Uniformity of the Caroline minuscule across the empire allowed for greater accountability and expedience in the expression of power, particularly that of Charlemagne. He demanded literacy and uniformity of writing from all of his territories. Therefore, he could send charters, edicts, demands, etc. to one end of his empire or the other and expect them to be understood and followed.
This placed a burden of accountability on those receiving his written demands. They could no longer fain ignorance of the contents of a message from the king, because they were obligated to be able to understand the writing in the edicts, and could not blame a bonded messenger for transferring the message improperly.
This also served to increase Charlemagne’s expedience in the way of meeting the needs of his country, for subjects in all of the realm could communicate with him via writing, which was a more explicit and assured form of communication than through messengers, and was far more expedient than meeting everyone in person who needed to be communicated with.
Power and political interests were not the only fields which were affected by the Caroline Minuscule. Culture, religion and classic texts were also affected. Knowledge and culture could now be shared among the entire empire, in a way that was unprecedented in the Merovingian era. Sacred and religious texts written in the Caroline Minuscule could be easily read by all, therefore, a scribe in Chartres could borrow and copy a text written or copied in Cologne, for instance. This made it easier for the entire empire to share each other’s knowledge, and to increase libraries and the amount of manuscripts to which people in each city or monastery had access. Increasing the flow of knowledge.
