In effect, the Germanic peoples who penetrated into Roman Gaul were but a small segment of the Germanic world. The northern Germans (Angles, Jutes, Saxons, and Frisians) still occupied the coastal regions of the North Sea east of the Rhine, and the Thuringians and Bavarians divided the territory between the Elbe and Danube. The Slavic world began on the opposite bank of the Elbe. The Merovingians Clovis and the unification of Gaul Frankish expansion
Clovis (reigned 481/482–511), the son of Childeric, unified Gaul with the exception of areas in the southeast. According to the traditional and highly stylized account by Gregory of Tours that is now generally questioned by scholars in its particulars, Clovis consolidated the position of the Franks in northern Gaul during the years following his accession. In 486 he defeated Syagrius, the last Roman ruler in Gaul, and in a series of subsequent campaigns with strong Gallo-Roman support he occupied an area situated between the Frankish kingdom of Tournai, the Visigothic and Burgundian kingdoms, and the lands occupied by the Ripuarian Franks and the Alemanni, removing it from imperial control once more. It was probably during this same period that he eliminated the other Salian kings. In a second phase he attacked the other Germanic peoples living in Gaul, with varying degrees of success. An Alemannian westward push was blocked, probably as a result of two campaigns—one conducted by the Franks of the kingdom of Cologne about 495–496 at the Battle of Tolbiacum (Zülpich), the second by Clovis about 506, after his annexation of Cologne. Clovis thus extended his authority over most of the territory of the Alemanni. Some of the former inhabitants sought refuge in the Ostrogothic kingdom of Theodoric the Great, the most powerful ruler in the West at that time.
In the late 490s, according to the traditional chronology, Clovis absorbed the region between the Seine and the Loire (including Nantes, Rennes, and Vannes) and then moved against the Visigothic kingdom. He defeated Alaric II at Vouillé (507). He annexed Aquitaine, between the Loire, Rhône, and Garonne, as well as Novempopulana, between the Garonne and the Pyrenees. Opposed to a Frankish hegemony in the West, Theodoric intervened on behalf of the Visigothic king. He prevented Clovis from annexing Septimania, on the Mediterranean between the Rhône and the Pyrenees, which the Visigoths retained, and occupied Provence. In addition, Clovis eliminated various Frankish kinglets in the east and united the Frankish people under his own leadership.
Clovis established Paris as the capital of his new kingdom, and in 508 he received some sort of recognition from Emperor Anastasius, possibly an honorary consulship, and the right to use the imperial insignia. These privileges gave the new king legitimacy of sorts and were useful in gaining the support of his Gallo-Roman subjects. The conversion of Clovis
According to Gregory of Tours, Clovis came to believe that his victory at Tolbiacum in 496 was due to the help of the Christian God, whom his wife Clotilda had been encouraging him to accept. With the support of Bishop Remigius of Reims, a leader of the Gallo-Roman aristocracy, Clovis converted to Catholic Christianity with some 3,000 of his army in 498. This traditional account of the conversion, however, has been questioned by scholars, especially because of the echoes of the conversion of Constantine that Gregory so clearly incorporated in his history. Scholars now believe that Clovis did not convert until as late as 508 and did not convert directly from paganism to Catholic Christianity but accepted Arian Christianity first. Clovis did, however, convert to the Catholic faith, and this conversion assured the Frankish king of the support not only of the ecclesiastical hierarchy but also of Roman Catholic Christians in general—the majority of the population. It also ensured the triumph in Gaul of Roman Christianity over paganism and Arianism and spared Gaul the lengthy conflicts that occurred in other Germanic kingdoms. The sons of Clovis
Following the death of Clovis in 511, the kingdom was divided among his four sons. This partition was not made according to ethnic, geographic, or administrative divisions. The only factor taken into account was that the portions be of equal value. This was defined in terms of the royal fisc (treasury), which had previously been the imperial fisc, and tax revenues from land and trade, which were based upon imperial practices. Boundaries for the division were poorly defined.
The division of the Frankish kingdom among the sons of Clovis at his death in 511.Encyclopædia Britannica, Inc.
Clovis’s lands included two general areas: one was the territory north of the Loire River (the part of Gaul that was conquered earliest); the other, to the south, in Aquitaine, was a region not yet assimilated. Theodoric I, Clovis’s eldest son by one of the wives he married in Germanic style before Clovis married Clotilda and converted to Christianity, received lands around the Rhine, Moselle, and upper Meuse rivers, as well as the Massif Central. Clodomir was given the Loire country to the other side of the Rhine, which was the only kingdom not composed of separated territories. Childebert I inherited the country of the English Channel and the lower Seine and, probably, the region of Bordeaux and Saintes. Chlotar I was granted the old Frankish country north of the Somme and an ill-defined area in Aquitaine. Their capitals were centred in the Paris Basin, which was divided among the four brothers: Theodoric used Reims; Clodomir, Orléans; Childebert, Paris; Chlotar, Soissons. As each brother died, the survivors partitioned the newly available lands among themselves. This system resulted in bloody competition until 558, when Chlotar, after his brothers’ deaths, succeeded in reuniting the kingdom under his own rule. The conquest of Burgundy
In spite of these partitions, the Frankish kings continued their conquests. One of their primary concerns was to extend their dominion over the whole of Gaul. It took two campaigns to overcome the Burgundian kingdom. In 523 Clodomir, Childebert I, and Chlotar I, as allies of Theodoric the Great, king of the Ostrogoths, moved into Burgundy, whose king, Sigismund, Theodoric’s son-in-law, had assassinated his own son. Sigismund was captured and killed. Godomer, the new Burgundian king, defeated the Franks at Vézeronce and forced them to retreat; Clodomir was killed in the battle. Childebert I, Chlotar I, and Theodebert I, the son of Theodoric I, regained the offensive in 532–534. The Burgundian kingdom was annexed and divided between the Frankish kings. Following Theodoric the Great’s death in 526, the Franks were able to gain a foothold in Provence by taking advantage of the weakened Ostrogothic kingdom. The Franks were thus masters of all of southeastern Gaul and had reached the Mediterranean. But, in spite of two expeditions (531 and 542), they were unable to gain possession of Visigothic Septimania. Also, at least a portion of Armorica in the northwest remained outside the Frankish sphere of influence. During this period, British colonization of the western half of the Armorican peninsula was at its height. The conquest of southern Germany
To the east, the Franks extended their domain in southern Germany, subjugating Thuringia (about 531 Chlotar I carried off Radegunda, a niece of the Thuringian king), the part of Alemannia between the Neckar River and the upper Danube (after 536), and Bavaria. The latter was created as a dependent duchy about 555. The Franks were less successful in northern Germany; in 536 they imposed a tribute on the Saxons (who occupied the area between the Elbe, the North Sea, and the Ems), but the latter revolted successfully in 555.