Tractoriae and the logistics of Carolingian entourages

Abstract

Entourages played a central role in Carolingian politics and military organization. Yet historians have neglected the important question of how kings and magnates supplied their retinues. This article investigates that topic by examining an overlooked genre of evidence: tractoriae or royal letters of requisition. Louis the Pious revived the use of these late Roman and Merovingian documents to authorize magnates to collect supplies for their followers and horses. The provisions enumerated in tractoriae give us rare insight into the composition and scale of ninth-century retinues and armies. Their disappearance during the reign of Charles the Bald was bound up with larger transformations of late Carolingian politics.