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Merovingian
The Merovingian dynasty () was the ruling family of the Franks from around the middle of the 5th century until Pepin the Short in 751. They first appear as "Kings of the Franks" in the Roman army of northern Gaul. By 509 they had united all the Franks and northern Gallo-Romans under their rule. They conquered most of Gaul, defeating the Visigoths (507) and the Burgundians (534), and also extended their rule into Raetia (537). In Germania, the Alemanni, Bavarii and Saxons accepted their lordship. The Merovingian realm was the largest and most powerful of the states of western Europe following the breakup of the empire of Theodoric the Great. The dynastic name, medieval Latin or ("sons of Merovech"), derives from an unattested Frankish language, Frankish form, akin to the attested Old English , with the final -''ing'' being a typical Germanic languages, Germanic patronymic suffix. The name derives from Salian Franks, Salian King Merovech, who is at the center of many legends. Unl ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Franks
file:Frankish arms.JPG, Aristocratic Frankish burial items from the Merovingian dynasty The Franks ( or ; ; ) were originally a group of Germanic peoples who lived near the Rhine river, Rhine-river military border of Germania Inferior, which was the most northerly province of the Roman Empire in continental Europe. These Frankish tribes lived for centuries under varying degrees of Roman hegemony and influence, but after the collapse of Roman institutions in western Europe they took control of a large empire including areas which had been ruled by Rome, and what it meant to be a Frank began to evolve. Once they were deeply established in Gaul, the Franks became a multilingual, Catholic Christian people, who subsequently came to rule over several other post-Roman kingdoms both inside and outside the old empire. In a broader sense much of the population of western Europe could eventually described as Franks in some contexts. The term "Frank" itself first appeared in the third cent ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Clovis I
Clovis (; reconstructed Old Frankish, Frankish: ; – 27 November 511) was the first List of Frankish kings, king of the Franks to unite all of the Franks under one ruler, changing the form of leadership from a group of petty kings to rule by a single king, and ensuring that the kingship was passed down to his heirs. He is considered to have been the founder of the Merovingian dynasty, which ruled the Frankish kingdom for the next two centuries. Clovis is important in the historiography of France as "the first king of what would become France." Clovis succeeded his father, Childeric I, as a king of the Salian Franks in 481, and eventually came to rule an area extending from what is now the southern Netherlands to northern France, corresponding in Roman terms to Gallia Belgica (northern Gaul). At the Battle of Soissons (486), he established his military dominance of the Domain of Soissons, rump state of the fragmenting Western Roman Empire, which was then under the command of Sya ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Austrasia
Austrasia was the northeastern kingdom within the core of the Francia, Frankish Empire during the Early Middle Ages, centring on the Meuse, Middle Rhine and the Moselle rivers. It included the original Frankish-ruled territories within what had been the northernmost part of Roman Gaul, and cities such as Cologne, Trier and Metz. It also stretched beyond the old Roman borders on the Rhine into Frankish areas which had never been formally under Roman rule. It came into being as a part of the Francia, Frankish Empire founded by Clovis I (481–511). At the same time, the initial powerbase of Clovis himself was the more Romanized part of northern Gaul, lying southwest of Austrasia, which came to be known as Neustria. These two sub-kingdoms, along with several others, were subsequently ruled by the descendants of Clovis, the Merovingian dynasty, followed in the 8th and 9th centuries by their successors the Carolingian dynasty, whose own powerbase was in Austrasia itself. The two Fran ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Merovech
Merovech (; ; 411 – 458) was the ancestor of the Merovingian dynasty. He was reportedly a king of the Salian Franks, but records of his existence are mixed with legend and myth. The most important written source, Gregory of Tours, recorded that Merovech was said to be descended from Chlodio, a roughly contemporary Frankish warlord who pushed from the Silva Carbonaria in modern central Belgium as far south as the Somme, north of Paris in modern-day France. His supposed descendants, the kings Childeric I and Clovis I, are the first well-attested Merovingians. He may have been one of several barbarian warlords and kings that joined forces with the Roman general Aetius against the Huns under Attila at the Battle of the Catalaunian Plains in Gaul in 451. Name The name ''Merovech'' is related to ''Marwig'', (compare modern Dutch "news, rumour", "famous" as well as "fight" with -''vech''). Historical accounts There is little information about him in the later histories of the ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Childeric I
Childeric I (died 481 AD) was a Frankish leader in the northern part of imperial Roman Gaul and a member of the Merovingian dynasty, described as a king (Latin ''rex''), both on his Roman-style seal ring, which was buried with him, and in fragmentary later records of his life. He was father of Clovis I, who acquired effective control over all or most Frankish kingdoms, and a significant part of Roman Gaul. Biography Most of early Merovingian history is based on the account of the 6th-century Gregory of Tours. The date of Childeric's accession is not given in the text, but it was after emperor Avitus' death in December 456II. 11. The only certain date is the Battle of Vouillé in 507; most of Gregory's other statements are contradictory. Childeric's father is recorded by several sources to have been Merovech, after whom the dynasty is named. Gregory (II.9) says that Merovech was reputed by some to be a descendant of Chlodio, an earlier Frankish king who had conquered Gaulish ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Salian Franks
The Salian Franks, or Salians, sometimes referred to using the Latin word or , were a Frankish people who lived in what was is now the Netherlands in the fourth century. They are only mentioned under this name in historical records relating to this one period, when they came into conflict with Roman forces led by Julian the Apostate in 358 AD, during the period when Julian ruled in Gaul as Caesar, under his cousin the emperor Constantius II. In modern historiography, they are traditionally believed to be ancestral to the Franks who became the rulers of much of present day northern France in the 5th century - at first under the leadership of Chlodio, and later under the leadership of the Merovingian dynasty. Roman sources describing the events of 358 AD indicate that the Salians were a Frankish people who had entered the empire from across the Rhine some time earlier, and settled with Roman acceptance in Batavia, which is a large island in the Rhine delta, that lay on the no ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Pepin The Short
the Short (; ; ; – 24 September 768), was King of the Franks from 751 until his death in 768. He was the first Carolingian dynasty, Carolingian to become king. Pepin was the son of the Frankish prince Charles Martel and his wife Rotrude of Hesbaye, Rotrude. Pepin's upbringing was distinguished by the ecclesiastical education he had received from the Christian monasticism, Christian monks of the Basilica of Saint-Denis, Abbey Church of St. Denis, near Paris. Succeeding his father as the Mayor of the Palace in 741, Pepin reigned over Francia jointly with his elder brother, Carloman (mayor of the palace), Carloman. Pepin ruled in Neustria, Burgundy, and Provence, while his older brother Carloman established himself in Austrasia, Alemannia, and Thuringia. The brothers were active in suppressing revolts led by the Bavarians, Aquitanians, Saxons, and the Alemanni in the early years of their reign. In 743, they ended the by choosing Childeric III, who was to be the last Merovingian ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Alemanni
The Alemanni or Alamanni were a confederation of Germanic peoples, Germanic tribes * * * on the Upper Rhine River during the first millennium. First mentioned by Cassius Dio in the context of the campaign of Roman emperor Caracalla of 213 CE, the Alemanni captured the in 260, and later expanded into present-day Alsace and northern Switzerland, leading to the establishment of the Old High German language in those regions, which by the eighth century were collectively referred to as ''Alamannia''. In 496, the Alemanni were battle of Tolbiac, conquered by the Franks, Frankish leader Clovis I, Clovis and incorporated into his Francia, dominions. Mentioned as still Germanic paganism, pagan allies of the Germanic Christianity, Christian Franks, the Alemanni were gradually Christianized during the seventh century. The is a record of their customary law during this period. Until the eighth century, Frankish suzerainty over Alemannia was mostly nominal. After an uprising by Theudeba ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Saxons
The Saxons, sometimes called the Old Saxons or Continental Saxons, were a Germanic people of early medieval "Old" Saxony () which became a Carolingian " stem duchy" in 804, in what is now northern Germany. Many of their neighbours were, like them, speakers of West Germanic dialects, including the inland Franks and Thuringians to the south, and the coastal Frisians and Angles to the north who were among the peoples who were originally referred to as "Saxons" in the context of early raiding and settlements in Roman Britain and Gaul. To their east were Obotrites and other Slavic-speaking peoples. The political history of these continental Saxons is unclear until the 8th century and the conflict between their semi-legendary hero Widukind and the Frankish emperor Charlemagne. They do not appear to have been politically united until the generations leading up to that conflict, and before then they were reportedly ruled by regional "satraps". Previous Frankish rulers of Austrasia ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Gaul
Gaul () was a region of Western Europe first clearly described by the Roman people, Romans, encompassing present-day France, Belgium, Luxembourg, and parts of Switzerland, the Netherlands, Germany, and Northern Italy. It covered an area of . According to Julius Caesar, who took control of the region on behalf of the Roman Republic, Gaul was divided into three parts: Gallia Celtica, Gallia Belgica, Belgica, and Gallia Aquitania, Aquitania. Archaeologically, the Gauls were bearers of the La Tène culture during the 5th to 1st centuries BC. This material culture was found throughout Gaul and as far east as modern-day southern Poland, Slovakia, and Hungary. Warbands led by the Gaul Brennus (leader of the Senones), Brennos Battle of the Allia, sacked Rome in 387 BC, becoming the only time Rome was conquered by a foreign enemy in 800 years. However, Gallia Cisalpina was conquered by the Romans in 204 BC and Gallia Narbonensis in 123 BC. Gaul was invaded after 120 BC by the Cimbri ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Neustria
Neustria was the western part of the Kingdom of the Franks during the Early Middle Ages, in contrast to the eastern Frankish kingdom, Austrasia. It initially included land between the Loire and the Silva Carbonaria, in the north of present-day France, with Paris, Orléans, Tours, Soissons as its main cities. The same term later referred to a smaller region between the Seine and the Loire rivers known as the ''regnum Neustriae'', a constituent subkingdom of the Carolingian Empire and then West Francia. The Carolingian kings also created a March of Neustria which was a frontier duchy against the Bretons and Vikings that lasted until the Capetian monarchy in the late 10th century, when the term was eclipsed as a European political or geographical term. Name The name ''Neustria'' is mostly explained as "new western land", although Taylor (1848) suggested the interpretation of "northeastern land". '' Nordisk familjebok'' (1913) even suggested "not the eastern land" (''icke öst ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Burgundians
The Burgundians were an early Germanic peoples, Germanic tribe or group of tribes. They appeared east in the middle Rhine region in the third century AD, and were later moved west into the Roman Empire, in Roman Gaul, Gaul. In the first and second centuries AD, they or a people with the same name were mentioned by Roman writers living west of the Vistula river, in the region of Germania, which is now part of Poland. The Burgundians were first mentioned near the Rhine regions together with the Alamanni as early as the 11th panegyric to Emperor Maximian given in Trier in 291 AD, referring to events that must have happened between 248 and 291, and these two peoples apparently remained neighbours for centuries. By 411 AD, Burgundians had established control over Roman cities on the Rhine, between Franks and Alamanni, including Worms, Germany, Worms, Speyer and Strasbourg. In 436 AD, Flavius Aetius, Aëtius defeated the Burgundians on the Rhine with the help of Huns, Hunnish forces, ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
