The Kingdom of the Burgundians, or First Kingdom of Burgundy, was established by Germanic

Burgundians The Burgundians were an early Germanic peoples, Germanic tribe or group of tribes. They appeared east in the middle Rhine region in the third century AD, and were later moved west into the Roman Empire, in Roman Gaul, Gaul. In the first and seco ...

in the

Rhineland The Rhineland ( ; ; ; ) is a loosely defined area of Western Germany along the Rhine, chiefly Middle Rhine, its middle section. It is the main industrial heartland of Germany because of its many factories, and it has historic ties to the Holy ...

and then in eastern

Gaul Gaul () was a region of Western Europe first clearly described by the Roman people, Romans, encompassing present-day France, Belgium, Luxembourg, and parts of Switzerland, the Netherlands, Germany, and Northern Italy. It covered an area of . Ac ...

in the 5th century.

History

Background

The

, a Germanic tribe, may have migrated from the Scandinavian island of

Bornholm Bornholm () is a List of islands of Denmark, Danish island in the Baltic Sea, to the east of the rest of Denmark, south of Sweden, northeast of Germany and north of Poland. Strategically located, Bornholm has been fought over for centuries. I ...

to the

Vistula The Vistula (; ) is the longest river in Poland and the ninth-longest in Europe, at in length. Its drainage basin, extending into three other countries apart from Poland, covers , of which is in Poland. The Vistula rises at Barania Góra i ...

basin in the 3rd century AD. However, the first documented King of the

Gjúki Gjúki (also ''Gebicca'', ''Gifica'', ''Gibica'', ''Gebicar'', ''Gibicho'' or ''Gippich'') was a figure of Germanic heroic legend. The historical Gibica is listed as the ancestor of the King of Burgundy, kings of the Burgundians, along with Gund ...

(Gebicca), lived in the late 4th century east of the Rhine. In 406 the

Alans The Alans () were an ancient and medieval Iranian peoples, Iranic Eurasian nomads, nomadic pastoral people who migrated to what is today North Caucasus – while some continued on to Europe and later North Africa. They are generally regarded ...

Vandals The Vandals were a Germanic people who were first reported in the written records as inhabitants of what is now Poland, during the period of the Roman Empire. Much later, in the fifth century, a group of Vandals led by kings established Vand ...

Suevi file:1st century Germani.png, 300px, The approximate positions of some Germanic peoples reported by Graeco-Roman authors in the 1st century. Suebian peoples in red, and other Irminones in purple. The Suebi (also spelled Suavi, Suevi or Suebians ...

, and possibly the Burgundians, crossed the Rhine and invaded

Roman Gaul Roman Gaul refers to GaulThe territory of Gaul roughly corresponds to modern-day France, Belgium and Luxembourg, and adjacent parts of the Netherlands, Switzerland and Germany. under provincial rule in the Roman Empire from the 1st century B ...

. The Burgundians settled as ''

foederati ''Foederati'' ( ; singular: ''foederatus'' ) were peoples and cities bound by a treaty, known as ''foedus'', with Rome. During the Roman Republic, the term identified the '' socii'', but during the Roman Empire, it was used to describe foreign ...

'' in the Roman province of

Germania Secunda ''Germania Inferior'' ("Lower Germania") was a Roman province from AD 85 until the province was renamed ''Germania Secunda'' in the 4th century AD, on the west bank of the Rhine bordering the North Sea. The capital of the province was Colonia Clau ...

along the Middle Rhine.

Kingdom

In 411 AD, Burgundian King Gunther (or Gundahar or Gundicar) in cooperation with Goar, king of the

, set up Jovinus as a puppet emperor. Under the pretext of Jovinus' imperial authority, Gunther settled on the western (i.e., Roman) bank of the Rhine, between the river Lauter and the Nahe, seizing the settlements of (present day

Worms The World Register of Marine Species (WoRMS) is a taxonomic database that aims to provide an authoritative and comprehensive catalogue and list of names of marine organisms. Content The content of the registry is edited and maintained by scien ...

Speyer Speyer (, older spelling ; ; ), historically known in English as Spires, is a city in Rhineland-Palatinate in the western part of the Germany, Federal Republic of Germany with approximately 50,000 inhabitants. Located on the left bank of the r ...

, and

Strasbourg Strasbourg ( , ; ; ) is the Prefectures in France, prefecture and largest city of the Grand Est Regions of France, region of Geography of France, eastern France, in the historic region of Alsace. It is the prefecture of the Bas-Rhin Departmen ...

. Apparently as part of a truce, Roman Emperor Honorius later officially "granted" them the land. The Burgundians established their capital at . Olympiodorus of Thebes also mentions a ''Guntiarios'' who was called "commander of the Burgundians" in the context of the 411 usurping of Germania Secunda by Jovinus. Despite their new status as , the Burgundians carried out raids into Roman upper Gallia Belgica that became intolerable to the Romans and were ruthlessly brought to an end in 436, when the Roman general

Flavius Aetius Flavius Aetius (also spelled Aëtius; ; 390 – 21 September 454) was a Roman Empire, Roman general and statesman of the Fall of the Western Roman Empire, closing period of the Western Roman Empire. He was a military commander and the most inf ...

called in Hun mercenaries, who overwhelmed the kingdom in 437. Gunther was killed in the fighting, reportedly along with the majority of the Burgundians.Prosper; ''Chronica Gallica'' 452; Hydatius; and Sidonius Apollinaris. The campaign was the origin of the mediæval poem. Gunther was succeeded as king by Gunderic (or Gundioc or Gondioc) in 437. After 443, the remaining Burgundians were resettled by Aetius to the region of present-day northeastern France and western Switzerland, again as , in the Roman province of . Their efforts to enlarge their kingdom down the Rhone river brought them into conflict with the

Visigothic Kingdom The Visigothic Kingdom, Visigothic Spain or Kingdom of the Goths () was a Barbarian kingdoms, barbarian kingdom that occupied what is now southwestern France and the Iberian Peninsula from the 5th to the 8th centuries. One of the Germanic people ...

in the south. In 451, Gunderic joined forces with Aetius against

Attila Attila ( or ; ), frequently called Attila the Hun, was the ruler of the Huns from 434 until his death in early 453. He was also the leader of an empire consisting of Huns, Ostrogoths, Alans, and Gepids, among others, in Central Europe, C ...

, leader of the Huns, in the

Battle of the Catalaunian Plains The Battle of the Catalaunian Plains (or Fields), also called the Battle of the Campus Mauriacus, Battle of Châlons, Battle of Troyes or the Battle of Maurica, took place on June 20, 451 AD, between a victorious coalition, led by the Roman ...

. When Gunderic died in 473, his kingdom was divided among his four sons:

Gundobad Gundobad (; ; 452 – 516) was King of the Burgundians (473–516), succeeding his father Gundioc of Burgundy. Previous to this, he had been a patrician of the moribund Western Roman Empire in 472–473, three years before its collapse, suc ...

(473–516 in Lyon, king of all of Burgundy from 480),

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 ...

(473–493 in Valence), Gundomar/Godomar (473–486 in Vienne) and Godegisel (473–500, in Vienne and Geneva). Europe and the Near East at 476 AD

After the fall of the Western Roman Empire in 476, King

allied with the mighty 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 ...

against the threat of

Ostrogothic The Ostrogoths () were a Roman-era Germanic peoples, Germanic people. In the 5th century, they followed the Visigoths in creating one of the two great Goths, Gothic kingdoms within the Western Roman Empire, drawing upon the large Gothic populatio ...

King, Theoderic the Great. Gundobad thereby secured the Burgundian acquisitions and compiled the , an Ancient Germanic law code. Later, when Rome was no longer able to afford protection to the inhabitants of Gaul, the Sequani became merged in the newly-formed

Kingdom of Burgundy Kingdom of Burgundy was a name given to various successive Monarchy, kingdoms centered in the historical region of Burgundy during the Middle Ages. The heartland of historical Burgundy correlates with the border area between France and Switze ...

. According to

Gregory of Tours Gregory of Tours (born ; 30 November – 17 November 594 AD) was a Gallo-Roman historian and Bishop of Tours during the Merovingian period and is known as the "father of French history". He was a prelate in the Merovingian kingdom, encom ...

(538–594), Gundobad slew his brother Chilperic II in 493 and exiled his daughter Clotilde, who was married to the

Merovingian The Merovingian dynasty () was the ruling family of the Franks from around the middle of the 5th century until Pepin the Short in 751. They first appear as "Kings of the Franks" in the Roman army of northern Gaul. By 509 they had united all the ...

Clovis,

King of the Franks The Franks, Germanic peoples that invaded the Western Roman Empire in the 5th century, were first led by individuals called dux, dukes and monarch, reguli. The earliest group of Franks that rose to prominence was the Salian Franks, Salian Mero ...

, who had just conquered northern Gaul. The decline of the kingdom began when they came under attack from their former Frankish allies. In 523, the sons of King Clovis campaigned in the Burgundian lands, instigated by their mother, Clotilde, in revenge for Gundobad's murder of her father. In 532, the Burgundians were decisively defeated by the Franks at the Battle of Autun, whereafter King Godomar was killed and Burgundy incorporated into the Frankish kingdom in 534.

List of kings

* Gebicca (late 4th century – c. 407) * Gundomar I (c. 407 – 411), son of Gebicca * Giselher (c. 407 – 411), son of Gebicca * Gunther (c. 407 – 436), son of Gebicca '' Flavius Aëtius moves the Burgundians into Sapaudia ( Upper Rhône Basin)''. * Gunderic/Gundioc (436–473) opposed by **

Chilperic I Chilperic I ( 539 – September 584) was the king of Neustria (or Soissons) from 561 to his death. He was one of the sons of the Franks, Frankish king Clotaire I and Queen Aregund. Life Immediately after the death of his father in 561, he ...

, brother of Gundioc (443–c. 480) *division of the kingdom among the four sons of Gundioc: **

(473–516 in Lyon, king of all of Burgundy from 480), **

(473–493 in Valence) **Gundomar/Godomar (473–486 in Vienne) **Godegisel (473–500, in Vienne and Geneva) * Sigismund, son of Gundobad (516–524) * Godomar II or Gundimar, son of Gundobad (524–532)

References

Sources

*Bury, J.B. ''The Invasion of Europe by the Barbarians.'' London: Macmillan and Co., 1928. * * Dalton, O.M. ''The History of the Franks, by Gregory of Tours.'' Oxford: The Clarendon Press, 1927. *Drew, Katherine Fischer. ''The Burgundian Code.'' Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 1972. *Gordon, C.D. ''The Age of Attila.'' Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 1961. *Guichard, Rene, ''Essai sur l'histoire du peuple burgonde, de Bornholm (Burgundarholm) vers la Bourgogne et les Bourguignons'', 1965, published by A. et J. Picard et Cie. *Murray, Alexander Callander. ''From Roman to Merovingian Gaul.'' Broadview Press, 2000. *Musset, Lucien. ''The Germanic Invasions: The Making of Europe AD 400-600.'' University Park, Pennsylvania: The Pennsylvania State University Press, 1975. *Nerman, Birger. ''Det svenska rikets uppkomst''. Generalstabens litagrafiska anstalt: Stockholm. 1925. *Rivers, Theodore John. ''Laws of the Salian and Ripuarian Franks.'' New York: AMS Press, 1986. *Rolfe, J.C., trans, ''Ammianus Marcellinus.'' Cambridge, Massachusetts: Harvard University Press, 1950. *Shanzer, Danuta. ‘Dating the Baptism of Clovis.’ In ''Early Medieval Europe'', volume 7, pages 29–57. Oxford: Blackwell Publishers Ltd, 1998. *Shanzer, D. and I. Wood. ''Avitus of Vienne: Letters and Selected Prose. Translated with an Introduction and Notes.'' Liverpool: Liverpool University Press, 2002. *Werner, J. (1953). "Beiträge zur Archäologie des Attila-Reiches", ''Die Bayerische Akademie der Wissenschaft. Abhandlungen.'' N.F. XXXVIII A Philosophische-philologische und historische Klasse. Münche *Wood, Ian N. ‘Ethnicity and the Ethnogenesis of the Burgundians’. In Herwig Wolfram and Walter Pohl, editors, ''Typen der Ethnogenese unter besonderer Berücksichtigung der Bayern'', volume 1, pages 53–69. Vienna: Denkschriften der Österreichische Akademie der Wissenschaften, 1990. *Wood, Ian N. ''The Merovingian Kingdoms.'' Harlow, England: The Longman Group, 1994. {{Early Germanic Kingdoms 411 establishments States and territories established in the 410s States and territories disestablished in the 530s 5th century in sub-Roman Gaul

534 disestablishments Barbarian kingdoms