It is not my intention to smear my pages with the blood and mire of the lives and acts of the Merovingian princes. We will content ourselves here with a brief glance at the principal events and incidents connected with the progress of the Frank empire during the two hundred years that intervene between the death of Clovis and the accession of Charles, afterwards surnamed Martel, as Mayor of the Palace.
In the year 523, the three sons of Clotilda, invited by their unforgiving mother, invaded Burgundy, and attacked the son and successor of Gundobald, Sigismond, whose conversion to the Catholic faith has gained him, in the lying annals penned by the clerical historians of the period, the name of a saint and a martyr, though he had imbrued his hands in the blood of his own son, an innocent youth whom he had basely sacrificed to the pride of his second wife! Sigismond lost a battle and fell soon after into the hands of the sons of Clotilda, who carried him to Orleans, and had him buried alive together with his wife and two of his children—an excellent proof that they had not degenerated. Sigismond’s brother, Gondemar, defeated the invaders in the battle of Vienna, where Clodomir fell. This gave Gondemar a few years’ respite, as the two brothers, Clotaire and Childebert, were busy sharing the inheritance of Clodomir.[88] But, in 534, the brothers invaded Burgundy again; when Gondemar lost his crown and his liberty, and the fair Burgundian provinces became the patrimony of the Merovingian princes. In the year 530, Theodoric and Clotaire conquered and annexed the territories of the Thuringians, thus extending their dominion to the banks of the Unstrut. Rhætia and Provence also fell into the hands of the successors of Clovis. Theudobald, the grandson and second successor of Theodoric, or Thierry, died in 554; as he left no heir, Clotaire and Childebert shared his dominions between them; Childebert’s death, in 558, without male heirs, left Clotaire in sole and undisputed possession of the Frankish empire, which now extended from the Atlantic and the Pyrenees to the Unstrut. After having added to the list of his crimes the murder of his son Chramus, and also of the wife and the two daughters of the latter, King Clotaire died in 560. His kingdom was again divided between his four sons, Charibert, Guntram, Sigebert, and Chilperic; the eldest of the brothers, Charibert, died in 567. As he left no heir, his territories were divided between the three surviving brothers. But Chilperic was dissatisfied with his share, and this led to a series of civil wars, which terminated only in 613, when Clotaire II., the son of Chilperic and Fredegonda, re-united in his hands the entire empire of the Franks.
It would be difficult to crowd a greater number of more appalling and atrocious crimes, within the short space of half a century, than were committed by the Merovingians, from the time of the death of Charibert up to the re-union of the empire under Clotaire II.; the names of Chilperic, of Fredegonda,[89] of Brunehilda,[90] of Theuderic,[91] and last, though not least, of the monster Clotaire (second of the name) deserve, indeed, prominent places in the great criminal calendar of the world’s history.
FOOTNOTES:
[71] Still we must not omit to state that the lays of ancient Germany, and the old Chronicles of the country, exhibit singular agreement in the reproduction of the popular tradition which makes the nation of the Franks come from Troy. However, after all, this makes no great difference, as even the most strenuous believers in the existence of a distinct nation of Franks, fully admit that as early as the third century (the time when the name of the Franks first appears in history) that name included several Germanic nations. By some the Thuringians are given as a branch of the Frank nation.
[72] Some, however, derive the name from the Old German word saljan, i.e. to grant, in reference to part of the territory occupied by the Salian Franks having been granted to them by the Romans (by Carausius, in 287, confirmed at a later period by Julian the Apostate). Leo derives the name from the Celtic word, Sal, i.e. the sea.
[73] Valerian was taken prisoner by Sapor, King of Persia, in 260, who is said to have treated the fallen emperor with the greatest indignity. Valerian died in captivity.
[74] He was one of the nineteen usurpers who rose against Gallienus in the several provinces of the empire. The writers of the Augustan history have magnified the number to thirty.
[75] History names Pharamond as the first King of the Franks; the author of the Gesta Francorum makes that prince the son of Marcomir, the king mentioned in the text; and there appears to be little doubt indeed, but that the Franks had established the right of hereditary succession somewhat before the time of Clodion, the reputed son of Pharamond.