Claimants to Royalty

by John Henry Ingram

There was just a possibility of this boy having been Clotaire's son, although an illegitimate one, no proof of the deceased monarch's marriage ever having been adduced; and as illegitimacy was not in those days deemed a bar to the crown, the claim of little Clovis the Third, as Ebroin had him styled, may have been as valid as that of his competitors. Be that as it may, historians have also termed this youthful pretender, or rather tool of the conspirators, the false Clovis. The lad was attired in royal robes, and taught to affect a majesty of deportment towards all those who came to render him homage, whilst all those who refused to acknowledge him as king were maltreated, and their goods seized by his followers. His reign, however, was of short duration. Bishop Leger having been captured, deprived of sight, and thrown into prison, the great nobles and chieftains succumbed at once, and Ebroin found the whole power of the country in his own hands; he, therefore, deemed it better to make terms with Thierry, who willingly replaced him in his post of Maire du Palais, conditionally upon being left in nominal possession of the sovereignty.

Having thus attained his purpose, Ebroin had no longer any need of his puppet, and at once relinquished the imposture; but what afterwards became of the boy king history does not relate. As regards the originator of the scheme, his cruelties and tyranny increased daily, so that when in 683, or three or four years after the re-establishment of his power, he was assassinated by a noble named Bermenfroy, whose property he had seized, and whose life he had menaced, it must have been a real relief to his country. Through Ebroin's death it was that a way was opened for the family of Pepin, the founder of the Carlovingian race, to acquire the dignity of Maire du Palais, and subsequently the monarchy of France.

SUATOCOPIUS OF MORAVIA.

A.D. 800.

To many casual readers it may seem a singular circumstance that nearly every claimant to regal paternity has found authors, more or less numerous, to espouse his cause, and assert his identity with the monarch whose name he laid claim to. On inspection the singularity vanishes. Putting on one side the difficulties of investigation which ancient annalists had to encounter, and as a rule the defective evidence they had to judge by, the undeniable fact is arrived at that not a few of the so-called historians often wilfully misrepresented, falsified, omitted, and even invented facts to suit their own party views.

Many of these forgeries the acumen and research of later ages have exposed; many more will doubtless, in course of time, be discovered, but a still larger number in all probability linger undetected in the pages of history, and will ever remain so. It is unfortunate that the class of men to whom we are compelled to resort chiefly for historic and social information prior to the invention of printing, are the very men whose writings it is necessary to hold in greatest doubt; and it is, beyond dispute, well ascertained that history which had to filter through a priest's brains, as a rule descended to posterity deeply tinged, to say the best of it, with the hue its author wished it to have in the eyes of the world.

Æneas Sylvius Piccolomini, better known as Pius the Second, amongst his numerous works left a History of Bohemia, and the thirteenth chapter of that history details the events which have caused us to insert amongst the claimants to royalty the name of Suatocopius, leaving the reader to decide for himself as to the credibility of the aspirant's claim to the name and title of the supposed slain monarch.

The Marcomanni, or Moravians, are asserted to have been converted to Christianity about the middle of the ninth century by Methodius and Cyril, two Greek monks. These two men, noted in history for having implanted the Christian faith in Russia, Bulgaria, and the adjacent lands, were brothers, members of an illustrious Thessalonican family, and distinguished for their learning and the purity of their lives. About the year 860 these missionaries are stated to have appeared at the court of Suatocopius, a king whose sway was more or less acknowledged, not only by the Moravians, but also, according to priestly authority, by the Hungarians, Bohemians, Poles, and inhabitants of Black Russia, but who, notwithstanding the extent of his territories and the number of his subjects, was tributary to the Emperor of Germany, as had been his predecessors since the days of Charlemagne.

Converted by the Greek brothers to the Christian religion, Suatocopius is stated for many years to have set a good example to his subjects of all the virtues called royal; but finally, emboldened by the continuous prosperity of a long reign and the representations of his courtiers, he declined paying any more tribute into the imperial exchequer. This refusal at once involved him in warfare with the Emperor Arnulph, and in a battle which ensued the Moravians were defeated, and, so it was universally believed, their monarch slain. The body of Suatocopius could not be discovered, declares our chief authority, but the fact of his death was deemed indisputable, and his son was permitted by his godfather, the victor, to ascend the vacant throne.