I. if not conquerors; but as years progressed, the leaders CHAP. began more and more to settle on the land, or to scatter into towns. War was no longer profitable. The south had been plundered again and again. again and again. Expeditions across the Alps or beyond the Rhine, proved alike unfortunate. One of the first acts of Clothaire was to lead the German Frank against a certain portion of the Saxon, who had accepted lands in Thuringia. At the sight of the army which marched against them, the Saxons offered half their goods and valuables. But the Franks would have all, and compelled Clothaire to fight. The result was, that he and they were beaten. An edict exists, issued by Clothaire, intended to correct the arbitrary conduct of judges and tax-gatherers. He ordains that heirs should succeed to their property, notwithstanding any order or interference of those in power, that the rent and tithes which the public officers had a right to collect should not be levied on Church property, and that thirty years' possession of land be sufficient to secure it, whether to the Church or to individuals. It was probably addressed to Western France, and evinces the existence of Roman ideas and principles of government, as well as an increase of ecclesiastical authority. One of its orders is, that if a provincial judge gave sentence against law, he was to be punished (castigetur) by the bishop. At the same time the rule of St. Benedict for incorporating monks, and subjecting them to order and discipline, penetrated into France. St. Benedict was the cotemporary of Clovis. His giving rules and organisation to the monks, and his enjoining the practice of agriculture by them, enabled those associations to acquire land and to cultivate it. As the cultivators of all other lands were either slaves or else subject, as in Roman times, to the vexation of the fisc, monastic establishments became the only rustic ones enjoying prosperity and capable of amassing wealth. No wonder that they increased. CHAP. I. Whilst Roman ideas and sacerdotal influence thus Under her influence Sigebert formed a court, and difficulty in Austrasia was to collect a public or a royal cessful war remunerated both. But when military expeditions became unprofitable and rare, the crown looked to levy rent, in the shape of tenths, from such fisc-land. The aristocracy, to whom the grants had been made, resisted those demands, as well as the resumption of the land itself at the death of each holder. Such were apparently the causes and nature of the at Constantinople and at Rome.* According to the early barbaric codes, all judicial power was exercised by the people themselves, in mallum, or periodical assembly. But as an aristocracy arose in the person of the leudes, these withdrew themselves from the jurisdiction of the mallum, and acknowledged no judge or judicial superior but the king. This was a great cause of the increase of the royal autho "Ad Palatinorum curam, et Rationalium officia, omnium rerum nostrarum, et totius perpetuarii, hoc est, emphyteuticarii juris exactio re- CHAP. I. I. CHAP. rity. The Major Domus was chosen to represent the king and fulfil the functions of judge in such cases; and he inflicted at times, it appears, capital punishments. But a powerful aristocracy could submit for no lengthened time to such a jurisdiction. They soon shook off the fiscal and judicial tyranny by rebellion, and by insisting that the Major Domus should be of their selection and class. At last, no authority being equal to pass judgment upon warriors proud of their independence, single combat was substituted for nobles, and more vulgar ordeals were used for warriors and men of low degree. The clergy, who multiplied miracles, and preached the doctrine of the daily intervention of the Deity in worldly affairs, promoted a mode of trial which gave them such opportunities of interference and means of power. And justice as well as every manly virtue was prostrated before the idols of superstition. Sigebert during his life kept down the turbulence of the Austrasian grandees, although their frowardness was supported by Chilperic, the King of Neustria, and his wife Fredegonde. It thus happened that the Romanising spirit of the Queen of Austrasia was checked, not aided, by that region where Roman ideas most prevailed. Female rivalry predominated over interest. Fredegonde at last caused the assassination of Sigebert, at the very moment that he was about to triumph over Neustria. In the anarchy which followed, the functionary noblesse of Sigebert fled; but the rude aristocracy themselves felt the necessity of these administrators, and by the advice of Chrodinus, the wisest and most influential of their party, they agreed to appoint Gogo, one of Sigebert's ministers, to be Major Domus. And Chrodinus set the example of obedience, by placing Gogo's bracile or armlet round. his own neck. The Austrasian noblesse and Brunehild afterwards resumed their quarrel, with its pristine inveteracy, I. and with alternating fortunes. Brunehild, in the name CHAP. of her son Childebert, who inherited Burgundy as well as Austrasia, for a time retained her ascendancy, and made use of the Burgundians to awe the Austrasians. When two sons of Childebert succeeded each to one of these kingdoms, she invaded Austrasia, and defeated the army of the prince of that region. Whilst pursuing these to the Rhine with her son Theodoric of Burgundy, they were met by Leonisius, bishop of Mayence. The advice of the prelate was, that they should spare none, all the people of that region being hostile to the Church and to Roman ideas. Theodoric, however, died in the midst of his triumph; and Brunehild, deserted even by the Burgundians, fell into the power of her enemies, and suffered cruel torture and death at their hands. The extinction of the first Austrasian family, and of their spirited queen Brunehild, took place in 613, when Clotaire the Second succeeded to the Frank empire. An early Capitulary of his provided against the exorbitance of any new tax or census, and against bishops appointing their own successors. In 622, Clotaire gave the Austrasians his son Dagobert to be their prince. What they stood in need of was a military leader; for the Slavons had advanced, their Sorabic tribes over the Elbe, the Wenden over the Saale. The latter had formed a kingdom under Samo, and had shaken off the yoke of the Avars, when Dagobert, who succeeded to the Frank empire in 628, demanded of them submission or reparation. Dagobert commenced his reign with power and haughtiness: south, west, and east obeyed him. Everywhere he humbled the aristocracy, enforced taxation and Roman laws, and was more an emperor than a Frank king. With this the Austrasians especially were discontented; and they showed their remissness in the war with the Slavons. Dagobert, in consequence, appointed his young son Sigebert to be ruler of Austrasia, |