FRANKS, King Chilperic Soissons I

Abt 530 - 584  (54 years)  Submit Photo / Document

 Set As Default Person

• Name	FRANKS, Chilperic Soissons
  Prefix	King
  Suffix	I
  Birth	Abt 530	Soissons, Aisne, Picardie, France
  Gender	Male
  _TAG	Reviewed on FS
  _TAG	Temple
  Death	9 Sep 584	St Vincent Abbey, Paris, Ile-de-France, FRANCE
  Burial	Oct 584	St. Vincent Abbey, Paris, Ville-de-Paris, France
  Headstones	Submit Headstone Photo
  Person ID	I42748	Joseph Smith Sr and Lucy Mack Smith
  Last Modified	19 Aug 2021

  
  

  Father	MEROVING, King Clotaire I ,   b. 497, Rheims, Marne, Loire-Alantique, France Rheims, Marne, Loire-Alantique, Franced. 23 Nov 561, Braine, Loire-Alantique, France (Age 64 years)
  Mother	INGONDE, Queen Waltrude ,   b. Abt 495, Thuringia, Germany Thuringia, Germanyd. DECEASED
  Marriage	France
  Family ID	F22968	Group Sheet  |  Family Chart

  
  

  Family	FRANKS, Queen Audouère ,   b. 525, Paris, Seine, France Paris, Seine, Franced. 580, Paris, Seine, Île-de-France, France (Age 55 years)
  Marriage	Abt 541
  Children	2 sons and 3 daughters
  1. FRANCE, Prince Theodebert ,   b. Abt 542, Soissons, Aisne, France Soissons, Aisne, Franced. 575, France (Age 33 years)   2. FRANCE, Prince Clovis ,   b. Abt 544, Soissons, Aisne, France Soissons, Aisne, Franced. 580, St Vincent Abbey, Paris, Seine, France (Age 36 years)   3. FRANCE, Princess Childesinde ,   b. Abt 551, Soissons, Aisne, France Soissons, Aisne, Franced. DECEASED   4. FRANKS, Princess Rigonte ,   b. Abt 555, Paris, Seine, France Paris, Seine, Franced. DECEASED   5. MEROVINGIAN, Richilde ,   b. 577, Paris, Île-de-France, France Paris, Île-de-France, Franced. 589, Paris, Île-de-France, France (Age 12 years)
  Family ID	F17832	Group Sheet  |  Family Chart
  Last Modified	24 Jan 2022

  
  

• Photos

  At least one living or private individual is linked to this item - Details withheld.

  
  

• Notes

  Immediately after the death of his father in 561, he endeavoured to take possession of the whole kingdom, seized the treasure amassed in the royal town of Berny and entered Paris. His brothers, however, compelled him to divide the kingdom with them, and Soissons, together with Amiens, Arras, Cambrai, Thérouanne, Tournai, and Boulogne fell to Chilperic's share. His eldest brother Charibert received Paris, the second eldest brother Guntram received Burgundy with its capital at Orléans, and Sigebert received Austrasia. On the death of Charibert in 567, his estates were augmented when the brothers divided Charibert's kingdom among themselves and agreed to share Paris. Not long after his accession, however, he was at war with Sigebert, with whom he would long remain in a state of—at the very least—antipathy. Sigebert defeated him and marched to Soissons, where he defeated and imprisoned Chilperic's eldest son, Theudebert. The war flared in 567, at the death of Charibert. Chilperic immediately invaded Sigebert's new lands, but Sigebert defeated him. Chilperic later allied with Guntram against Sigebert (573), but Guntram changed sides and Chilperic again lost the war. When Sigebert married Brunhilda, daughter of the Visigothic sovereign in Spain (Athanagild), Chilperic also wished to make a brilliant marriage. He had already repudiated his first wife, Audovera, and had taken as his concubine a serving-woman called Fredegund. He accordingly dismissed Fredegund, and married Brunhilda's sister, Galswintha. But he soon tired of his new partner, and one morning Galswintha was found strangled in her bed. A few days afterwards Chilperic married Fredegund. This murder was the cause of more long and bloody wars, interspersed with truces, between Chilperic and Sigebert. In 575, Sigebert was assassinated by Fredegund at the very moment when he had Chilperic at his mercy. Chilperic then made war with the protector of Sigebert's wife and son, Guntram. Chilperic retrieved his position, took from Austrasia Tours and Poitiers and some places in Aquitaine, and fostered discord in the kingdom of the east during the minority of Childebert II. In 578, Chilperic sent an army to fight the Breton ruler Waroch II of the Bro-Wened along the Vilaine. The Frankish army consisted of units from the Poitou, Touraine, Anjou, Maine, and Bayeux. The Baiocassenses (men from Bayeux) were Saxons and they in particular were routed by the Bretons.[1] The armies fought for three days before Waroch submitted, did homage for Vannes, sent his son as a hostage, and agreed to pay an annual tribute. He subsequently broke his oath but Chilperic's dominion over the Bretons was relatively secure, as evidenced by Venantius Fortunatus's celebration of it in a poem. Most of what is known of Chilperic comes from The History of the Franks by Gregory of Tours. Gregory detested Chilperic, calling him "the Nero and Herod of his time" (VI.46): he had provoked Gregory's wrath by wresting Tours from Austrasia, seizing ecclesiastical property, and appointing as bishops counts of the palace who were not clerics. Gregory also objected to Chilperic's attempts to teach a new doctrine of the Trinity.[2] Chilperic's reign in Neustria saw the introduction of the Byzantine punishment of eye-gouging. Yet, he was also a man of culture: he was a musician of some talent, and he wrote verse (modelled on that of Sedulius); he attempted to reform the Frankish alphabet; and he worked to reduce the worst effects of Salic law upon women. In September 584, while returning from a hunting expedition to his royal villa of Chelles, Chilperic was stabbed to death by an unknown assailant.