ringlets on their back and shoulders; while the rest of the nation were obliged, either by law or custom, to shave the hinder part of their head, to comb their hair over the forehead, and to content themselves with the ornament of two small whiskers. 18 The lofty stature of the Franks, and their blue eyes, denoted a Germanic origin; their close apparel accurately expressed the figure of their limbs; a weighty sword was suspended from a broad belt; their bodies were protected by a large shield; and these warlike Barbarians were trained, from their earliest youth, to run, to leap, to swim; to dart the javelin or battle-axe with unerring aim; to advance, without hesitation, against a superior enemy; and to maintain, either in life or death, the invincible reputation of their ancestors.19 Clodion, the first of the long-haired kings whose name and actions are mentioned in authentic history, held his residence at Dispargum,20 a village or fortress whose place may be assigned between Louvain and Brussels. From the report of his spies the king of the Franks was informed that the defenceless state of the second Belgic must yield, on the slightest attack, to the valour of his subjects. He boldly penetrated through the thickets and morasses of the Carbonarian forest; 21 occupied [CameraTournay and Cambray, the only cities which existed in the nacum) fifth century; and extended his conquests as far as the river Somme, over a desolate country, whose cultivation and populousness are the effects of more recent industry." 22 While 18 Cæsaries prolixa . . . crinium flagellis per terga dimissis, &c. See the Preface to the third volume of the Historians of France, and the Abbé Le Bœuf (Dissertat. tom. iii. p. 47-79). This peculiar fashion of the Merovingians has been remarked by natives and strangers; by Priscus (tom. i. p. 608), by Agathias (tom. ii. p. 49 [i. c. 3]) and by Gregory of Tours, 1. iii. 18, vi. 24, viii. 10, tom. ii. p. 196, 278, 316. [For the short hair of the other Franks cp. Claudian's detonsa Sigambria (in Eutr. i. 383) and Sidon. Apoll. Epist. 8, 9.] 19 See an original picture of the figure, dress, arms, and temper of the ancient Franks in Sidonius Apollinaris (Panegyr. Majorian. 238-254); and such pictures, though coarsely drawn, have a real and intrinsic value. Father Daniel (Hist. de la Milice Françoise, tom. i. p. 2-7) has illustrated the description. 20 Dubos, Hist. Critique, &c. tom. i. p. 271, 272. Some geographers have placed Dispargum on the German side of the Rhine. See a note of the Benedictine Editors to the Historians of France, tom. ii. p. 166. [Greg. ii. 9 (p. 77, ed. M. G. H.). The site of Dispargum is uncertain. Cp. Longnon, Géogr. de la Gaule, p. 619. Some identify it with Duisburg.] 21 The Carbonarian wood was that part of the great forest of the Ardennes, which lay between the Escaut, or Scheld, and the Meuse. Vales. Notit. Gall. p. 126. [Cp. Longnon, op. cit. p. 154.] Gregor. Turon. 1. ii. c. 9, in tom. ii. p. 166, 167. Fredegar. Epitom. c. 9, p. 395. Gesta Reg. Francor. c. 5, in tom. ii. p. 544. Vit. St. Remig. ab Hincmar, in tom. iii. p. 373. cum, Tor Clodion lay encamped in the plains of Artois, and celebrated with vain and ostentatious security the marriage, perhaps, of his son, the nuptial feast was interrupted by the unexpected and unwelcome presence of Aetius, who had passed the Somme at the head of his light cavalry. The tables, which had been spread under the shelter of a hill, along the banks of a pleasant stream, were rudely overturned; the Franks were oppressed before they could recover their arms, or their ranks; and their unavailing valour was fatal only to themselves. The loaded waggons which had followed their march afforded a rich booty; and the virgin bride, with her female attendants, submitted to the new lovers who were imposed on them by the chance of war. This advantage, which had been obtained by the skill and activity of Aetius, might reflect some disgrace on the military prudence of Clodion; but the king of the Franks soon regained his strength and reputation, and still maintained the possession of his Gallic kingdom from the Rhine to the Somme.24 Under his reign, and most probably from the enterprising spirit of his subjects, the three capitals, Mentz, Treves, and Cologne, experienced the effects of hostile cruelty and avarice. The distress of Cologne was prolonged by the perpetual dominion of the same Barbarians, who evacuated the ruins of Treves; and Treves, which, in the space of forty years, had been four times besieged and pillaged, was disposed to lose the memory of her afflictions in the vain amusements of the circus.* The death of Clodion, after a reign of twenty years, exposed his kingdom to the discord and ambition of his two sons. Meroveus, the younger," was persuaded to implore the protection of 23 Francus qua Cloio patentes Panegyr. Majorian. 212. The precise spot was a town or village called Vicus Helena [ib. 215]; and both the name and the place are discovered by modern geographers at Lens. [Longnon suggests Hélenne. Sirmond sought the place at Vieil-Hesdin.] See Vales. Notit. Gall. p. 246. Longuerue, Description de la France, tom. ii. p. 88. 24 See a vague account of the action in Sidonius, Panegyr. Majorian. 212-230. The French critics, impatient to establish their monarchy in Gaul, have drawn a strong argument from the silence of Sidonius, who dares not insinuate that the vanquished Franks were compelled to repass the Rhine. Dubos, tom. i. p. 322. Salvian (de Gubernat. Dei, 1. vi.) has expressed, in vague and declamatory language, the misfortunes of these three cities, which are distinctly ascertained by the learned Mascou, Hist. of the Ancient Germans, ix. 21. 26 Priscus, in relating the contest, does not name the two brothers; the second of whom he had seen at Rome, a beardless youth, with long flowing hair (Histo rians of France, tom. i. p. 607, 608). The Benedictine Editors are inclined Rome; he was received at the Imperial court as the ally of Valentinian and the adopted son of the patrician Aetius; and dismissed to his native country with splendid gifts and the strongest assurances of friendship and support. During his absence, his elder brother had solicited, with equal ardour, the formidable aid of Attila; and the king of the Huns embraced an alliance which facilitated the passage of the Rhine and justified, by a specious and honourable pretence, the invasion of Gaul.27 tures of the Honoria 418] When Attila declared his resolution of supporting the cause The advenof his allies, the Vandals and the Franks, at the same time, and princess almost in the spirit of romantic chivalry, the savage monarch professed himself the lover and the champion of the princess Honoria. The sister of Valentinian was educated in the palace [Born A.D. of Ravenna; and, as her marriage might be productive of some danger to the state, she was raised, by the title of Augusta, 28 above the hopes of the most presumptuous subject. But the fair Honoria had no sooner attained the sixteenth year of her age than she detested the importunate greatness which must for ever exclude her from the comforts of honourable love; in the midst of vain and unsatisfactory pomp, Honoria sighed, yielded [A.D. 434] to the impulse of nature, and threw herself into the arms of her chamberlain Eugenius. Her guilt and shame (such is the absurd language of imperious man) were soon betrayed by the appearances of pregnancy; but the disgrace of the royal family was published to the world by the imprudence of the empress Placidia; who dismissed her daughter, after a strict and shameful confinement, to a remote exile at Constantinople. The unhappy princess passed twelve or fourteen years in the irksome society of the sisters of Theodosius, and their chosen to believe that they were the sons of some unknown king of the Franks who reigned on the banks of the Necker; but the arguments of M. de Foncemagne (Mém. de l'Académie, tom. viii. p. 464) seem to prove that the succession of Clodion was disputed by his two sons, and that the younger was Meroveus, the father of Childeric. [Of Merovech, Gregory says merely that, according to some, he was of the race of Chlojo (de hujus stirpe).] Under the Merovingian race the throne was hereditary; but all the sons of the deceased monarch were equally entitled to their share of his treasures and territories. See the Dissertations of M. de Foncemagne in the sixth and eighth volumes of the Mémoires de l'Académie. [Cp. Waitz, Deutsche Verfassungsgeschichte, ii. i. 139 sqq.] 28 A medal is still extant, which exhibits the pleasing countenance of Honoria, with the title of Augusta; and on the reverse the improper legend of Salus Reipublicæ round the monogram of Christ. See Ducange, Famil. Byzantin. p. 67, 73. [Obverse D.N. IvsT. GRAT. HONORIA P.F. AVG.; see Eckhel, Doctr, Num. 8, 189.] VOL. III.-31 virgins; to whose crown Honoria could no longer aspire, and whose monastic assiduity of prayer, fasting, and vigils, she reluctantly imitated. Her impatience of long and hopeless celibacy urged her to embrace a strange and desperate resolution. The name of Attila was familiar and formidable at Constantinople; and his frequent embassies entertained a perpetual intercourse between his camp and the Imperial palace. In the pursuit of love, or rather of revenge, the daughter of Placidia sacrificed every duty and every prejudice; and offered to deliver her person into the arms of a Barbarian, of whose language she was ignorant, whose figure was scarcely human, and whose religion and manners she abhorred. By the ministry of a faithful eunuch, she transmitted to Attila a ring, the pledge of her affection; and earnestly conjured him to claim her as a lawful spouse, to whom he had been secretly betrothed. These indecent advances were received, however, with coldness and disdain; and the king of the Huns continued to multiply the number of his wives, till his love was awakened by the more forcible passions of ambition and avarice. The invasion [A.D. 450] of Gaul was preceded, and justified, by a formal demand of the princess Honoria, with a just and equal share of the Imperial patrimony. His predecessors, the ancient Tanjous, had often addressed, in the same hostile and peremptory manner, the daughters of China; and the pretensions of Attila were not less offensive to the majesty of Rome. A firm, but temperate, refusal was communicated to his ambassadors. The right of female succession, though it might derive a specious argument from the recent examples of Placidia and Pulcheria, was strenuously denied; and the indissoluble engagements of Honoria were opposed to the claims of her Scythian lover." On the discovery of her connexion with the king of the Huns, the guilty princess had been sent away, as an object of horror, from Constantinople to Italy; her life was spared; but the ceremony of her marriage was performed with some obscure and nominal husband, before she was immured in a perpetual prison, to bewail those crimes and misfortunes which Honoria might 29 See Priscus, p. 39, 40 [fr. 15, 16]. It might be fairly alleged that, if females could succeed to the throne, Valentinian himself, who had married the daughter and heiress of the younger Theodosius, would have asserted her right to the eastern empire. have escaped, had she not been born the daughter of an emperor.30 32 vades Gaul sieges A.D. 451 A native of Gaul and a contemporary, the learned and Attila ineloquent Sidonius, who was afterwards bishop of Clermont, had and be made a promise to one of his friends that he would compose a Orleans. regular history of the war of Attila. If the modesty of Sidonius had not discouraged him from the prosecution of this interesting work, the historian would have related, with the simplicity of truth, those memorable events to which the poet, in vague and doubtful metaphors, has concisely alluded. The kings and nations of Germany and Scythia, from the Volga perhaps to the Danube, obeyed the warlike summons of Attila. From the royal village, in the plains of Hungary, his standard moved towards the West; and, after a march of seven or eight hundred miles, he reached the conflux of the Rhine and the Necker; where he was joined by the Franks, who adhered to his ally, the [Ripuarian elder of the sons of Clodion. A troop of light Barbarians, who roamed in quest of plunder, might choose the winter for the convenience of passing the river on the ice; but the innumerable cavalry of the Huns required such plenty of forage and provisions, as could be procured only in a milder season; the Hercynian forest supplied materials for a bridge of boats; and the hostile myriads were poured, with resistless violence, into the Belgic provinces.33 The consternation of Gaul was uni 30 The adventures of Honoria are imperfectly related by Jornandes, de Successione Regn. c. 97, and de Reb. Get. c. 42, p. 674, and in the Chronicles of Prosper and Marcellinus; but they cannot be made consistent, or probable, unless we separate, by an interval of time and place, her intrigue with Eugenius and her invitation of Attila. 31 Exegeras mihi, ut promitterem tibi Attile bellum stylo me posteris intimaturum cœperam scribere, sed operis arrepti fasce perspecto tæduit inchoasse. Sidon. Apoll. 1. viii. epist. 15, p. 246. 32 -Subito cum rupta tumultu Barbaries totas in te transfuderat arctos, Gallia. Pugnacem Rugum comitante Gelono Panegyr. Avit. 319, &c. [The Bellonoti are unknown. Cp. Valer. Flaccus, vi. 160: Balloniti.] 33 The most authentic and circumstantial account of this war is contained in Jornandes (de Reb. Geticis, c. 36-41, p. 662-672), who has sometimes abridged, and sometimes transcribed, the larger history of Cassiodorius. Jornandes, a Franks] |
