Merovingian dynasty

Merovingians
Symbol of the Merovingians
Country	Francia
Titles	King of the Salian Franks King of the Franks
Founder	Chlodio
Final ruler	Childeric III
Founding year	420
Dissolution	752
Ethnicity	Frankish, Germanic

The Merovingian dynasty was a royal house originating in the 5th century, taking its name from the semi-legendary figure Merovech.

History

The Merovingian began as monarchs of the Salian Franks, a Germanic sub-group and later dominating tribe amongst the Franks, reigning in an area subsequently known as the Salland. During 451, they allied with the Romans and other Germanic tribes to drive the Huns back at the Catalaunian Plains. After the Western Roman Empire began to decline in Gaul and the troops withdrew to defend Italia, various Germanic tribes struggled for hegemony. The Franks under the kingship of the Merovingians—especially Childeric I and Clovis I—soon established themselves over the new Kingdom of Francia in 509.

The name Merovingian derives from that of Merovech, of whom nothing is known except that he was the father of Childeric I, who ruled a tribe of Salian Franks from his capital at Tournai. Childeric was succeeded by his son Clovis I in 481 or 482. Clovis I extended his rule over all the Salian Franks, conquered or annexed the territories of the Ripuarian Franks and the Alemanni, and united nearly all of Gaul except for Burgundy and what is now Provence. Of equal importance, he was converted to Christianity in either 496 or 506. At Clovis I’s death in 511, his realm was divided among his four sons, Theuderic I, Chlodomir, Childebert I, and Chlotar I. Despite the frequently bloody competition between the brothers, they managed among them to extend Frankish rule over Thuringia in approximately 531 and Burgundy in 534 and to gain sway over, if not possession of, Septimania on the Mediterranean coast, Bavaria, and the lands of the Saxons to the north. By 558 Chlotar I was the last surviving son of Clovis I, and until his death in 561 the Frankish realm was once again united. In 561 the realm was again divided between brothers—Charibert I, Guntram, Sigebert, and Chilperic I—and again family strife and intrigue ensued, particularly between Chilperic and his wife, Fredegund, in the northwest of Gaul and Sigebert and his wife, Brunhild, in the northeast. Dynastic struggles and increasing pressures exerted on the realm by neighbouring peoples—Bretons and Gascons in the west, Lombards in the southeast, Avars in the east—prompted a reorganization of the Frankish kingdoms. Several eastern regions were merged into the kingdom of Austrasia, with its capital at Metz; in the west Neustria emerged, with its capital first at Soissons and later at Paris; to the south was the enlarged kingdom of Burgundy, with its capital at Chalon-sur-Saône. Overall Frankish unity was again achieved in 613, when Chlotar II, son of Chilperic I and king of Neustria, inherited the other two kingdoms as well. On the death of Chlotar’s son Dagobert I in 639, the realm was divided yet again, but by that time the kings of the two regions, Neustria and Burgundy on the one hand and Austrasia on the other, had been forced to yield much of their power to household officials known as mayors of the palace. The later Merovingian kings were little more than puppets and were enthroned and deposed at will by powerful mayors of the palace. The last Merovingian, Childeric III, was deposed in 750 by Pippin III the Short, one of a line of Austrasian mayors of the palace who finally usurped the throne itself to establish the Carolingian dynasty.

External links

• The Merovingians: 5th – 8th century AD
• The Oxford Merovingian Page
• Genealogy of the Merovingian dynasty at Genealogy.eu
• Merovingian Archaeology at the Museum of the Dark Ages

MP3

• The Merovingian Franks