Godegisel (? – 501) was a Burgundian sub-king and son of the Burgundian king Gondioc. Godegisel was the educator and uncle of Clotilde, wife of the Frankish king

Clovis I Clovis (; reconstructed Old Frankish, Frankish: ; – 27 November 511) was the first List of Frankish kings, king of the Franks to unite all of the Franks under one ruler, changing the form of leadership from a group of petty kings to rule by a ...

. Beginning in 463 he was a sub-king of Kingdom of the Burgundians. With the help of Clovis, Godegisel attempted to become the king of all the Kingdom of the Burgundians by eliminating his brother Gundobad. Gundobad had previously seized the rest of the kingdom after the assassination of their brother

Chilperic II Chilperic II ( 672 – 13 February 721) was King of the Franks from 715 until his death. He was a son of Childeric II and his half-cousin wife, Bilichild, both of whom were assassinated, along with their eldest son Dagobert, in 675. Still a ...

, the father of Clotilde. With the promise of annual tribute and territorial cessions, Clovis agreed to aid Godegisel, and in 500 (or 501) Clovis entered the Burgundian territory, compelling Gundobad to march against the invaders and request his brother's aid. When the armies arrived outside of Dijon, Gundobad found himself fighting both the Franks and his brother. Defeated, Gundobad fled to Avignon, while Godigisel retired to Vienne. Clovis followed Gundobad to Avignon and began besieging it, only to abandon the operation and make peace with Gundobad. In 501 Gundobad was able to recover his territory with

Visigothic The Visigoths (; ) were a Germanic people united under the rule of a king and living within the Roman Empire during late antiquity. The Visigoths first appeared in the Balkans, as a Roman-allied barbarian military group united under the comman ...

aid. Gundobad murdered Godegisel in Vienne, and replaced him with his son Sigismund. He was married to Teudelinda, who also died at Vienne.

References

Sources

Hodgkin, ''Italy and Her Invaders'', Book IV, Ch. 9 (pp323-350)
* Reinhold Kaiser: Die Burgunder (Kohlhammer-Urban-Taschenbücher. Bd. 586). Kohlhammer Verlag, Stuttgart 2004, , S. 57 und S. 114–116. {{Authority control 5th-century Germanic people 501 deaths Assassinated royalty Kings of the Burgundians Early Germanic warriors