• General Notes

  King of the Salic Franks (481-511), King of France. (Came to throne at about age 15.
  
  Founder of the Empire of the Franks
  
  Born: circa 466, son of Childeric I, King des Francs and Basine Andovera de Turinge, Clovis I became King between the Summer of 481 and Autumn of 482. According to Gregoire de Tours, he was only about 15 years of age at the time. In any case he was quite young as he was called "juvenis". Timelines here are bound to be fraught with error since the custom of counting years from the time of Jesus Christ was not established until the 8th Century. Thus, both the Larousse and the History of France assert a birth date circa 466 whereas Stuart's "Royalty for Commoners" claims Clovis I was alive in the year 420! That date is necessary to claim that Sigebert I is the son of Childebert, son of Clovis, since Stuart claims Sigebert I was King of the Salic Francs from 481 to 511.
  
  Significant-Other: Evochilde before 486 - Evochilde was a concubine. Note - between 486 and 507: King of the Franks, Clovis I vanquished the Romans at Soissons in 486. Syagrius, the "Roman King" takes refuge in Toulouse under the protection of the King of the Wisigoths, Alaric [who had just become King in 484]. By the end of the year, Clovis I forced Alaric to give up Syagrius, and Clovis I secretly has Syagrius put to death. From 487 to 490, Clovis I extended his kingdom all the way to the Loire River, however, he respects the border of the Wisigoths to the South and of the Burgundians to the South-West, as well as that of the riparian Francs to the East. From 490 to 495, Clovis is occupied with the liquidation of the Salic Franc dynasty North of Gaule. King Chararic of Tongres is decapitated, and King Ragnacaire of Cambrai is executed. Upon the request for aid from the Riparian Francs, Clovis I defeats the Alamans (Germans) at the Battle of Tolbiac in 496 thus bringing Champagne under his jurisdiction. In 500, he wages war against Gondebaud, King of Burgundy defeating him near Dijon. Gondebaud retreats to Avignon. In 502, on the Cure and the Cousin, Clovis I and Gondebaud seal an alliance. From April to June 507, the French Army attack the Wisigoths, whose Kingdom extends from the Mediterranean to the ocean, and cross the Loire, going up the Valley of Calin toward Poitiers and encounter the Visigoth Army in the plain of Vouille, 15 km West of Clain. Alaric II, King of the Visigoths is killed and the Wisigoths thus are defeated. By 507, thanks to the efforts of his son, Thierry, the entire Meridional Gaule falls into Clovis I's control. In 508, the Franc Army lays siege on Arles in order to secure Provence. Theodoric, King of the Ostrogoths, occupies Provence, and his general, Ibbas, crosses the Alps to deliver Arles from Clovis I's clutch. Theodoric conquers the Burgundians at Avignon and Orange and makes Amalaric, his grandson and son of Alaric II, King of the Wisigoths. Clovis I loses the Bas-Languedoc, then called Septimania.
  
  Around 510, Clovis has Cloderic, King of the Riparian tribes who had fought in his support at Vouille, assassinated, and proclaims himself King of the Riparians. Thus, the Kingdom extends from the Pyrenees, to the ocean to beyond the Rhine. Upon his death, according to Frankish custom, his kingdom was divided among his four sons: Thierry, Clodomir, Childebert and Clotaire. Married circa 493: Sainte Clotilde de Bourgogne, daughter of Chilperic, King de Bourgogne and N?; Clotilde was a Merovingien. By the time Clovis I married her, he already had a son through his concubine. Clotilde contributed to the conversion of Clovis to Christianity. After his death, she retired to the monastery of Saint-Martin in Tours (France). Her Feast Day is 3 June. Baptized: on 25 December 496; When the Queen, Clotilde, convinced Clovis I to have their son Ingomer baptized, he relented. Shortly afterwards, the son died.
  
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  From Gregory, Bishop of Tours (539-594) History of the Franks:
  
  "While Clovis was resident in Paris he sent secretly to the son of Sigibert, saying: "Your Father is old and he is lame in one leg. If he were to die, his kingdom would come to you of right, and my alliance would come with it." Chloderic was led astray by his lust for power and began to plot his father's death"
  
  "[After Chloderic killed Sigibert, Clovis' messengers kill Chloderic.] When Clovis heard that both Sigibert and his son were dead, he came to Cologne himself and ordered the inhabitants to assemble. "While I was out sailing on the River Scheldt, and he, Chloderic, the son of your King, my brother, was busy plotting against his father and putting it out that I wanted him killed. As Sigibert fled through the forest of Buchau, Chloderic set assassins on him and had him murdered. While Chloderic was showing his father's treasure, he in his turn was killed by somebody or other. I take no responsibility for what has happened. It is not for me to shed the blood of one of my fellow kings, for that is a crime; but since things have turned out in this way, I will give you my advice and you must make of it what you will. It is that you should turn to me and put yourself under my protection." When they heard what he had say, they clashed their shields and shouted their approval."
  
  "Day in day out God submitted the enemies of Clovis to his dominion and increased his power, for he walked before Him with an upright heart and did what was pleasing in His sight."
  
  "In the same way he encompassed the death of many other kings and blood-relations of his whom he suspected of conspiring against his kingdom. By doing this he spread his dominion over the whole of Gaul. One day when he had called a general assembly of his subjects, he is said to have made the following remark about the relatives whom he had destroyed: "How sad a thing it is that I live among strangers like some solitary pilgrim, and that I have none of my own relations left to help me when disaster threatens!" He said this not because he grieved for their deaths, but because in his cunning way he hoped to find some relative still in the land of the living whom he could kill."
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  Clovis - or Chlodovech - succeeded his father, Childeric, as King of the Salian Franks in 481. In 486, he defeated Syagrius, who ruled an isolated Roman territory in northern Gaul, then went on to defeat various rivals in the lands surrounding his capital at Soissons.
  
  In 493, he married a Burgundian princess, a Christian woman named Chlothild (later canonised as St. Clotilda). She was the daughter of Chilperic II, King of Burgundy. Chilperic was murdered by his brother, Gundobad. Clovis, learning about the girl, asked for her hand, and Gundobad was said to be too afraid to refuse. Chlothild attempted to convert her new husband to Christianity but initially failed.
  
  In 496, he came into conflict with the Alamanni. According to Gregory of Tours, he vowed to become a Christian if he was victorious. When victory was forthcoming, he was true to his word and was baptised by bishop Remigius of Rheims. Significantly, he was baptised into the Orthodox, rather than the heretical Arian persuasion, unlike the rulers of the other Germanic successor kingdoms. This was a shrewd political move, which ensured the approval and support of the Roman Church in his subsequent campaigns.
  
  King Gundobad's brother, Godegisel, now made secret overtures to Clovis, persuading him to invade Burgundy to support his own attempt on the throne. In the light of Gundobad's murder of Chilperic, this might be seen as a pursuit of Chlothild's blood feud with the Burgundian king - or it might be that the 'murder' never took place, and was invented retrospectively, to justify Clovis' invasion. In any event, Gundobad fled to Avignon, but eventually came to terms with Clovis, and became his tributary. (He then wasted no time in bringing his brother to bay at Vienne and killing him).
  
  He then attacked the Visigoths, perhaps on the pretext that they were heretical Arians. He defeated and killed their king, Alaric II, in 507 at VouillÃ(c) near Poitiers.
  
  He made Paris his capital and spent the remainder of his reign eliminating rival Frankish leaders. By the time of his death in 511, his empire stretched to include much of modern-day France and south-western Germany, and he was the favoured ally of the Eastern Emperor, Anastasius. The Franks were not yet the dominant power in Western Europe, nor had they even completed their hegemony in Gaul, which was still contested by the Burgundians, but Clovis had turned the Salian Franks into a major power amongst the barbarian successor kingdoms.
  
  Marriage 1 Clothilda b: 475
  Change Date: 1 Feb 1999
  Children
  Chlodebaud CHILDEBERT I DE COLOGNE b: abt 430 lv 450
  Chlotaire CHLOTHAR I MEROVING b: 499 in in Rheims, Marne, Loire-Alantique, France
  Clotilda b: Abt 507 in Rheims, Marne, Loire-Atlantique, France
  
  Marriage 2 AMALABERGE HÉRULE b: Abt 462
  Change Date: 26 Jun 1999
  Children
  Thierry I b: Abt 486

Details of the Great, the Riparian's family with St. Clotilda of Burgundy