charlemagne the man – the imagined contour of his life – was primarily important in each Latin source because one could use him to say something about the imagined Frankish Golden Age. Thus, it is particularly important for modern scholars to be sensitive to the interpenetrating ways particular historical circumstances could generate instances of the Charlemagne legend. Using his name, evoking his reign with a particular phrase, was never a value-neutral act during the ninth through eleventh centuries. Charlemagne's presence – or conspicuous absence – therefore meant something to the scribe, it meant something to the intended audience, and so it should mean something to us.

In some ways, the pro-Carolingian programme evident during much of the reign of King Philip I of Francia (r. 1060–1108) serves as a microcosm for the elements described above. The son of King Henry I (r. 1031–60), Philip became king of the Franks at the age of seven, achieved majority in 1068 at the age of fifteen, expanded royal power outwards from the Île-de-France, fought early and often with the dukes of Normandy, patronized monasteries, married into the family of the count of Flanders, repudiated his first wife, Bertha of Holland, and married the wife of the count of Anjou, quarrelled with popes Urban II (1088–99) and Paschal II (1099–1118) about both the appointment of bishops and his second marriage, sent his brother and much of his court on the First Crusade, married his daughter to a hero of that crusade, set his son Louis VI (r. 1108–37) on the throne, and was buried at Fleury.