Tassilo I (or ''Tassilon'') (560 – 610) was

Duke of Bavaria The following is a list of rulers during the history of Bavaria. Bavaria was ruled by several dukes and Monarch, kings, partitioned and reunited, under several dynasties. Since 1949, Bavaria has been a democratic States of Germany, state in th ...

from 591 to his death. According to

Paul the Deacon Paul the Deacon ( 720s 13 April in 796, 797, 798, or 799 AD), also known as ''Paulus Diaconus'', ''Warnefridus'', ''Barnefridus'', or ''Winfridus'', and sometimes suffixed ''Cassinensis'' (''i.e.'' "of Monte Cassino"), was a Benedictine monk, s ...

, he was appointed as Bavarian ''rex'' by

Childebert II Childebert II (c.570–596) was the Merovingian king of Austrasia (which included Provence at the time) from 575 until his death in March 596, as the only son of Sigebert I and Brunhilda of Austrasia; and the king of Burgundy from 592 to his de ...

Frankish king The Franks, Germanic-speaking peoples that invaded the Western Roman Empire in the 5th century, were first led by individuals called dukes and reguli. The earliest group of Franks that rose to prominence was the Salian Merovingians, who con ...

Austrasia Austrasia was a territory which formed the north-eastern section of the Merovingian Kingdom of the Franks during the 6th to 8th centuries. It was centred on the Meuse, Middle Rhine and the Moselle rivers, and was the original territory of the F ...

, in 591, ending the war with the Franks. The war began during the reign of Tassilo's predecessor,

Garibald I Garibald I (also Garivald; la, Garibaldus; born 540) was Duke (or King) of Bavaria from 555 until 591. He was the head of the Agilolfings, and the ancestor of the Bavarian dynasty that ruled the Kingdom of the Lombards. Biography After the dea ...

, when Garibald concluded a marriage alliance with the

Lombards The Lombards () or Langobards ( la, Langobardi) were a Germanic people who ruled most of the Italian Peninsula from 568 to 774. The medieval Lombard historian Paul the Deacon wrote in the ''History of the Lombards'' (written between 787 and ...

. We do not know whether Garibald died or was deposed. Nor do we know Tassilo's exact relationship to Garibald, though we can assume Tassilo was a close relation if not his son. The fact that Childebert named Tassilo duke shows Frankish control over the Bavarian state. Paul the Deacon also tells us that Tassilo soon moved into the lands of the

Slavs Slavs are the largest European ethnolinguistic group. They speak the various Slavic languages, belonging to the larger Balto-Slavic branch of the Indo-European languages. Slavs are geographically distributed throughout northern Eurasia, main ...

(probably the recently conquered eastern Tyrol and

Carinthia Carinthia (german: Kärnten ; sl, Koroška ) is the southernmost States of Austria, Austrian state, in the Eastern Alps, and is noted for its mountains and lakes. The main language is German language, German. Its regional dialects belong to t ...

), and returned victorious with much plunder. This victory proved to be short-lived as Paul tells us of 2,000 Bavarians, who were slain to the last man in 595. They had invaded the lands of the Slavs, who received help from the Kaghan (chief) of the Avars. Tassilo died in 610 and was succeeded by his son Garibald II.

Sources

*Störmer, Wilhelm. "Die Baiuwaren: Von der Völkerwanderung bis Tassilo III." pp 64 – 66, Verlag C. H. Beck, 2002, . *

''History of the Lombards: Book 4''
Chapter VII 560 births 610 deaths 6th-century dukes of Bavaria 7th-century dukes of Bavaria Agilolfings {{Germany-noble-stub