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Much more interesting than the question "chicken or egg?" is: What is the etymology of the name. This site has one derivation, quite commonly given on the web and in books: Old High German "karl, char(e/i)l" (man, free man). But it looks like since the late 1960s another explanation is more and more accepted (this is taken from a very reliable book: Das große Vornamen-Lexikon, Duden; W.Seibicke: HDV has the same): pet form of a name beginning with the Old High German element "heri" (army) + the Romanic ending "-olus", used in the area whe West Frankish and Romanic influences mingled. The Germanic H would be represented by a C in Romanic spelling, this is where the C or K came in.

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W. Seibicke quotes Henning Kaufmann (1965: Untersuchungen zu altdeutschen Rufnamen. München (= Grundfragen der Namenkunde 3)):
Kaufmann "geht aus von einer Kosef. Háriolus zu german. *Charja-/Harja-, indoeurop. ‘korios ‘Heer’ (vgl. HER) aus, die sich zu lat. Carolus entwickelte"

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Does anyone know more about this theory?

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Andy ;—)