Clovis Ier

Chronology

The chronology of the reign of Clovis is very badly known. All that we know rises from Gregoire de Tours ( Histoire , Livre), which mentions the events according to a cutting in five year old sections (reminiscence of the quinquennalia or glossed Roman?) : war against Syagrius after five years of reign, fifteen for the war against Alamans, war against the Visigoths five years before his death; the whole forming a thirty years reign after an advent at the fifteen years age. One could reject this information like simplifying; however it proves that no study forever called basically into question these indications, which according to any probability are slightly simplified but valid with few things close . The only date fixed by other sources is that of its death, in 511, which would approximately go back its advent to 481, perhaps 482.

The following chronology is thus obtained:

466 : birth of Clovis, wire of Childéric {{Ier}}, king of the Francs saliens of Turned, and of the queen Basine of Thuringe.
481 - 482: advent of Clovis. The kingdom of which he inherits corresponds to the Belgium Second, small province located between the the North Sea, the the Scheldt and the Cambrésis, that is to say a going territory of Rheims until Amiens and Boulogne, except for the area of Soissons, which as for it was controlled by Syagrius.
484 : Alliance with the Rhenish Francs and the Francs of Cambric. (Ragnacaire, king of the Francs of Cambric, was probably one of the parents of Clovis).
485 : It Marie with a Rhenish princess, girl of Chloderic prince de Cologne with which he has a son, Thierry. This union was often interpreted like the episode of a tactical alliance with its Eastern neighbors, enabling him to turn its ambitions towards the south.
486 : Battle of Soissons against Syagrius. Syagrius, wire of Ægidius, was entitled “King of the Romans” and controlled a Gallo-Roman enclave between Meuse and the Loire, last fragment of the Western Empire.
La victory of Soissons makes it possible the kingdom of Clovis to embrace all the north of Gaulle. Syagrius takes refuge at the Visigoths who deliver it to Clovis. The Gallo-Roman chief will finish discreetly cut the throat of.

It is also at the time of this battle, that place had - according to Gregoire de Tours - the anecdotic episode of the Vase of Soissons, where, against the military law of the division, the king asked to withdraw spoils an invaluable vase to return it to the church of Rheims, at the request of the bishop of this last city. The epilog of the history took place, as for him, on March 1st 487.

490 : Victorious raids against the Visigoths: Saintonge in 494, Bordeaux in 498. Clovis has then probably the desire to extend its kingdom towards the the Mediterranean. It starts offensives against the Germanie Rhenish and transrhenan.
493 : Non-aggression pact with the kings Burgondes, concretized by a matrimonial alliance: Clovis marries in second weddings the princess Burgonde Clotilde (girl of the king burgonde Chilpéric {{II}} and niece of the king Gondebaud). Clotilde will work with the bishop Remi of Rheims to the conversion of Clovis to the Catholicisme.
496 : Bataille of Tolbiac ( Zülpich ) close to Cologne against the Alamans at the time which Clovis would have made the wish convert with the Christianisme if “Jesus that his wife Clotilde proclaims alive sons of God” granted him the victory. This victory makes it possible the kingdom of Clovis to extend until the the High-Rhineland.
496 the day of Christmas the December 24th, Clovis is baptized with Rheims with “more than 3000 men of its army” (according to Gregoire) by the bishop Remi of Rheims (future Remi saint). The baptism of Clovis undoubtedly improves its legitimacy in the Gallo-Roman population, but represents a dangerous bet: the Francs, the German ones, consider that a chief is worth by the protection which the gods inspire to him; conversion goes against that; the German ones christianized (Goths…) are often ariens, because the king remains chief of the Church there.
499 : Clovis is combined to the king Burgonde of Geneva, Godégisèle, which wants to seize the territories of his/her brother Gondebaud

500 : Clovis signs a treaty of alliance with the Armoricains (Gallic tribes of the Breton peninsula and the shore of the English Channel). After the Battle of Dijon and its victory against the Burgondes of Gondebaud, constrained Clovis this last to give up its kingdom and to take refuge with Avignon. However, the king Visigoth Alaric {{II}} goes to the help of Gondebaud and thus persuades Clovis to give up Godégisèle.

Clovis and Gondebaud reconciles and signs a treaty of alliance to fight against the Visigoths.

502 : his/her Thierry son marries 1°) Eustère, girl Alaric II King of the Visigoths of which it has Thibert 1st King de Reims (+548) then 2°) Swavegothe, girl of Sigismond king of Burgondes of which it has a Theodechilde girl.
507 : Battle of Vouillé, close to Poitiers, against the Visigoths: This victory makes it possible the kingdom of Clovis to extend in Aquitaine. The king of the Visigoths Alaric {{II}} is killed and the Visigoths have of another alternative to only fold up themselves in Spain, beyond the Pyrenees. The Ostrogoths of Théodoric cannot intervene in favor of the Visigoths because of a conflict with the Byzantine Empire.
508 : Clovis receives from the emperor of the East Anastase {{Ier}} the title of “Consul” and is greeted like “majestic” during a ceremony with Tours. Paris becomes its main home. French nationalist mythology sees there, in an anachronistic way, the first accession with the statute of capital of old the Lutèce, which took the name of its Gallic inhabitants, the Parisii.
510 : Clovis seizes the frank kingdoms of Sigebert, Chararic and Ragnacaire after having made them assassinate, and thus extends its authority beyond the Rhine. Clovis is from now on the Master of a single kingdom, corresponding to a Western portion of the old Roman Empire, average valley of the Rhine, (the mouth of the Rhine east always to the hands of the Friesian tribes), to the Pyrenees, held by terrible the Basques. The kingdom of Clovis does not include/understand however the island of Brittany (current Great Britain), nor Mediterranean regions.
July 511: first Concile of Gaules to Orleans to which to share thirty-two bishops take, of which the half come from the “kingdom from the Francs”: Clovis is indicated “ Rex Gloriosissimus wire of the Holy Church”, by all the bishops present.
November 27th 511: Clovis dies and is buried in the basilica of the Saint-Apostles in Paris, on the Montagne Holy-Genevieve.

To its continuation, the descendants of Clovis still extend the kingdom (Burgondie, Provence…), and reign during nearly three centuries before leaving their place to a family of the franque nobility austrasienne: the Pippinides (Charles Martel, Pip the Brief…).

The Gaulle at the end of the 5th century

At the end of the 5th century, Gaulle is parcelled out under the domination of several kingdoms Barbare S, constantly in war the ones against the others, seeking to extend their influences and their possessions:

the Frank , established in the North-East, had a long time served the Roman Empire like auxiliary Troupes on the Rhenish border ; they are still pagan with the advent of Clovis.

the Burgondes, establish by Rome in Savoy (in Sapaudie ) and in the Lyon are born, Christian ariens and relatively tolerant;

the Visigoths, people powerful bench in the south of the the Loire, in Languedoc, especially in the valley of the the Garonne, also ariens, much less tolerant towards the Gallo-Roman catholics than they dominate;

the Ostrogoths are not present as a Gaulle, but their king Théodoric Large the, from Italy, seeks to maintain balance between the various kingdoms.

With far, the Roman Empire of the East still exerts a purely theoretical authority.

A multitude of local or regional “capacities” of military origin (of the “kingdoms” or reigned) had thus occupied the vacuum left by the deposition of the last Roman Emperor of Occident in 476. Among those still the kingdom of some is Syagrius, established in the area of Soissons. The “capacity” of which it is question has nothing to do with the modern concepts of legislative power, executive or legal, but covers a relation dominate-dominated nearer to that of a chief of gang with the territory than it rackette.

In 481, Clovis, wire of the king Childéric {{Ier}} and of the princess thuringienne Basin, frankly take as for him the head of a kingdom salien, located in the area of Tournai into current Belgium. The title of “king” (in Latin rex ) is not new: it was in particular reserved for the war leaders of the cruel nations to the service of Rome. Thus, the Francs, former trusty servants of Rome, do not remain about it less Germains, Barbare S pagan and moved away well by their lifestyle from Gallic romanized by nearly five centuries of domination and Roman influence.

Clovis is then old only fifteen years and nothing predisposes this small barbarian chief among so much of others supplanting its rivals, more powerful. In the light of the posterior events, its success, if it is undeniable on the military level, must at least as much with the Roman experiment of the war that his for a long time acquired them - the discipline required of its soldiers at the time of the episode of Soissons testifies to it, just like fall it from his/her father, Childéric - that with its conversion with Catholicism (and not with the Arianisme), and through this one, with the Gallo-Roman elites. finally, an alliance with the Byzantine Empire allows point named “to fix” Ostrogoths.

Also, the reign of Clovis fits rather in the continuity of the late Antiquité that in the top Moyen-âge for many historians. It however contributes to forge the original character of this last period by giving rise to a first dynasty of Christian kings and, because of its acceptance by the Gallo-Roman elites, by creating an original capacity as a Gaulle.

Children

Ingomir/Ingomer (+494 in its christening robe) wire Clotilde
Clodomir King Orleans (495+524) wire Clotilde, it marries Gondiuque de Burgondie
Childebert 1st King Paris (495+558) wire Clotilde, wife Ultrogothe d' Ostrogothie
Clotaire 1st King soissons, of Rheims and All the Francs
Clotilde (+531) girl Clotilde, wife 517 Amalaric king Wisigoths
Thierry 1st King Austrasie and Co-king Orleans, wire 1st wife.

Extension of the kingdom of Clovis towards the east

All its life, Clovis tries to preserve its kingdom for its sons, according to the Germanic tradition, and to increase the territory of this one. For that, he does not hesitate to eliminate all the obstacles: he makes assassinate all the Rhenish saliens chiefs and close, some of his former companions, and even certain members of his family, even distant, in order to make sure that only its sons will inherit its kingdom.

He launches out in addition in a great series of alliances and military conquests, at the beginning only with the head of a few thousands of men. More than the weapons, as one believed a long time; those of the Francs were effective, certainly; - it is a know-how with the combat acquired with the service of the Empire and against the other barbarians who undoubtedly made possible military successes of the warriors of Clovis.

Another idea that it is necessary to reject: through him it is not a Germanic Peuple which is essential on the Gallo-Roman ones, but the fusion of the German elements and Latin which continues. At the time of Clovis, whereas Syagrius, however qualified of “Romain” by the sources, bears a barbarian name and does not profit obviously from the support of its people, the “barbarian” king ostrogoth Théodoric Large the, in his prestigious court of Ravenne, perpetuates all the characters of late Roman civilization, while remaining Ostrogoth arien, a barbarian heretic with the eyes of the Church.

If Clovis can rather quickly be essential, in spite of hard combat, it is certainly because ultimately they appears to be a less bad Master than the majority of the applicants: at least, the Gallo-Romans, he would have said catholic and was already passably romanisé. Contrary, the Visigoths, Christians but ariens, held Aquitaine of an iron hand and did not make any effort to try a bringing together with the catholic Gallo-Romans whom they dominated.

Little by little, Clovis conquers the northern half of the current France: it is combined initially with the Rhenish Francs, in 484. Then it carries out offensives towards the south, starting from 486. It starts by reversing Syagrius, the last one representing deposed Empire. The kingdom of Syagrius covered roughly space between the Seine and the Loire. Against this last, it carries the towns of Senlis, Beauvais, Soissons and Paris of which it plunders the neighborhoods. It is at the time of these campaigns that celebrates it episode of the vase takes place.

Conversion and baptism

The Bishop of Rheims, the Saint-Remi future, then seeks probably the protection of a strong authority for its people, and written with Clovis as of its advent. The contacts are numerous between the king and the bishop, this last incentive initially Clovis to protect the Christians present on his territory. Thanks to his charisma and perhaps because of the authority of which itself enjoys, Remi can be made respect of Clovis and is used for to him even to advise. It in particular encourages it to ask in marriage Clotilde, a catholic princess of noble lineage, girl of a king of the Burgondes (these people close to the Francs were established in current the Dauphiné and Savoy). The marriage takes place in 492, probably in Soissons.

Consequently, according to Gregoire de Tours, Clotilde makes very to convince her husband to convert with the Christianisme. But Clovis is initially reticent: it doubts the existence of a single God; besides death in low age of its first wire baptized, Ingomer, makes only accentuate this mistrust. In addition, while agreeing to convert, it fears to lose the support of its people, still pagan: the majority of German, those considers that the king, war leader, are worth only by the favor which the gods grant to him with the combat. If they convert, the German ones become rather ariens, the rejection of the dogma of the Trinity to some extent supporting the maintenance of the elected king of God and chief of the Church.

Nevertheless, Clovis has more than any need for the support of the Gallo-Roman clergy , because this last represents the Gallic population. bishop S, to which falls the first role in the cities since the civil authorities were erased, remain the real Masters of the executives of the ancient capacity as a Gaulle. I.e. also of the zones where still the richness concentrated. However, even the Église has evil to maintain its coherence: exiled bishops or not replaced in territories Visigoths, difficult papal successions with Rome, disagreement between catholics pro-Visigoths (by realism) and pro-francs (Remi of Rheims, Genevieve of Paris…), etc

It is finally during the Bataille of Tolbiac against the Alamans, towards 496, that the destiny erases the doubts of Clovis: its army is about to be overcome. Always according to Gregoire de Tours, not knowing more with which pagan god to dedicate itself, Clovis requests then the Christ and promises to him to convert if it obtains the victory, as one century the Roman Emperor Constantin did it more early. In the middle of the battle, whereas itself is encircled and will be taken, the alaman chief is killed out of an arrow, which puts its routed army. The victory is in Clovis and to the god of the Christians.

According to other sources, Tolbiac would have been only one stage and the final illumination of Clovis would have in fact take place at the time of the visit to the tomb of Saint-Martin de Tours. Always it is that Clovis receives then the Baptême with 3.000 warriors - collective baptisms being then a current practice - hands of Remi saint, in Rheims, the December 25th one year ranging between 496 and 499. This baptism is remained a significant event for the Histoire of France: almost all the French kings, thereafter, were crowned in the Cathédrale of Rheims to the king Charles {{X}}, in 1825.

Thus, the baptism of Clovis marks the beginning of the bond between the clergy and franque monarchy then French, bond which will last until the beginning of the 19th century. Henceforth, the sovereign must reign in the name of God. This baptism also makes it possible Clovis to durably sit its authority on the populations, primarily Gallo-Roman and catholic, that it dominates: this baptism, it could take into account on the support of the Clergé, and vice versa.

Extension of the kingdom towards the south

With the support of the Roman Emperor of the East Anastase, very anxious of the expansionist aimings of Goths, Clovis then attacks the Visigoths who then dominate the major part of the Iberian peninsula and the south-west of Gaulle (the Septimanie or “Marquisat de Gothie”), to the Loire in north and the the Cevennes in the east.

In spring 507, the Francs launch their offensive towards the south, crossing the Loire towards Tours, while the allies burgondes attack in the east. The Francs face the army of the king Alaric {{II}} in a plain close to Poitiers. The battles known as, of “Vouillé”, is terrible according to historiography, and the Visigoths fold up themselves after the death of their king, killed by Clovis itself, in singular combat.

This victory makes it possible the Francs to annex all the territories before Visigoths between the Loire, ocean and the Pyrenees. From Italy, Ostrogoths de Théodoric take again well Provence and some parts in Burgondes, but the Empire threatens their coasts, and Clovis keeps the main part of the old territories Visigoths.

Paris, the new capital

After Turned and Soissons, Clovis chooses finally like Paris capital, into 508. It is notable that the Pacte of the salic law is him also dated according to 507: perhaps its promulgation coincides it with the installation of the king in Paris. Paris is also the town of Sainte Genevieve, actress major.

Its reasons are undoubtedly mainly strategic, the city having been a garrison town and an imperial residence towards the end of the Empire. Moreover, vast and rich tax department surrounds it. It has only one importance symbolic system: the frank kingdom did not have administration (nor moreover none the characters which founds a modern state), and the frank kings who succeed Clovis do not attach importance to the possession of the city. However, the town of Lyon, old “capital of Gaules”, definitively loses its political supremacy in the Ouest-européen isthmus.

Under the reign of Clovis, in any case, and even during the whole of the period mérovingienne, the city does not know major changes because its development will be initially slowed down by the multiplication of the capitals resulting from the successive divisions of the territory of Gaulle: the ancient real inheritance is preserved, sometimes reallocated. Only of new religious buildings given by the royal family and the aristocracy transform the urban landscape somewhat. But it is especially after the death of Clovis that the first of these buildings transfer the day ( cf the article on Clotilde ).

The council of Orleans

In 511, Clovis joins together a council in Orleans, capital in the establishment of the relations between king and Catholic church. Clovis is not posed as chief of the Church as a king arien would make it, it cooperates with this one and does not intervene in the decisions of the bishops (even if it convened them, their installation of the questions, and promulgates the guns of the council).

This council aims giving of the order in the episcopate of the frank kingdom, at facilitating the conversion and the assimilation of the converted Francs and the ariens, to limit the incestes (thus breaking the Germanic tradition matriarcale family clans endogames), to share the tasks between administration and Église, to restore the bonds with papacy.

The alliance of the Christian Church and the capacity, which began with the baptism from the king (496) and who will perdurera nearly fourteen centuries, is a major political act which continues because the rural populations, until there pagan, increasingly christianized, trust him more. It is by this alliance that Clovis seems the true founder of French monarchy.

Legends around Clovis

Legends will reduce Clovis from Trojan king Énée via Pharamond († 428), more or less mythical chief.

Another legend affirms that at the time of the battle of Tolbiac, a dream would have shown to him a cross while a voice said to him: “ In hoc signo vinces ” Under this sign, you will overcome”, legend also brought back to the emperor Constantin during his fight against Maxence.

Another legend, hawked by the archbishop of Rheims Hincmar (845 - 882) ensures that it would have received the miraculous oiling of an oil descended from the Sky in a Sainte bulb, the chrism, brought by the Holy Spirit descended in the shape from a dove.

The royal burial

Clovis dies in Paris the November 27th 511, 45 years old.

According to the tradition, it would have been buried in the basilica of the Saint-Apostles, future Holy-Genevieve church, which it had made build on the tomb even the holy guardian one of the city, with the site of the current street Clovis (street which separates the church Saint-Etienne-of-Mount from the Henri-V college).

Actually, the monument which accommodated the relics of holy was not completed. Clovis was rather buried, like writes it Gregoire de Tours, in the sacrarium of the basilica of the Saint-Apostles, i.e. in a mausoleum builds purposely with the manner of the burial which had accommodated the Christian Roman Emperor Constantin the Large one with the Saint-Apostles with Constantinople ( P. Périn ).

The division of the kingdom in 511

With died of Clovis, its sons Clotaire, Clodomir, Thierry and Childebert, divide the kingdom which it had put a life to join together, in accordance with the franque tradition. The essence of Gaulle is subjected, except the Provence, the Septimanie and the kingdom of the Burgondes.

Its kingdom can thus be cut out in four big parts, including three about equivalent. The fourth, between the Rhine and the Loire is allotted to Thierry, elder wire of Clovis, born from union of a pagan type before 493. It is larger, since it covered approximately a third of franque Gaulle.

The division takes place in the presence of large kingdom, of Thierry who was already major and of the Clotilde queen, according to Gregoire de Tours. It is established according to the private law that Clovis had made register in the Salic law: in 511, it is thus before all the division of an inheritance, that of the heirs to a king owner of his kingdom which one observes. One can, in the light of this remark, to understand that the royalty of the Francs was unaware of the concept of “public goods” ( LMBO publica of the Romains) and thus of State. The disappearance of the State, indeed, seems consumed through the division of the kingdom of Clovis.

This practice very different from the divisions is also practiced by the last Roman Emperors: legally, the Empire remained one, the division took place for practical reasons, the successors were sometimes selected according to their merits. Even when they were wire of the emperor, the empire was not cut out in as many shares as there were wire, and never the empire was not separated from the concept of State by the Romans.

However, notable fact, the four capitals of the new kingdoms all are located at the center of the unit, relatively close relations from/to each other and in the old kingdom of Syagrius: as from this moment: “one sees appearing a contrast striking between strong tendencies to dispersion and the force immanente of a unit of a higher nature: the idea of a kingdom of the Francs unified remained anchored in the spirits”: (Patrick Périn, Clovis and Mérovingiens )

Gregoire de Tours, baptism of Clovis

It is about an extract of the Book, chapter of the History of the Francs : The queen then makes come in secrecy Remi, bishop of the town of Rheims, by requesting it to insinuate in the king the word of the hello. The bishop having made it come in secrecy started to insinuate to him that it was to accept true God, creator of the sky and the ground, and to give up the idols which can be useful to him, neither with him, nor with the others. But this last retorted to him: “I listened to you very readily, very holy Père, however there remains a thing; it is that the people which are under my orders, do not want to forsake his gods; but I will maintain it in accordance with your word”. It thus went in the middle of his and before even as it had spoken, the power of God having preceded it, all the people exclaimed at the same time: “The gods mortals, us them kids, pious king, and it is immortal God who Remi sermon which we are ready to follow”. This news is carried to the prelate who, filled of a great joy, made prepare the swimming pool. It was the king who it first asked to be baptized by the pontiff. He advances, new Constantin, towards the swimming pool to cure disease of an old leprosy and to erase with a fresh water of dirty made spots in the past. When it had entered for the baptism, the saint of God challenged it of an eloquent voice in these terms: “Curve gently the head, O Sicambre; adore what you burned, burns what you adored”. Remi was a bishop of a remarkable science and which had first of all impregnated study of rhetoric, but it was distinguished as so much by its holiness as it equalized Silvestre by his miracles. There nowadays exists a book of its life which tells that it has ressuscity a death. Thus the king, having confessed very powerful God in his Trinity, was baptized in the name of the Father, of the Son and the Saint Spirit and oint of the chrism with the sign of the cross of Christ. More than three thousand men of his army were also baptized.

Of “Clovis” with “Louis”

“Clovis” corresponds to the late Francization of “Clodweg”, probably coming from a Germanic deformation of the Roman “Claudius”.

Name “Clovis”, posterior with the frank king, derives successively towards “Hlodovic”, then “Clodovic”, and “Clouis”, of which was born the first name “Louis” carried by eighteen kings from France.

One will note in the passing as the Roman “Claudius” as well leads to the French “Louis” as in the Germanic “Ludwig” (Clodweg, Cludwig).

See too

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