Franks

In 451 AD Frankish groups participated on both sides in the Battle of the Catalaunian Plains, where Attila and his allies were defeated by a Roman-led alliance of most of the various peoples who now lived in Gaul.

In various historical contexts, such as during the medieval crusades, not only the French, but also people from neighbouring regions in Western Europe, continued to be referred to collectively as Franks.

For example, Eumenius rhetorically addressed the Franks when Frankish prisoners were executed in the area at Trier by Constantine I in 306: Ubi nunc est illa ferocia?

However, in more international contexts such as during the crusades in the Eastern Mediterranean, the term Frank was also used for any Europeans from Western and Central Europe, that followed the Latin rites of Christianity under the authority of the pope in Rome.

[13] On the other hand, concerning the Trojan element in the Frankish origin stories, historian Patrick J. Geary has for example written that they are "alike in betraying both the fact that the Franks knew little about their background and that they may have felt some inferiority in comparison with other peoples of antiquity who possessed an ancient name and glorious tradition.

Roymans and Heeren proposed that one possible explanation for such a sudden depopulation is that the Roman emperors Maximian and Constantius Chlorus deported very large numbers of locals (and not only immigrants) out of the region.

[26] During this period, the 260s, archaeologists also note an increase in coin hoards in populations on the Roman side the Rhine, in Tongeren, Amiens, Beauvais, Trier, Metz, Toul, and Chalon-sur-Saône attesting to Frankish activity in this region.

[25] In 275/76, after the death of Tetricus and the reunification of the empire under Probus (reigned 276-282) archaeologists believe that a larger incursion into Gaul occurred, with the main thrust seemingly along the Meuse.

Taken in combination with the 10th panegyric 289 AD, these records indicate that in the winter of 287/288 Maximian, based in Trier at this time, forced a Frankish king Genobaud and his people to become Roman clients.

[44][45] Roman texts of the third and fourth centuries describe Franks being settled in many areas of Gaul both as semi-free colonists who had to provide soldiers (laeti) and as conquered dediticii with no rights of citizenship.

The reason for this was primarily that he needed to ensure the arrival of 600 grain carrying ships coming up the rivers from Britain, and he preferred not to simply pay the tribes off, as previous administrators had been doing.

[43] Similar accounts are given by Julian himself in his letter to the Athenians, Ammianus Marcellinus who served under him,[47] Libanius who wrote his funeral oration, and the later Greek historians Eunapius and Zosimus.

Despite these differences in terminology, Zosimus and Eunapius both remark how the barbarian Charietto was brought from Trier to neutralize this group's raiding, and how Julian captured the son of their king.

The Burgundians, who had been living south of the Franks in the Rhine area for more than a century, took control of some of the main Roman cities within the empire, Worms, Speyer, and Strassburg.

From his base in Pannonia and the Middle Danube, Attila and his allies launched a major invasion into Gaul, where they were defeated by a Roman led alliance under the command of Flavius Aetius at the Battle of the Catalaunian Plains in 451 AD.

This new type of kingship, perhaps inspired by Alaric I,[60] represents the start of the Merovingian dynasty which succeeded in conquering most of Gaul in the 6th century, as well as establishing its leadership over all the Frankish kingdoms on the Rhine frontier.

The Frankish realm was reunited in 613 by Chlothar II, the son of Chilperic, who granted his nobles the Edict of Paris in an effort to reduce corruption and reassert his authority.

Following the military successes of his son and successor Dagobert I, royal authority rapidly declined under a series of kings, traditionally known as les rois fainéants.

Writing of 539, Procopius says: At this time the Franks, hearing that both the Goths and Romans had suffered severely by the war ... forgetting for the moment their oaths and treaties ... (for this nation in matters of trust is the most treacherous in the world), they straightway gathered to the number of one hundred thousand under the leadership of Theudebert I and marched into Italy: they had a small body of cavalry about their leader, and these were the only ones armed with spears, while all the rest were foot soldiers having neither bows nor spears, but each man carried a sword and shield and one axe.

The Lex Ribuaria specifies that a mare's value was the same as that of an ox or of a shield and spear, two solidi and a stallion seven or the same as a sword and scabbard,[66] which suggests that horses were relatively common.

The peoples east of the Rhine – Franks, Saxons and even Wends – who were sometimes called upon to serve, wore rudimentary armour and carried weapons such as spears and axes.

The Franks called annual meetings every Marchfeld (1 March), when the king and his nobles assembled in large open fields and determined their targets for the next campaigning season.

[76] Frankish influence is thought to include the designations of the four cardinal directions: nord "north", sud "south", est "east" and ouest "west" and at least an additional 1000 stem words.

Such Frankish objects show a greater use of the style and motifs of Late Antiquity and a lesser degree of skill and sophistication in design and manufacture than comparable works from the British Isles.

The main surviving monument of Carolingian architecture is the Palatine Chapel in Aachen, which is an impressive and confident adaptation of San Vitale, Ravenna – from where some of the pillars were brought.

[90] The Church sometimes had an uneasy relationship with the Merovingian kings, whose claim to rule depended on a mystique of royal descent and who tended to revert to the polygamy of their pagan ancestors.

The term Frangistan ("Land of the Franks") was used by Muslims to refer to Christian Europe and was commonly used over several centuries in Iberia, North Africa, and the Middle East.

During the reign of Chingtih (Zhengde) (1506), foreigners from the west called Fah-lan-ki (or Franks), who said they had tribute, abruptly entered the Bogue, and by their tremendously loud guns shook the place far and near.

For example, in Khmer, môn barang, literally "French Chicken", refers to a turkey and in Thai, Farang is the name both for Europeans and for the guava fruit, introduced by Portuguese traders over 400 years ago.

In contemporary Israel, the Yiddish[citation needed] word פרענק (Frenk) has, by a curious etymological development, come to refer to Mizrahi Jews in Modern Hebrew and carries a strong pejorative connotation.