The Historians' History of the World 07

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.”

The whole power of the three kingdoms was thus suddenly thrown into the hands of Pepin, who showed in his subsequent career that he was equal to the far more difficult task of keeping, by his wisdom and moderation, what he had gained by the vigour of his intellect and his undaunted valour. He, too, was happily free from the little vanity which takes more delight in the pomp than in the realities of power, and, provided he possessed the substantial authority, was contented to leave the royal name to others. He must have felt himself strong enough to do what his uncle Grimwald had vainly attempted, and his grandson happily accomplished; but he saw that by grasping at the shadow he might lose the substance. He was surrounded by proud and suspicious seigneurs, whose jealousy would have been more excited by his taking the title than by his exercising the powers of a king; and, strange though it may seem, the reverence for the ancient race, and the notion of their exclusive and inalienable rights, were far from being extinguished in the breasts of the common people. By keeping Thierry upon the throne and ruling in his name, he united both reason and prejudice in support of his government. Yet some approach was made, though probably not by his own desire, towards acknowledged sovereignty in the case of Pepin. He was called dux et princeps Francorum, and the years of his office were reckoned, as well as those of the king, in all public documents.