Clovis I
Clovis (Latin: Chlodovechus; reconstructed Frankish: *Hlodowig;[1] c. 466 – c. 511) was the first king of the Franks to unite all of the Frankish tribesunder one ruler, changing the form of leadership from a group of royal chieftains to rule by a single king and ensuring that the kingship was passed down to his heirs.[2] He is considered to have been the founder of the Merovingian dynasty, which ruled the Frankish kingdom for the next two centuries.
Clovis was the son of Childeric I, a Merovingian king of the Salian Franks, and Basina, Queen of Thuringia, and he succeeded his father in 481, at the age of fifteen.[3] He conquered the remaining rump state of theWestern Roman Empire at the Battle of Soissons (486), and by his death in 511 he had conquered much of the northern and western parts of what had formerly been Roman Gaul.
Clovis is important in the historiography of France as "the first king of what would become France".[4] His name is Germanic, composed of the elements hlod ("fame") and wig ("combat"), and is the origin of the later French given name Louis, borne by 18 kings of France. Dutch, the most closely related modern language to Frankish, reborrowed the name asLodewijk from German in the 12th century.[5]
Clovis is also significant due to his conversion to Christianity in 496, largely at the behest of his wife, Clotilde, who would later be venerated as a saint for this act, celebrated today in both the Roman Catholic Churchand Eastern Orthodox Church. Clovis was later baptized on Christmas Day in AD 508.[6] The adoption by Clovis of Catholicism (as opposed to theArianism of some other Germanic tribes) led to widespread conversion among the Frankish peoples, to religious unification across modern-day France and Germany, and to Charlemagne's alliance with the Bishop of Rome three centuries later and the consequent birth of the early Holy Roman Empire.
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