From Gaul to the Franks: Clovis and Charlemagne
A Frankish king is baptised at Reims and three centuries later Charlemagne is crowned emperor in Rome, giving France its name, its faith and its founding myths.
- The Origins of France: From Clovis to the Capetians, 500–1000 — Edward James, Macmillan (1982)
- Charlemagne — Roger Collins, Macmillan (1998)
- The Cambridge Illustrated History of France — Colin Jones, Cambridge University Press (1994)
Before there was France there was Gaul, a land of Celtic peoples conquered by Julius Caesar between 58 and 50 BCE. The defeat of the Gallic chief Vercingetorix at Alesia in 52 BCE became, much later, a patriotic legend, and five centuries of Roman rule left Latin (the root of French), roads, cities and Christianity.
- The Cambridge Illustrated History of France — Colin Jones, Cambridge University Press (1994)
- France — Encyclopaedia Britannica, Encyclopaedia Britannica
As Roman power collapsed in the fifth century, the Franks, a Germanic people from the lower Rhine, took over much of Gaul. Their king Clovis united them, defeated rivals, and was baptised a Catholic at Reims, traditionally in 496, though historians place it anywhere between about 496 and 508. Choosing Catholic rather than Arian Christianity won him the support of the Gallo-Roman bishops and population.
- The Origins of France: From Clovis to the Capetians, 500–1000 — Edward James, Macmillan (1982)
Clovis’s Merovingian dynasty was replaced by the Carolingians. Charles Martel defeated a Muslim army near Poitiers (traditionally 732), and his grandson Charlemagne built an empire stretching from the Pyrenees to the Elbe and into Italy. On Christmas Day 800, Pope Leo III crowned him emperor in Rome. His court at Aachen revived Latin learning.
- Charlemagne — Roger Collins, Macmillan (1998)
- The Origins of France: From Clovis to the Capetians, 500–1000 — Edward James, Macmillan (1982)
Charlemagne belongs to Germans as much as to French people, and when his grandsons divided the empire at Verdun in 843, the western part, West Francia, became the core of the future France.
- Charlemagne — Roger Collins, Macmillan (1998)
- The Cambridge Illustrated History of France — Colin Jones, Cambridge University Press (1994)
Why it matters today
France takes its name from the Franks, French kings were crowned at Reims for a thousand years in memory of Clovis's baptism, and Catholics still call France "the eldest daughter of the Church". At the same time, Republican schools taught generations to begin with "nos ancêtres les Gaulois", so the question of where France starts, with Gauls, Romans or Franks, is itself part of the national argument.