Gregory of Tours: The Merovingians

326 Pages·2005·6.504 MB·English

by  Alexander Callander Murray

GREGORY OF TOURS
READINGS IN MEDIEVAL CIVILIZATIONS AND CULTURES: X
series editor: Paul Edward Dutton
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GREGORY OF TOURS
THE MEROVINGIANS
edited and translated by
ALEXANDER CALLANDER MURRAY
broadview press
©2006 Alexander Callander Murray
All rights reserved. The use of any part of this publication reproduced, transmitted in any
form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, or
stored in a retrieval system, without prior written consent of the publisher—or in the case of
photocopying, a licence from Access Copyright (Canadian Copyright Licensing Agency), One
Yonge Street, Suite 1900, Toronto, on m5e 1e5—is an infringement of the copyright law.
Library and Archives Canada Cataloguing in Publication
Gregory, Saint, Bishop of Tours, 538-594.
Gregory of Tours : the Merovingians / edited and translated by Alexander Callander
Murray.
(Readings in medieval civilizations and cultures ; 10)
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN 1-55111-523-9
1. Merovingians—History—Sources. I. Murray, Alexander C., 1946- II. Title. III. Series.
DC65.G74 2005 944’.013 C2005-905166-3
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CONTENTS
List of Illustrations • vi
List of Genealogies • vii
List of Maps • vii
Abbreviations • vii
Preface • ix
Introduction • xi
Note on the Drawings of Jean-Paul Laurens • xxvii
Bibliography • xxix
PART I: FROM MEROVECH TO CLOVIS • 1
1. Origins of the Merovingian Kingdom (Book II) • 3
PART II: THE KINGDOM OF THE FRANKS, a. 511–575 • 23
2. From the Death of Clovis to the Death of Chlothar I, a. 511–561
(Books III–IV) • 25
3. From the Division of Chlothar’s Kingdom to the Death of Sigibert I,
a. 561–575 (Book IV) • 55
PART III: THE REIGN OF CHILDEBERT II, a. 576–591 • 73
4. Succession of Childebert II and the Demise of Royal Cousins, a. 576–580
(Book V) • 75
5. From the Treaty of Nogent to the Death of Chilperic, a. 581–Fall 584
(Book VI) • 121
6. Aftermath of Chilperic’s Death and the Revolt of Gundovald,
Fall 584–Spring 585 (Book VII) • 147
7. Aftermath of Gundovald’s Revolt, Summer 585–587 (Book VIII) • 174
8. Revolt in Austrasia and the Fall of Egidius, August 587–591
(Books IX–X) • 198
Epilogue and Postscripts • 233
Appendix: The Merovingian Bishop • 239
Genealogies • 261
Maps • 264
Index of Persons • 276
v
LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS
1. Queen Radegund, having left her husband Chlothar, places the sym-
bols of her worldly rank on the altar and enters the religious life (III
7). • 28
2. “I have taken care of the favor your sweet self asked of me (IV 3).” Chlo-
thar announces to Ingund that he has married her sister Aregund. • 48
3. The sons of Chlothar I accompany the body of their father to the basilica
of Saint Medard in Soissons (IV 21). • 53
4. Venantius Fortunatus recites an epithalamium, or wedding oration, before
Sigibert and Brunhild. • 59
5. “In the end, he had her strangled by a slave, and he himself found the
corpse on the bed (IV 28).” The death of Galswinth. • 60
6. Chilperic views the body of his brother Sigibert (IV 51). • 71
7. “Changing his clothing for the customary garb of the clergy, he was
ordained a priest and sent to the monastery at Le Mans called Aninsola to
be instructed in the duties of priests (V 14).” Merovech’s exile. • 82
8. “Merovech began to shout that I had no right to suspend him from com-
munion without the consent of our brother bishops (V 14).” Merovech
confronts Bishops Gregory and Ragnemod. • 84
9. The trial of Praetextatus (V 18). • 94
10. Guntram Boso, with his daughters, encounters Dracolen (V 25). • 100
11. Marcus the referendary announces new taxes in Limoges (V 28). • 103
12. The punishment of Limoges (V 28). • 104
13. The sons of Chilperic and Fredegund are stricken by the epidemic
(V 34). • 106
14. “I see the sword of divine wrath unsheathed and hanging over this house
(V 50).” The prediction of Bishop Salvius. • 119
15. “Taking Priscus gently by the hair, the king said to me, ‘Come, bishop of
God, and lay your hands on him (VI 5).’” • 124
16. Gregory reacts to Chilperic’s poetry (VI 46). • 145
17. At Reuil, Fredegund contemplates assassinating Brunhild (VII
20). • 156
18. “The king bore the body amidst countless candles to its burial site in the
basilica of Saint Vincent (VIII 10).” Guntram buries Clovis. • 180
19. “Let’s hope the person who dared do this can be pointed out (VIII 31).”
Fredegund, Beppolen, and Ansovald visit Praetextatus. • 190
20. “He waited for a cup, and when he received it, drank its mixture of
absinthe, wine, and honey (VIII 31).” • 191
21. Radegund and Agnes entertain Venantius Fortunatus at the monastery of
the Holy Cross in Poitiers. • 199
vi
LIST OF GENEALOGIES
1. The Early Merovingians: Clovis, his Sons, and Grandsons • 262
2. The Early Merovingians: Sigibert I, Brunhild, and their Descen-
dants • 262
3. The Early Merovingians: Chilperic I, Fredegund, and their Descen-
dants • 263
4. The House of Chlothar I and the Visigothic Monarchy • 263
LIST OF MAPS
1. Bishoprics of Gaul • 265
2. Gaul in the Sixth Century • 271
3. The Division of 561 (cf. Gregory, Hist. IV 22) • 272
4. Regions of Gaul and its Neighbors in the Merovingian Period • 273
5. West and East on the Death of Theoderic the Great, a. 526 • 274
6. West and East around the Deaths of Chlothar I (a. 561) and Justinian (a.
565) • 275
ABBREVIATIONS
a. anno, annis, in the year(s)
ca circa, around (the year)
GC Gregory of Tours, Liber in Gloria Confessorum. Trans. Raymond Van
Dam, Glory of the Confessor (Liverpool, 1998)
s.a. sub anno, under the year
MGH Monumenta Germaniae Historica
VM Gregory of Tours, Libri IV de Virtutibus Sancti Martini. Trans. Ray-
mond Van Dam, in Saints and their Miracles in Late Antique Gaul
(Princeton, 1993)
References to the Histories:
Roman numerals refer to the book numbers, Arabic to the chapter number; IX
2, for example, would be Book Nine, chapter 2.
vii
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PREFACE
Abridging the Histories of Gregory of Tours has a long, and some will think
ignoble, history. Gregory gravely anticipated the development. In the last chap-
ter of the Histories, having listed his various writings, he adjured his successors,
under threat of having to keep company with the devil at the last judgment, to
leave his work intact. As Gregory conceded the privilege of turning selections
into verse, his concern may not have been so much abridgement as such as the
potential for an epitome to consign the real thing to oblivion. The Histories
never found its poet, but not too long after Gregory’s death, his history was
abbreviated. It was reduced to its first six books, and numerous chapters of an
ecclesiastical character excised. The popularity of the epitome seems to have
long eclipsed the original. Fredegar in his Chronicle around 660 and the Neus-
trian author of a History of the Franks (Liber historiae Francorum) around 727 used
the six-book epitome, neither aware of the ten-book version that Gregory had
feared might suffer diminution. Both authors in turn abbreviated the epitome
further in the composition of their own distinctive versions. Fortunately the
ten-book version survived, acquiring in the Carolingian period the title History
of the Franks, the name by which it was known for most of the medieval and
modern periods.
The present abridgement has its own history too, brief as it is. It is a con-
siderably expanded version of selections that started life as a chapter in From
Roman to Merovingian Gaul: A Reader, a collection of original sources that I
translated and compiled for Broadview Press in 2000 in the series Readings
in Medieval Civilizations and Cultures. The thanks I rendered there to Walter
Goffart and Joan Murray bear repeating here. Special acknowledgment is due
Paul Dutton, the series editor, and Broadview Press for not only suggesting this
new translation but patiently awaiting the arrival of a manuscript that, like the
Reader before it, outgrew the modest dimensions that were first intended.
One can readily detect in the early abridgements of the Histories a response
to the historical interests of the generations after Gregory’s death. The con-
figuration of the present selections differs significantly from previous medieval
or modern epitomes, but no great claim can be made for it responding to
some distinctive interest of the present age. This is, after all, a time in which
the integrity of Gregory’s work has been asserted and the designation Histories
restored as the title of Gregory’s historical books. The selections, nevertheless,
will I hope fill a need, which for want of better words may be called utilitarian
and even, if the term does not offend, pedagogical. The thought occasionally
ix