Europe in the Middle Ages

by Ierne L. Plunket

By the beginning of the sixth century, when the Franks were well established in Gaul, the management of their important tribal affairs had passed entirely into the hands of the nobles surrounding the king. These bore such titles as Major Domus or ‘Mayor of the Palace’, at first only a steward, but later the chief minister of the crown; the ‘Seneschal’ or head of the royal household; the ‘Marshal’ or Master of the Stables; the ‘Chamberlain’ or chief servant of the bedchamber.

Clovis, King of the Franks

The most famous of the Merovingian kings, as the descendants of Merovius were called, was Clovis, who established the Frankish capital at Paris. He and his tribe, though pagans, were on friendly terms with the Roman inhabitants of northern Gaul, and especially with some of the Catholic clergy. When Clovis sacked the town of Soissons he tried to save the church plate, and especially a vase of great beauty that he knew St. Remi, Bishop of Reims, highly valued. ‘Let it be put amongst my booty,’ he said to his soldiers, intending to give it to the bishop later; but one of them answered him insolently, ‘Only that is thine which falls to thy share by lot,’ and with his axe he shivered the vase into a thousand pieces.

Clovis concealed his fury at the moment, but he did not forget, and a year afterwards, when he was reviewing his troops, he noticed the same man who had opposed his will. Stepping forward, he tore the fellow’s weapons from his grasp and threw them on the ground, saying, ‘No arms are worse cared for than thine!’ The soldier stooped to pick them up, and Clovis, raising his battle-axe high in the air, brought it down on the bent head before him with the comment, ‘Thus didst thou to the vase at Soissons!’

Clovis married a Christian princess, Clotilda, a niece of the Burgundian king, and, at her request, he allowed their eldest child to be baptized, but for a long time he refused to become a Christian himself. One day, however, when in the midst of a battle in which his warriors were so hard pressed that they had almost taken to flight, he cried aloud—‘Jesus Christ, thou whom Clotilda doth call the Son of the Living God ... I now devoutly beseech thy aid, and I promise if thou dost give me victory over these my enemies ... that I will believe in thee and be baptized in thy name, for I have called on my own gods and they have failed to help me.’

Shortly afterwards the tide of battle turned, the Franks rallied, and Clovis obtained a complete victory. Remembering his promise, he went to Reims, and there he and three thousand of his warriors were received into the Catholic Church. ‘Bow thy head low,’ said St. Remi who baptized the King, ‘henceforth adore that which thou hast burned and burn that which thou didst formerly adore.’

When he became a Catholic, Clovis had no idea that he had altered the whole future of his race, for to him it seemed merely that he had fulfilled the bargain he had made with the Christian God. He did not change his ways, but pursued his ambitions as before, now by treachery and now by force. It was his determination to make himself supreme ruler over all the Franks, and in the case of another branch, the Ripuarians, he began by secretly persuading their heir to the kingly title, the young prince Chloderic, to kill his father and seize the royal coffers.

Chloderic, fired by the idea of becoming powerful, did so and wrote exultingly to Clovis, ‘My father is dead and his wealth is mine. Let some of thy men come hither, and that of his treasure which pleaseth them I will send thee.’

Ambassadors from the Salians duly arrived, and Chloderic led them secretly apart and showed them his money, running his hand through the pieces of gold that lay on the surface of the coffer. The men begged him to thrust his arm in deep that they might judge how great his wealth really was, and as he bent to do so, one of them struck him a mortal wound from behind. Then they fled. Thus by treachery died both father and son; but Clovis unblushingly denied to the Ripuarian Franks that he had been in any way responsible.

‘Chloderic murdered his father, and he hath been assassinated by I know not whom. I am no partner in such deeds, for it is against the law to take the life of relations. Nevertheless, since it has happened, I offer you this advice, that you should put yourselves under my protection.’