Treaty of Verdun

Three-way partition of the Carolingian Empire among the surviving sons of Louis the Pious after three years of civil war. Lothair I retained the imperial title and a long, narrow Middle Francia stretching from the Low Countries through Burgundy into Italy. Louis the German received East Francia, the kernel of medieval Germany; Charles the Bald received West Francia, the kernel of France. The borders sketched in 843 shaped European politics for the next millennium.