The renegotiation of precariae in the eighth century echoed throughout the Frankish world in a number of disputes. The precaria verbo regis, through which Carolingian rulers reconciled networks of property holders to the imperatives of royal lordship, in time elicited criticisms of abuse from prelates; and the monks' imposition of rents, which revamped their relationship to precarists, almost immediately aroused the opposition of traditional patrons. Such strains should hardly be surprising. Any period of political consolidation was bound to be disruptive as local patterns were redirected to the political centre. These flash-points are instructive because they shed light on the processes of centralization in early medieval Europe, on the methods by which a general political order might be constructed from local institutional networks. At Murbach in southern Alsace, where monks complained about the loss of property to royal agents, and at Weissenburg to the north, where patrons contested precarial rents, we can observe in detail the alignment of local power with an assertive Carolingian authority.

THE RECEPTION OF THE PRECARIA VERBO REGIS

By the late eighth century, many monasteries and churches were concerned that royal retainers endowed with precariae verbo regis would look to the ruler as the source of their grants and neglect to honour ecclesiastical rights. This was a noticeable change in attitude from the early eighth century when, if the absence of concrete complaints in the contemporary record is any indication, such worries had not yet arisen.