In this chapter we explore the textual and material evidence for the transformation of the city of Antioch in northern Syria from the seventh through ninth centuries. Through observations of the environmental shocks, including the Justinianic Plague, which first arrived in AD 542, as well as the effects of a series of major earthquakes, we assess demographic changes that likely accompanied these events. Following this, we explore some possible reconstruction of the population of Antioch and its hinterland. In the early medieval period, a reassessment of the material evidence, read together with descriptions from medieval texts, demonstrates that a level economic and social activity, probably significantly exceeding previous estimates, persisted through the ‘Dark Ages’ of the seventh-ninth centuries.

This chapter argues that, especially in the East Frankish Kingdom, Carolingian advocates were operating as key local agents for churches on their estates by the mid-ninth century at the latest. While the sources from the West Frankish and Italian parts of the Carolingian empire suggest different trends, the East Frankish sources (especially royal grants of immunity) demonstrate that advocates acquired important policing powers and judicial authority on ecclesiastical properties during this period. This undermines the typical scholarly argument that Carolingian advocates were a different phenomenon than subsequent types of advocates, as these East Frankish advocates already had responsibilities that most later advocates would continue to have into the eighteenth century.

One interesting way to discern how Carolingian ninth-century Italy actually was is to look at major narrative sources produced in Italy at that time and see how often and in what ways they talked about the Carolingians. This chapter looks in particular at History of the Lombards in the Gotha Codex, the history of Andreas of Bergamo, the Roman Liber Pontificalis,  Agnellus of Ravenna’s Book of Pontiffs, the Chronicle of Benedict of Monte Casino and the History of the Lombards of Benevento by Erchempert. One finds that Carolingians are mentioned surprisingly infrequently apart from the era of Louis II, and he turns out to have been a rather polarizing figure. Major wars and political struggles in southern Italy feature Carolingians only tangentially. Carolingians appear sporadically on the Roman scene. Carolingians appear infrequently in accounts fo development sin northern Italy. Reading the narrative sources would not lead one to speak of a 'Carolingian' Italy.