A missus dominicus (plural missi dominici), Latin for "envoy[s] of the lord [ruler]" or palace inspector, also known in Dutch as Zendgraaf (German: Sendgraf), meaning "sent Graf", was an official commissioned by the Frankish king or Holy Roman Emperor to supervise the administration, mainly of justice, in parts of his dominions too remote for frequent personal visits.
Four points made the missi effective as instruments of the centralized monarchy: the personal character of the missus, yearly change, isolation from local interests and the free choice of the king.
[2] Based on Merovingian ad hoc arrangements,[3] using the form missus regis (the "king's envoy") and sending a layman and an ecclesiastic in pairs,[4] the use of missi dominici was fully exploited by Charlemagne (ruling 768—814), who made them a regular part of his administration,[5][6][7] "a highly intelligent and plausible innovation in Carolingian government", Norman F. Cantor observes,[8] "and a tribute to the administrative skill of the ecclesiastics, such as Alcuin and Einhard".
[5] They were sent out collegially, usually in twos, an ecclesiastic and a layman, and were generally complete strangers to the district which they administered,[5] to deter them from putting out local roots and acting on their own initiative, as the counts were doing.
In the course of the ninth century, the forces which were making for feudalism tended to produce inherited fiefdoms as the only way to ensure stability, especially in the face of renewed external aggression in the form of Viking attacks, to which the impaired central power was demonstrated to be impotent.