The Historians' History of the World 07 [The History of the Later Roman Empire]

A Lombard King

The insolent disregard which this man showed for the feelings and wishes of the most powerful Neustrians, induced many of them to make common cause with Pepin, to whom they are said to have bound themselves by hostages. In 687 A.D. Pepin was strong enough to assume the offensive; and, yielding to the entreaties of the Neustrian refugees, he sent an embassy to Thierry III to demand the restoration of the exiles to their confiscated lands. The king of Neustria, prompted by Berchar, his major-domus, haughtily replied that he would come himself and fetch his runaway slaves. Pepin then prepared for war, with the unanimous consent of the Austrasian seigneurs, whose wishes he scrupulously consulted. Marching through the Silva Carbonaria he entered the Neustrian territory, and took post at Textri (Testry) on the river Somme. Thierry and Berchar also collected a large army and marched to meet the invaders. The two armies encamped in sight of each other near the village of Textri, on opposite sides of the little river Daumignon, the Neustrians on the southern and the Austrasians on the northern bank. Whether from policy or a higher motive, Pepin displayed great unwillingness, even then, to bring the matter to extremities; and, sending emissaries into the camp of Thierry, he once more endeavoured to negotiate; demanding, amongst other things, that the property of which the churches had been “despoiled by wicked tyrants” should be restored to them. He promised that, if his conditions of peace were accepted and the effusion of kindred blood prevented, he would give the king a large amount of silver and gold.

[687-717 A.D.]

The wise and humane reluctance of Pepin was naturally construed by Thierry and his “little-minded” mayor into fear, and distrust of his army, which was inferior to their own in numbers; a haughty answer was returned, and all negotiations were broken off. Both sides then prepared for the morrow’s battle. Pepin, having passed the night in forming his plans, crossed the river before daybreak and drew up his army to the east of Thierry’s position, that the rising sun might blind the enemy. The spies of Thierry reported that the Austrasian camp was deserted, on which the Neustrians were led out to pursue the flying foe. The mistake of the scouts was soon made clear by the vigorous onset of Pepin; and after a fierce but brief combat the Neustrians were totally defeated, and Thierry and Berchar fled from the field. The latter was slain by his own followers; the king was taken prisoner, but his life was mercifully spared.

The battle of Textri is notable in Frankish history as that in which the death-stroke was given to the Merovingian dynasty, by an ancestor of a far more glorious race of monarchs. “From this time forward,” says the chronicler Erchanbertus,y “the kings began to have only the royal name, and not the royal dignity.” A very striking picture of the Rois Fainéants has been handed down to us by Einhardu (Eginhard), in his famous biography of Charlemagne which we quote in Chapter V. “The race of the Merovingians,” he says, “from which the Franks were formerly accustomed to choose their kings, is generally considered to have ended with Chilperic; who, at the command of the Roman pontiff Stephen, was deposed, shorn of his locks, and sent into a monastery. But although the stock died out with him, it had long been entirely without life and vigour, and had no distinction beyond the empty title of king; for the authority and government were in the hands of the highest officers of the palace, who were called majores-domus, and had the entire administration of affairs. Nothing was left to the king, except that, contenting himself with the mere royal name, he was allowed to sit on the throne with long hair and unshorn beard, to play the part of a ruler, to hear the ambassadors from whatever part they might come, and at their departure to communicate to them the answers which he had been taught or even commanded to make, as if by his own authority. Besides the worthless title of king and a scanty maintenance, which the major-domus meted out according to his pleasure, the king possessed only one farm, and that by no means a lucrative one, on which he had a dwelling-house and a few servants, just sufficient to supply his most urgent necessities. Wherever he had to go, he travelled in a carriage drawn by a yoke of oxen and driven by a cowherd in rustic fashion. It was thus that he went to the palace, to the public assembly of the people, which met every year for the good of the kingdom; after which he returned home. But the whole administration of the state, and everything which had to be regulated or executed, either at home or abroad, was carried on by the mayors.”