Frédégaire

It is a marginal note of manuscript 766 of the Public library of Saint-Omer which gives the name of Frédégaire , used as of the 16th century, to indicate a narrative compilation reporting the events going of the origin of the world at the year 660. The debate of the scholars continues to determine the number of the authors, their geographic origin, the original structure of work. The last assumptions would make of Frédégaire (known as also Pseudo-Frédégaire because of these uncertainties) a single author of Burgundian origin but which would have written in Austrasie towards 658 -660. The Chronicle of Frédégaire represents one of the rare documents written at the time of the Mérovingiens.

If the account is centered on the frank Royaumes, it also provides invaluable information on the history of the Italy (Lombards and Ostrogoths, probably), of the Hispanie with the Royaume Visigoth and even on the Byzantine world .

History

The cutting which follows, is of nothing absolute because there does not exist any certainty over the authors, their sources and the periods that they covered. However this text is used as reference, because its contents are completely corroborated by other documents, Byzantine history, Liber pontificalis… What appears certain for all the historians, it is that Childebrand and its son Nibelung wrote the last parts well of them.

One associates with this chronicle three continuations successively added in 736, 751 and 768.

The first takes again a version austrasienne Liber Historiae Francorum prolonged until 736.

The second covers the period going from 736 to 751.

The third tells the facts during the reign of Pépin the Brief until the advent of its sons Carloman and Charlemagne into 768.

The chronicle written towards 660, is composed of thirty-three paragraphs (either four books). Are the first three books only more or less right chronological lists, inspired by the Liber Generationis of Hippolyte of Rome (writer of first half of IIIe century) to which succeed of the Chronicles of Isidore of Seville (560? - 636), of Jerome de Stridon (347? - 420) and of Hydatius. These texts are used here as reference, as for good number of other works of the Moyen-âge. Then a summary comes from books I to IV of Ten books of history of Gregoire de Tours.

Then finally work begins from pseudo-Frédégaire (pseudo, because no one is certain only it existed). The fourth book is original, covering the period of 584 with 642.

The drafting was started by one or two authors, burgonde (S) seems it. First the period going from 604 to 613 wrote. Second added notes over years 614 to 624. From 625 to 642, the drafting is worked out and proceeds in Austrasie (what could make think of two authors, a burgonde and the second austrasien, or with only one having changed residence). For this period, one feels that the author evolved certainly /moved at the Court, obtaining direct information.

The first continuator, is known under the name of “Monk of Laon”, he lives doubtless in Austrasie and covers the years going of 642 with 736. He integrates there the Liber Historiae Francorum , chronicle written in Saint-Denis or Rouen, by modifying it. Work was certainly stopped by the death of its author. It is in this part, concerning the year 685, which one finds the only historical allusion to Alpaïde mother of Charles Martel (685 - 741) and of Childebrand (690 - 751). Text (IV-172) says this exactly to us: " (Pip II) took another uxor nobilis and elegans (wife noble and elegant), of which it had a fils". There does not exist any other text of this time, which speaks about the birth of Charles or his mother. It is only well later, which texts will appear evoking the origins of the " seconde" marry.

The second continuator, is a large perfectly known character, the count austrasien Childebrand, brother of Charles Martel. For the years 736 with 751 that it writes or directs, the text becomes more political, exciting the important facts of the family members who holds the capacity and aspires to the supreme title.

The third and last continuator, are not other than Nibelung the son of Childebrand, which continues the work of 751 with 768.

Handwritten tradition and printed editions

One has this thirty-four Chronicle manuscripts, that Krusch and Wallace-Hadrill group in five families. The original is lost, but there is a copy into uncial made towards the end of the same century by a Burgundian monk of the name of Lucerius. However, the majority of the manuscripts are copies austrasiennes made towards the end of the eighth and the beginning of the ninth century. Wallace-Hadrill based his translation on the text of the ms Paris 10910.

The princeps Editio was published in Basle in 1568 by Flacius It, who took for text that of the ms Lat. 864 of the Palatine Library of the University of Heidelberg. The second edition published was Antiquae Lectiones of Canisius to Ingolstadt in 1602. Freherus was the first to call the " author; Frédégaire" in its edition published with Hanover in 1613.

References

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