Ripuarian Franks
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Franks
The Franks were a confederation of Germanic tribes first attested in the third century AD as living north and east of the Lower Rhine River. From the third to fifth centuries some Franks raided Roman territory while other Franks joined the Roman troops in Gaul. Only the Salian Franks formed a...
" and "Francia" are innovations dating to no earlier than the first few centuries of that era.
Once the term "Franks" appeared, authors of the Roman Empire
Roman Empire
The Roman Empire was the post-Republican period of the ancient Roman civilization, characterised by an autocratic form of government and large territorial holdings in Europe and around the Mediterranean....
made a general distinction between Salii, "Salian Franks," and Ripuarii or Riparii, "Ripuarian Franks," which are Latin language terms probably, but not certainly, referring to unknown Germanic originals. They are not known in this case. Before they were called "Franks," the Romans referred to them as Germani, "Germans." Strabo
Strabo
Strabo, also written Strabon was a Greek historian, geographer and philosopher.-Life:Strabo was born to an affluent family from Amaseia in Pontus , a city which he said was situated the approximate equivalent of 75 km from the Black Sea...
explains that "in the language of the Romans" "germani" means "genuine." Although genuine overlaps on the meaning of frank, there is no evidence etymological or otherwise to connect Frank with German.
Geography of origins
The "first undoubted mention" of any Franks occurs in the Augustan HistoryAugustan History
The Augustan History is a late Roman collection of biographies, in Latin, of the Roman Emperors, their junior colleagues and usurpers of the period 117 to 284...
, a collection of biographies of emperors written possibly in the 4th century. The Life of Aurelian, possibly by Vopiscus, mentions that the Franks had been raiding across the Rhine and the raiders were captured by the 6th Legion stationed at Mainz
Mainz
Mainz under the Holy Roman Empire, and previously was a Roman fort city which commanded the west bank of the Rhine and formed part of the northernmost frontier of the Roman Empire...
. The Romans killed 700 and sold 300 into slavery. This event happened in the first year of Gordian III
Gordian III
Gordian III , was Roman Emperor from 238 to 244. Gordian was the son of Antonia Gordiana and an unnamed Roman Senator who died before 238. Antonia Gordiana was the daughter of Emperor Gordian I and younger sister of Emperor Gordian II. Very little is known on his early life before his acclamation...
, or 238. No mention of Ripuarian is made but these Franks if they were in the jurisdiction of the 6th very likely came from that territory.
Subsequently Frankish incursions over the Rhine were so frequent that the emperors began to adopt them into the empire and settle them on the borders so that they could control them better. In 292 Constantius
Constantius Chlorus
Constantius I , commonly known as Constantius Chlorus, was Roman Emperor from 293 to 306. He was the father of Constantine the Great and founder of the Constantinian dynasty. As Caesar he defeated the usurper Allectus in Britain and campaigned extensively along the Rhine frontier, defeating the...
defeated and removed some Franks who had settled on the then island of Batavia at the mouth of the Rhine. These were resettled not far way, in Toxandria
Toxandria
Toxandria is the classical name for a region between the Meuse and the Scheldt rivers in the Netherlands and Belgium. The name is also spelled Taxandria...
, the seat of the later Salian Franks. Eumenius
Eumenius
Eumenius , was one of the Roman panegyrists and author of a speech transmitted in the collection of the Panegyrici Latini .-Life:...
mentioned that Constantius "killed, expelled, captured, kidnapped" two groups of Franks, the one that had settled on Batavia and the other having crossed the Rhine. He also uses the term nationes Franciae, the first use of Francia.
Salian was used for the first time by Ammianus Marcellinus
Ammianus Marcellinus
Ammianus Marcellinus was a fourth-century Roman historian. He wrote the penultimate major historical account surviving from Antiquity...
on the occasion of Julian
Julian the Apostate
Julian "the Apostate" , commonly known as Julian, or also Julian the Philosopher, was Roman Emperor from 361 to 363 and a noted philosopher and Greek writer....
in 358 campaigning against "the first Franks of all," the Salians, who at that time were in Toxandria. He defeated them but left them in place, promoting them instead to foederati of the empire. Their soldiers are listed as the Salii in the 5th century Notitia Dignitatum
Notitia Dignitatum
The Notitia Dignitatum is a unique document of the Roman imperial chanceries. One of the very few surviving documents of Roman government, it details the administrative organisation of the eastern and western empires, listing several thousand offices from the imperial court down to the provincial...
, a book of Roman unit insigniae. The Merovingians were to come from these Salian Franks.
Jordanes
Jordanes
Jordanes, also written Jordanis or Jornandes, was a 6th century Roman bureaucrat, who turned his hand to history later in life....
in Getica
Getica (Jordanes)
De origine actibusque Getarum , or the Getica, written in Late Latin by Jordanes in 551, claims to be a summary of a voluminous account by Cassiodorus of the origin and history of the Gothic people, which may have had the title "Origo Gothica" and which is now lost...
mentions some Riparii as auxilliaries of Flavius Aetius
Flavius Aëtius
Flavius Aëtius , dux et patricius, was a Roman general of the closing period of the Western Roman Empire. He was an able military commander and the most influential man in the Western Roman Empire for two decades . He managed policy in regard to the attacks of barbarian peoples pressing on the Empire...
in the Battle of Chalons
Battle of Chalons
The Battle of the Catalaunian Plains , also called the Battle of Châlons sur Marne, took place in AD 451 between a coalition led by the Visigothic king Theodoric I and the Roman general Flavius Aëtius, against the Huns and their allies commanded by their leader Attila...
, 451:
"Hi enim affuerunt auxiliares: Franci, Sarmatae, Armoriciani, Liticiani, Burgundiones, Saxones, Riparii, Olibriones ..."
Considering that Franci is already listed, there is no definite statement that these Riparii are the Ripuarian Franks. They do not appear for certain under that name until their final subjugation by Clovis
Clovis
-Places:* Clovis, California** Clovis Unified School District, serving Clovis and Fresno* Clovis, New Mexico** Clovis Municipal School District** Clovis Municipal Airport-Royalty:...
, who united all the Franks of Neustria
Neustria
The territory of Neustria or Neustrasia, meaning "new [western] land", originated in 511, made up of the regions from Aquitaine to the English Channel, approximating most of the north of present-day France, with Paris and Soissons as its main cities...
making a capital at Paris
Paris
Paris is the capital and largest city in France, situated on the river Seine, in northern France, at the heart of the Île-de-France region...
. By that time the Salians extended south to the Loire
Loire
Loire is an administrative department in the east-central part of France occupying the River Loire's upper reaches.-History:Loire was created in 1793 when after just 3½ years the young Rhône-et-Loire department was split into two. This was a response to counter-Revolutionary activities in Lyon...
, where they reached the border of the then Basque
Basque
Basque may refer to:* The Basque language* The Basque people* A type of clothing:**A short basque; see torsolette**An old basque; see basque See also:* List of Basques...
country of Aquitania
Aquitania
Aquitania may refer to:* the territory of the Aquitani, a people living in Roman times in what is now Aquitaine, France* Aquitaine, a region of France roughly between the Pyrenees, the Atlantic ocean and the Garonne, also a former kingdom and duchy...
. Their leadership had descended to the Merovingian family, hereditary kings first of the Salian Franks, then of all the Franks, of whom Clovis was king. According to his chronicler, or quasi-chronicler, Gregory of Tours
Gregory of Tours
Saint Gregory of Tours was a Gallo-Roman historian and Bishop of Tours, which made him a leading prelate of Gaul. He was born Georgius Florentius, later adding the name Gregorius in honour of his maternal great-grandfather...
, in Historia Francorum, he subjected the previously independent Ripuarians. Some detective work is required to locate the Ripuarians in his sparse entries of the chronicle.
Gregory says "after the death of Theudebald
Theudebald
Theudebald or Theodebald , son of Theudebert I and Deuteria, was the king of Metz, Rheims, or Austrasia—as it's variously called—from 547 or 548 to 555.He was only thirteen years of age when he succeeded and of ill health...
(ca. 555), Lothar took over the lands of the Ripuarian Franks." Evidently Theudebald had possessed them. He was the son of Theudebert
Theudebert
Theudebert is a Germanic dithematic name, composed from the elements theo- "people" and bert "bright".The name is attested primarily in the German Middle Ages...
, who was the son of Theuderic,, a son of Clovis,, as was Lothar. Clovis (died 511) had left his kingdom to his four sons, Theuderic, Chlodomer, Childebert and Lothar. Part of that inheritance was the country of the Ripuarian Franks. The fact that it was attacked by Saxons, who entered it from their own country and "laid waste as far as the city of Deutz," the originally Frankish part of the Roman city of Cologne
Cologne
Cologne is Germany's fourth-largest city , and is the largest city both in the Germany Federal State of North Rhine-Westphalia and within the Rhine-Ruhr Metropolitan Area, one of the major European metropolitan areas with more than ten million inhabitants.Cologne is located on both sides of the...
, identifies it at least in part as the country around Cologne. The latter had been built as an emporium with the Germans, located logically at Deutz (Deutsch).
After the death of Lothar (561) his four sons inherited the kingdom jointly. Sigibert received the share formerly Theuderic's (the Ripuarii) and set up a capital at Rheims. Presumably, the Ripuarians at that time occupied the country between Cologne and Rheims, both banks of the Rhine, as they had been attacked from well north of the Rhine.
Etymology
The name Ripuarian, and variants Ripaurii and Riparii, may have come from the Roman word ripa, (Latin for "river bank"), to mean people from the Rhine according to Perry. Generally Ripuarian refers to a people river-dwelling along the Rhine, and would be used to differentiate them from the Salian FranksSalian Franks
The Salian Franks or Salii were a subgroup of the early Franks who originally had been living north of the limes in the area above the Rhine. The Merovingian kings responsible for the conquest of Gaul were Salians. From the 3rd century on, the Salian Franks appear in the historical records as...
(the Franks of the Sal, the IJssel River
IJssel
River IJssel , sometimes called Gelderse IJssel to avoid confusion with its Hollandse IJssel namesake in the west of the Netherlands, is a branch of the Rhine in the Dutch provinces of Gelderland and Overijssel...
, or the Franks of the salty sea.)
History
The people who came to be known as the Ripuarians probably composed the Frankish army that was defeated by Emperor MaximianMaximian
Maximian was Roman Emperor from 286 to 305. He was Caesar from 285 to 286, then Augustus from 286 to 305. He shared the latter title with his co-emperor and superior, Diocletian, whose political brain complemented Maximian's military brawn. Maximian established his residence at Trier but spent...
(250-310) in the battle at Treves
Trèves
-France:Trèves is the name or part of the name of several communes in France:* Trèves, in the Rhône department* Trèves, in the Gard department* Trèves, former commune of the Maine-et-Loire department, now part of Chênehutte-Trèves-Cunault...
. They began to populate the regions of Andernach
Andernach
Andernach is a town in the district of Mayen-Koblenz, in Rhineland-Palatinate, Germany, of currently about 30,000 inhabitants. It is situated towards the end of the Neuwied basin on the left bank of the Rhine between the former tiny fishing village of Fornich in the north and the mouth of the...
down the Rhine through the 5th Century and took possession of Cologne
Cologne
Cologne is Germany's fourth-largest city , and is the largest city both in the Germany Federal State of North Rhine-Westphalia and within the Rhine-Ruhr Metropolitan Area, one of the major European metropolitan areas with more than ten million inhabitants.Cologne is located on both sides of the...
, where they held the left banks of the Rhine in the area known as Germania Secunda
Germania Secunda
In the early fourth-century Notitia Dignitatum, Germania Secunda , situated along the Lower Rhine and administered by a Consularis, was the name under the Dominate of Germania Inferior, a military border territory which had been established under the Flavian reorganization of the Roman Empire, out...
. They also spread into Belgica Secunda as far south as the Moselle River
Moselle River
The Moselle is a river flowing through France, Luxembourg, and Germany. It is a left tributary of the Rhine, joining the Rhine at Koblenz. A small part of Belgium is also drained by the Mosel through the Our....
, although without taking the City of Treves.
Earliest known Franks
One of the key documents in identifying the earliest known Franks is the Tabula PeutingerianaTabula Peutingeriana
The Tabula Peutingeriana is an itinerarium showing the cursus publicus, the road network in the Roman Empire. The original map of which this is a unique copy was last revised in the fourth or early fifth century. It covers Europe, parts of Asia and North Africa...
, a 13th century copy of a Roman road map (or perhaps chart) from a 4th or 5th century original reflecting information from the 3rd century. The northermost limit of the empire depicted there is the right bank of the Rhine. North of it is the ocean. The Romans were well aware from their geographers of the rough outline of Europe; however, the chart was only a practical guide to the roads, to be followed from point to point.
The date of the information is only known through internal evidence; i.e., the disposition of the geopolitical terrain. As this disposition has been the topic of extensive scholarly debate the estimated date varies by a few critical centuries. The information may well be the earliest; if not, the 238 of the Augustan History must stand.
In the middle Rhine region is the word Francia followed upstream by a misspelling of Bructeri
Bructeri
The Bructeri were a Germanic tribe located in northwestern Germany , between the Lippe and Ems rivers south of the Teutoburg Forest, in present-day North Rhine-Westphalia around 100 BC through 350 AD....
. Bonnae (Bonne
Bonne
Bonne can refer to:* Bonne Bay* Bonne Bell* Bonne Nouvelle * Bonne nuit ma chérie* Bonne Terre, Missouri* Bonne of Artois* Bonne of Berry* Bonne of Bohemia* Bonne of Bourbon* Bonne projection* Bonne, Haute-Savoie...
) is in their territory, but Moguntiaco (Mainz
Mainz
Mainz under the Holy Roman Empire, and previously was a Roman fort city which commanded the west bank of the Rhine and formed part of the northernmost frontier of the Roman Empire...
) is further upstream. Beyond Mainz is Suevia, country of the Suebi
Suebi
The Suebi or Suevi were a group of Germanic peoples who were first mentioned by Julius Caesar in connection with Ariovistus' campaign, c...
, and beyond them Alamannia, country of another confederacy, the Alamanni
Alamanni
The Alamanni, Allemanni, or Alemanni were originally an alliance of Germanic tribes located around the upper Rhine river . One of the earliest references to them is the cognomen Alamannicus assumed by Roman Emperor Caracalla, who ruled the Roman Empire from 211 to 217 and claimed thereby to be...
. More follow. Agripina (Cologne
Cologne
Cologne is Germany's fourth-largest city , and is the largest city both in the Germany Federal State of North Rhine-Westphalia and within the Rhine-Ruhr Metropolitan Area, one of the major European metropolitan areas with more than ten million inhabitants.Cologne is located on both sides of the...
} is between the Bructeri and Francia. Downstream after a gap are four tribes at the mouth of the Rhine: Chauci
Chauci
The Chauci were an ancient Germanic tribe living in the low-lying region between the Rivers Ems and Elbe, on both sides of the Weser and ranging as far inland as the upper Weser. Along the coast they lived on artificial hills called terpen, built high enough to remain dry during the highest tide...
, Amsivarii
Ampsivarii
The Ampsivarii, sometimes referenced by modern writers as Ampsivari , were a Germanic tribe mentioned by ancient authors....
("Ems dwellers"), Cherusci
Cherusci
The Cherusci were a Germanic tribe that inhabited parts of the northern Rhine valley and the plains and forests of northwestern Germany, in the area between present-day Osnabrück and Hanover, during the 1st century BC and 1st century AD...
and Chamavi
Chamavi
The Chamavi were a Germanic tribe of Late Antiquity and the European Dark Age. They first appear under that name in the 1st century AD Germania of Tacitus as a Germanic tribe that, for most of their history, existed along the North bank of the Lower Rhine in the region today called Hamaland after...
, followed by qui et Pranci, "who are also Franks."
Ultimately the tabula was probably based on the Orbis Pictus, a map of 20 years' labor commissioned by Augustus
Augustus
Augustus ;23 September 63 BC – 19 August AD 14) is considered the first emperor of the Roman Empire, which he ruled alone from 27 BC until his death in 14 AD.The dates of his rule are contemporary dates; Augustus lived under two calendars, the Roman Republican until 45 BC, and the Julian...
and kept locked away in the Roman Treasury Department for assessment of taxes. It did not survive as such. Some of the data probably derives from it, such as the early imperial divisions of Gaul. A number of configurations specific to early imperial Rome can be cited, but in general none of the tribes and confederacies are depicted on the left bank of the Rhine, which places them at least as early as the 3rd century. The Alamanni first appeared on the Danube River in the reign of Caracalla
Caracalla
Caracalla , was Roman emperor from 198 to 217. The eldest son of Septimius Severus, he ruled jointly with his younger brother Geta until he murdered the latter in 211...
, ca. 211, but no Goths
Goths
The Goths were an East Germanic tribe of Scandinavian origin whose two branches, the Visigoths and the Ostrogoths, played an important role in the fall of the Roman Empire and the emergence of Medieval Europe....
appear there, suggesting a date of 211-221, the year before the reign of Alexander Severus
Alexander Severus
Severus Alexander was Roman Emperor from 222 to 235. Alexander was the last emperor of the Severan dynasty. He succeeded his cousin Elagabalus upon the latter's assassination in 222, and was ultimately assassinated himself, marking the epoch event for the Crisis of the Third Century — nearly fifty...
, when they are known to have been on the Danube.
Loss of sovereignity
Without naming the people as Ripuarian, but referring to Cologne and its vicinity, Gregory explains how they voluntarily gave up their sovereignity to Clovis. Gregory evidences a certain dualism. Acts that he finds reprehensible when committed by other Franks, when practiced by Clovis to spread the authority of the Catholic Church, are saintly.The region of Cologne was under the rule of Sigobert the Lame
Sigobert the Lame
Sigobert the Lame was a king of the Franks in the area of Zülpich and Cologne.He was presumably wounded at the knee at the Battle of Tolbiac against the Alamanni....
, an old campaigner who had fought side by side with Clovis in the wars against the Alamanni
Alamanni
The Alamanni, Allemanni, or Alemanni were originally an alliance of Germanic tribes located around the upper Rhine river . One of the earliest references to them is the cognomen Alamannicus assumed by Roman Emperor Caracalla, who ruled the Roman Empire from 211 to 217 and claimed thereby to be...
. He was called "the lame" because of a wound he had received at the Battle of Tolbiac
Battle of Tolbiac
The Battle of Tolbiac was fought between the Franks under Clovis I and the Alamanni, traditionally set in 496. The site of "Tolbiac", or "Tulpiacum" is usually given as Zülpich, North Rhine-Westphalia, about 60km east of the present German-Belgian frontier, which is not implausible...
, 496, the same year as Clovis' conversion to Catholicism. Clovis believed he had won by calling on the name of Christ and now had a mandate from God to Christianize all Neustria
Neustria
The territory of Neustria or Neustrasia, meaning "new [western] land", originated in 511, made up of the regions from Aquitaine to the English Channel, approximating most of the north of present-day France, with Paris and Soissons as its main cities...
. This was a long process not free from resistance.
In 509 he sent a messenger to Chloderic to state that if his father, Sigobert, were to die, he, Clovis, would ally himself to Chloderic. Whatever Clovis may have meant, as Sigobert was sleeping at noon in his tent in the forest across the Rhine from Cologne after a walk, Chloderic's hired assassins killed him. Chloderic sent to Clovis offering some of Sigobert's treasury as enticement. Clovis sent messengers refusing the treasure but asked to see it. Complying with their request to sink his arms into it so that they could see how deep it was, he was dispatched by the blow of an axe, unable to defend himself.
Arriving in person Clovis assembled the citizens of Cologne, denied the murders, saying "It is not for me to shed the blood of one of my fellow kings, for that is a crime ...." He advised them to place themselves under his protection, after which he was shouted into office by a voice vote and raised up on their shields in a ceremony of installation. Thus the independent kingdom of the Ripuarian Franks was voted out of existence by the people at a single assembly in 509.
Ripuarian laws
In the first half of the 7th century the Ripuarians received the Ripuarian law (Lex RipuariaLex Ripuaria
The Lex Ripuaria is a 7th century collection of Germanic law, the laws of the Ripuarian Franks. It is a major influence on the Lex Saxonum of AD 802...
), a law code applying only to them, from the dominating Salian Franks. The Salians, following the custom of the Romans before them, were mainly re-authorizing laws already in use by the Ripuarians, so that the latter could retain their local constitution.