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206 to England. At this time the mighty king Grimoald died, after having made sure the limits of his realm, and broken the dukes' power, in the ninth year of his reign (671). His eldest son Romuald took his place in the dukedom of Benevento, while the young boy Garibald, his son by Aripert's daughter, inherited the royal crown.

By this time Perctarit returned from his exile and dethroned his nephew Garibald with the help of his numerous followers; he and his dynasty now held the throne for more than 40 years consecutively. He made his son Cunincpert co-regent (680) and entered into friendly terms with Romuald of Benevento, whose son, the younger Grimoald, married Perctarit's daughter. In the south as well as in the north-west Catholicism gained exclusive power, and in Benevento and Pavia many foundations of cloisters spoke of a growing piety, shewn especially by the two princesses. Numerous Lombard bishops had already assisted at the Roman synod of 680; on the other hand the Three Chapters Schism lasted on in Austrasia, on the east border of the Adda, in contrast to Neustria westwards, where royalty had taken root more decidedly. The duke Alahis of Tridentum, who had extended his territory northward in the direction of the Bavarians, was too strong for Perctarit and even added the dukedom of Brescia to his own. After Perctarit's death he also occupied Pavia, drove King Cunincpert to a refuge on an isle in the Lake of Como and acted as king, acknowledged by the greater part of the north of Italy. But passing for a heretic and acting recklessly against the Church, he made an enemy of the hierarchy, and Cunincpert was soon able to return to Pavia, protected by their adherents. Between Neustria and Austria on the field of Coronate a battle was fought between them; Alahis fell, and a great part of his followers perished in the flood of the Adda. This was at once a victory of kingdom over dukedom, and orthodoxy over the Three Chapters Schism. An insurrection in Friuli was also subdued; at a synod that had been convoked at the king's request in Pavia (698 ?) even those bishops of Austrasia who were still schismatic acknowledged the fifth and sixth oecumenical councils, and thus the unity of Catholic faith was established in Lombard Italy. The only lasting effect of this schism was the division of the patriarchate of Aquileia between the bishops of Grado and of Old-Aquileia, following the civil boundaries between Lombards and Romans. Even before the Roman Church triumphed throughout the whole Lombard realm, after the Emperor Constans' attempt to reconquer what he had lost had failed, and the Bavarian dynasty's traditional policy of peace had replaced Grimoald's belligerent policy — even at that time definite peace had been made between the Empire and the Lombards, thereby placing the Lombard State amid the States which were officially acknowledged by the respublica. The acknowledgment of the status quo, the limits, which had been fixed by a hundred years of war, formed the basis of peace; and the Lombards renounced any further policy of conquest. This peace