2005  ~  Paul Dutton, Charlemagne's Mustache and Other Cultural Clusters of a Dark Age. Palgrave MacMillan, 2004.

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Charlemagne's Mustache and Other Cultural Clusters of a Dark Age presents the reader with seven engaging studies of cultural life and thought in the Carolingian world: Why did Charlemagne have a mustache and why did hair matter? Why did the king own peacocks and other exotic animals? Why was he writing in bed and could he write at all? How did medieval kings become stars? How were secrets kept and conveyed in the early Middle Ages? Does the world age with the aged? And why did early medieval peoples believe in storm- and hailmakers? The answers, Dutton finds, are often surprising.