Many would dream during the Middle Ages of piecing all these fragments back together, but it would take nearly a thousand years for one ruler to once again hold the whole Carolingian inheritance in his hands. He was Napoléon Bonaparte—another irresistible warrior and accumulator, but one whose career only served to emphasize what Charlemagne’s had done: it has only been possible to unite Europe once or twice in every millennium, and even then, not for very long.
