Franks

The Franks (Latin: Franci) were a Western European people who first appeared under this name in the third century AD as a group of Germanic tribes living near the Rhine River, and who gradually became a larger, multilingual, Catholic Christian people, in control of large territories both inside and outside the former Roman Empire. Much of what is now the Netherlands, Germany, Belgium, Luxembourg, France, and in a broader sense much of the population of medieval Western Europe, could eventually be described as Franks in some contexts.

Pre-existing Germanic tribes such as the Bructeri and Chattuari began being referred to as Franks during the crisis of the 3rd century, a period when Rome lost control of regions near the lower Rhine, within the Roman province of Germania Inferior. The Rhine was a militarized border defended by the Romans, and the Frankish tribes had been living across the Rhine under Roman hegemony for centuries, under other tribal names. During the crisis they made frequent incursions, and in some cases settled some areas on the Roman side. Despite the reassertion of Roman authority in the 4th century, Franks continued to live semi-independently on both sides of the Rhine, while the Romans came to agreements with them, recruiting large numbers of Frankish soldiers, some of whom achieved high imperial rank.

When the Roman administration of Britain and northern Gaul eventually broke down once more in the fifth century, it was the Franks who attempted to defend the Roman border in 406 when a largescale Rhine crossing was made by Alans and Vandals from eastern Europe. Frankish kings subsequently divided up Germania Inferior between them, and at least one, Chlodio, also began to rule more Romanized populations to the south, in what is now northern France. In 451, Frankish groups participated on both sides in the Battle of the Catalaunian Plains, where Attila and his allies were defeated by a Roman-led alliance of various peoples established in Gaul. By the early 6th century, the whole of Gaul north of the Loire, and all the Frankish kingdoms, were united within the kingdom of the Frank Clovis I, the founder of the Merovingian dynasty. By building upon the basis of this empire, the subsequent Frankish dynasty, the Carolingians, eventually came to be seen as the new emperors of Western Europe in 800, when Charlemagne was crowned by the pope.

As the original Frankish communities merged into others, the term Frank lost its original meaning. In 870, the Frankish realm was permanently divided between western and eastern kingdoms, which were the predecessors of the later Kingdom of France and Holy Roman Empire respectively. The Latin term Franci, and equivalents in other languages, came to refer mainly to the people of the Kingdom of France, the forerunner of present day France. However, in various historical contexts, such as during the medieval crusades, not only the French, but also people from neighbouring regions in Western Europe, continued to be referred to collectively as Franks. The crusades in particular had a lasting impact on the use of Frank-related names, which are now used generically for all Western Europeans in many non-European languages.