III.
A RAPID glance at the political history of the country will further show the extraordinary condition of fluctuation and uncertainty which existed during the dismal period which followed the overthrow of the Roman rule, as well as the gradual growth of the new state of things under which the great revival of the twelfth century occurred. We shall also observe how the early renewal of civilisation in the South, aided as it was by the preservation of some relics of old Roman culture, ultimately yielded to the more vigorous life and growth of the new political system of the North.
We have seen that Aquitaine was occupied by the Visigoths in the fourth century, while Provence was still held by the Burgundians and Gallo-Romans.
In 425 Aetius made a final stand for the Roman cause, but was defeated by Theodoric, King of the Visigoths, and the last vestige of the Empire was swept away. These two powers of the South afterwards united their forces against Attila, their common foe, and drove back the Huns in 451. In 480 Arles was captured by Euric for the Visigoths, who thus became masters of Provence. In the sixth century the Franks extended their arms southwards, and under Clovis, and Gundibald, King of the Burgundians, defeated the Visigoths at Bouglé in 507.
In 511 Theodoric, King of the Ostrogoths in North Italy, defeated the army of Clovis while engaged in the siege of Arles, and thus preserved the Mediterranean coast to Italy. But Provence was resigned in 536 by his successor Witiges to Theodoric, King of the Franks, who had overthrown the Burgundian Kingdom.
At the death of Clothair I. in 561, Provence was divided between his sons, Sigebert, King of Austrasia obtaining Marseilles, and Gontran of Burgundy, Arles. Under subsequent kings Provence was again reunited and again divided.
In 719 the Saracens crossed the Pyrenees and took possession of Languedoc. They subsequently united with Maurontis, the Byzantine governor of Marseilles, for the purpose of driving out the Franks, but were defeated by Charles Martel, who thus united Aquitaine and Provence to the Frank kingdom.
These Southern provinces, which, as already mentioned, were governed by municipal and ecclesiastical organisations, were too weak either to resist the inroads of the Saracens, or to defend themselves against the more vigorous discipline of the North.
At the division of the Carlovingian empire, after the death of Charlemagne in 843, Provence fell to Lothaire, along with Burgundy. In 863 it was seized by Charles the Bald, and in 879 his brother-in-law Boson, governor of Vienne, was elected King by the synod of Montale, and Provence was thus converted into a separate monarchy.