Preface

This short preface is divided into two parts. The first aims to recall the research project Ruling in hard times. Patterns of power and practices of government in the making of Carolingian Italy, to which this volume belongs. The second part recalls the epistemological principles common to the various essays and, in particular, highlights an aspect that characterises them: the desire to move away from a stereotypical opposition between local elites and the “transalpine”Reichsaristokratie that has long dominated the study of Carolingian Italy.