Ripuarian Franks - Geography of Origins

Geography of Origins

The confederacy of the Germanic Franks came into being for certain in the early 3rd century among the tribes of the right bank of the Rhine: the Sicambri, Chamavi, Bructeri, Chatti, Chattuarii, Ampsivarii, Tencteri and Ubii. At the time they were being submerged in a new identity, the Franks, which superseded and took precedence over the older tribes. Tacitus had said of them as tribesmen:

"The Germans have no taste for peace; renown is easier won among perils, and you cannot maintain a large body of companions except by violence and war."

Julius Caesar offered a similar opinion over a century earlier:

"No disgrace attaches to armed robbery, provided it is committed outside the frontiers of the tribe ....When one of the chiefs announces at an assembly that he is going to lead a raid, and calls for volunteers, ... those who agree with the raid and approve of the men proposing it stand up ....If any of those men then fail to go with him, they are regarded as deserters and traitors and no one ever trusts them again in anything."

These independent Franks of the right bank seem to have typified those earlier views. With the assistance of tribes already on the left bank they crossed the Rhine frequently to establish bases there from which they raided to the south by sea and land. The Romans eventually bought peace by exchanging freedom to settle on the left bank for cooperation in maintaining the peace. Many of these Franks rose to high office in the empire. Also they became politically distinct according to the regions entrusted to their occupation and guardianship: the Salii, or "maritime people," and the Ripuarii, or "river people."

Apart from mention of some unknown Riparii by Jordanes in Getica who fought as auxiliaries of Flavius Aetius in the Battle of Chalons, 451, the first mention of the Ripuarii comes from Gregory of Tours, in Historia Francorum. He says that Clovis, first king of all the Franks and first king to convert to Christianity, subjected the previously independent Ripuarians. Some detective work is required to locate the Ripuarians in his sparse entries of the chronicle.

Gregory says "after the death of Theudebald (ca. 555), Lothar took over the lands of the Ripuarian Franks." Evidently Theudebald had possessed them. He was the son of Theudebert, who was the son of Theuderic, a son of Clovis, as was Lothar. Clovis (died 511) had left his kingdom to his four sons, Theuderic, Chlodomer, Childebert and Lothar. Part of that inheritance was the country of the Ripuarian Franks. The fact that it was attacked by Saxons, who entered it from their own country and "laid waste as far as the city of Deutz," the originally Frankish part of the Roman city of Cologne, identifies it at least in part as the country around Cologne. The latter had been built as an emporium with the Germans, located logically at Deutz (Deutsch).

After the death of Lothar (561) his four sons inherited the kingdom jointly. Sigibert received the share formerly Theuderic's (the Ripuarii) and set up a capital at Rheims. Presumably, the Ripuarians at that time occupied the country between Cologne and Rheims, both banks of the Rhine, as they had been attacked from well north of the Rhine.