Wasn't Charlemagne a German?
Depends on how technical you want to get.
Charlamange was a Frank...that is he belonged to the ancient Germanic tribe named the Franks. So in that aspect yes he WAS a German, but the Frankish tribe he belonged to would of course help establish the Kingdom of France and lend to the country its name.
An argument can be made that ALL French are Germans, with an underlying Gallo-Romantic sub-strata. Gaul was occupied by the Franks, Visigoths, Burgundians, Alemanni, and other German tribes after the collapse of Roman authority in the West (and you could lump in the Norse in Normandy too several centuries later, as they were Germans as well, but a little north and separated in time to make them a distinct people). However, the ideas of "being French" (as opposed to being a Norman, Tolousian, Parisian, etc) would come MUCH later anyway...towards the end of the Middle Ages and the beginning of the Early Modern period. So calling Charlemange "French" is not neccessarily an accurate description of a man that pre-exists any notion of a nation of France...
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