Frankish victory The Saxon Wars were the campaigns and insurrections of the thirty-three years from 772, when Charlemagne first entered Saxony with the intent to conquer, to 804, when the last rebellion of tribesmen was defeated.

Despite repeated setbacks, the Saxons resisted steadfastly, returning to raid Charlemagne's domains as soon as he turned his attention elsewhere.

It began with a Frankish invasion of Saxon territory and the subjugation of the Engrians and destruction of their sacred symbol Irminsul near Paderborn in 772 or 773 at Eresburg.

Charlemagne issued a number of decrees designed to break Saxon resistance and to inflict capital punishment on anyone observing heathen practices or disrespecting the king's peace.

His severe and uncompromising position, which earned him the title "butcher of Saxons", caused his close adviser Alcuin of York, later abbot of Marmoutier Abbey, Tours, to urge leniency, as God's word should be spread not by the sword but by persuasion; but the wars continued.

Charlemagne returned in 782 to Saxony and instituted a code of law, the Lex Frisionum, and appointed counts, both Saxon and Frank.

The Saxons invaded the area of the Chatti, a Germanic tribe already converted by Saint Boniface and firmly in Charlemagne's empire.

Upon this Blutgericht, some historians have stated the massacre did not happen, or that it was actually a battle, but according to Alessandro Barbero, none of these claims are credible.

[2] The action led to two straight years of constant warfare (783–785), with Charlemagne wintering in central Saxony, at Minden.

It was with the conclusion of this war that Charlemagne could have claimed to have conquered Saxony, and the land had peace for the next seven years, though revolts continued sporadically until 804.

Einhard, Charlemagne's biographer, said on the closing of the conflict: The war that had lasted so many years was at length ended by their acceding to the terms offered by the King; which were renunciation of their national religious customs and the worship of devils, acceptance of the sacraments of the Christian faith and religion, and union with the Franks to form one people.Towards the end of the wars, Charlemagne had begun to place more emphasis on reconciliation.

This was accompanied by the establishment of ecclesiastic structures (including bishoprics in Paderborn, Münster, Bremen, Minden, Verden and Osnabrück) that secured the conversion of the Saxon people.

Alluding to the Saxons, the contemporary poet of the Paderborn Epic praises terror as a means of conversion: "What the contrary mind and perverse soul refuse to do with persuasion, / Let them leap to accomplish when compelled by fear.