Carloman of Bavaria

Carloman
King of Bavaria and Italy
Carloman (Karlomannus rex Bawariae), from a 12th-century manuscript
King of Bavaria
Reign	28 August 876 – 879
Predecessor	Louis II
Successor	Louis III
King of Italy
Reign	877–879
Predecessor	Charles II
Successor	Charles III
Born	c. 830
Died	22 March 880
Burial	Ötting, Bavaria
Wife Concubine	Unnamed wife (a daughter of Count Ernest) Liutswind
Issue	Arnulf
Dynasty	Carolingian
Father	Louis II
Mother	Hemma

Carloman (German: Karlmann, Latin: Karlomannus; c. 830 – 22 March 880), was a Frankish king of the Carolingian dynasty. He was the eldest son of Louis the German, king of East Francia, and Hemma, daughter of a Bavarian count. His father appointed him margrave of Pannonia in 856, and upon his father's death in 876 he became King of Bavaria. He was appointed by King Louis II of Italy as his successor, but the Kingdom of Italy was taken by his uncle Charles the Bald in 875. Carloman only conquered it in 877. In 879 he was incapacitated, perhaps by a stroke, and abdicated Bavaria to Louis the Younger and Italy to Charles the Fat.

Carloman's birth date is unknown, but was probably around 830. His naming can be connected to his father's push to rule Alemannia around the time of his father's assembly of Worms in 829. The first Carolingian dynast named Carloman had ruled Alemannia in 741–48, and subjugated it to the Franks.

Carloman was old enough to participate in the civil war of 840–43, waged between his father and his uncles, Lothair and Charles the Bald. His first record public appearance is as the leader of an army of reinforcements from Bavaria and Alemannia which he brought to his father at Worms in 842. He subsequently led them in battle alongside his father and uncle (Charles the Bald) against his other uncle (Lothair). It was the beginning of a warlike career. Notker of Saint Gall, who bewailed the decline of the dynasty a generation later, called Carloman bellicosissimus (literally "most warlike", or in historian Eric Goldberg's words a "real ass-kicker").