The Palace of Aachen was a group of buildings with residential, political, and religious purposes chosen by Charlemagne to be the center of power of the Carolingian Empire. The palace was located north of the current city of Aachen, today in the German Land of North Rhine-Westphalia. Most of the Carolingian palace was built in the 790s but the works went on until Charlemagne's death in 814. The plans, drawn by Odo of Metz, were part of the program of renovation of the kingdom decided by the ruler. Today much of the palace is ruined, but the Palatine Chapel has been preserved and is considered a masterpiece of Carolingian architecture and a characteristic example of architecture from the Carolingian Renaissance.
The construction of Aachen, illumination by Jean Fouquet, in the Grandes Chroniques de France, 15th century. Charlemagne is in the foreground.
Statue of Charlemagne in front of Aachen's city hall
Carolingian Empire and its capital, Aachen, in the early 9th century.
Eginhard is Charlemagne's biographer; the name of the architect of the Palace of Aachen is known thanks to his work (14th/15th-century illumination)
Charlemagne was King of the Franks from 768, King of the Lombards from 774, and Emperor of what is now known as the Carolingian Empire from 800, holding all these titles until his death in 814. Charlemagne succeeded in uniting the majority of Western Central Europe, and was the first recognized emperor to rule in the west after the fall of the Western Roman Empire approximately three centuries earlier. Charlemagne's rule saw a program of political and social changes that had a lasting impact on Europe in the Middle Ages.
A denarius of Charlemagne dated c. 812–814 with the inscription KAROLVS IMP AVG (Karolus Imperator Augustus)
Sketch thought to be of Charlemagne c. 800
20th-century painting of Charlemagne's coronation at Noyon in 768.
Pope Adrian receiving Charlemagne at Rome
