Page:Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire vol 3 (1897).djvu/477

 OF THE ROMAN EMPIRE 455 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.-^ Under his reign, and most probably ft'om the enter- prising 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 perpet- ual 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 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 ab- sence, his elder brother had solicited, with equal ardour, the for- midable 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.-" When Attila declared his resolution of supporting the cause The a4ven- of his allies, the Vandals and the Franks, at the same time, and princess almost in the spirit of romantic chivalry, the savage monarch 2^ 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, torn. i. p. 322. 2sSalvian (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 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 Fonce- magne (M6m. de lAcad^mie, 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).] 27 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 Memoires de 1' Academic. [Cp. Waitz, Deutsche Verfassungs- geschichte, ii., i., 139 sg(f.'