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202 once more, occupied Balneum Regis and Orvieto, but in November, 605 the imperialists obtained a new armistice at the price of paying a tribute of 12,000 solidi. From that time till Agilulf's death and even afterwards, this armistice was continually prolonged. It is true that a definite state of peace, which would have naturally led to a legal partition of the Italian soil, was not effected, though Agilulf's ambassador Stablicianus seems to have entered into negotiations on this subject in Constantinople. Agilulf died in 616 after 25 years of a warlike reign, in which he had expanded and strengthened his empire and obliged the Romans to pay tribute.

To Agilulf his son Adaloald (a minor) followed in name, but Theodelinda exercised the ruling influence on government in his place. While Authari had never allowed Lombard children Catholic baptism, a Catholic chapel had been conceded to Theodelinda at Monza and Adaloald himself was already baptized as a Catholic, though by a schismatic, and Theodelinda, who exchanged occasional letters with Pope Gregory, was schismatic in relation to the Three Chapters. In this way Agilulf had not tolerated the organisation of the Roman Church within the reach of his power, but the schismatic bishop of Aquileia and his schismatic suffragans had taken refuge with the Lombards. Agilulf had also given deserted land in the Apennines at the confluence of the torrent Bobbio and the Trebbia to the Irish monk Columba (Columbanus) who had fled from Gaul, and differed dogmatically from Rome. He also gave permission to lay the foundations of a monastery at Bobbio, but the monks soon turned to orthodoxy after Columbanus' death, and even got a privilege in 628, by which they were exempted from the power of the neighbouring bishop of Tortona. In contrast to the national chiefs, who were still Arian, the government favoured the Catholics or at least the schismatics, and in consequence Roman influence made rapid progress in the Lombard kingdom, favoured partly by the social influence of the Roman subjects, partly by the intercourse with the Roman neighbours, which the long armistices had so well prepared. Nevertheless the peace was once more broken at the beginning of Adaloald's reign between the Exarch Eleutherius and the Lombards under the commander Sundrarius, who owed his training to Agilulf, but this war was ended by another armistice, the exarch consenting to pay a tribute of 500 pounds in gold. In the following years the Roman influence on the king was so great that he was generally said to be either mad or bewitched. Perhaps it was the national party among the Lombards which raised upon the buckler Arioald, the duke of Turin, the husband of Adaloald's sister Gundeberga, and after several combats dethroned King Adaloald, who was then said to have been removed by poison (626). Arioald reigned ten years too, without much change in the course of Lombard politics. He came in conflict with his Catholic wife, who was released from prison by the intervention of the Franks