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These duties were functions of the civil power, and in assuming them Gregory may be said to have founded the temporal power of the popes. Beyond the borders of Italy, Gregory was in constant communication with the emperor, with the rulers of Austrasia, Neustria, and Burgundy.
When in 687 the battle fought at Testry, on the banks of the Somme, left Pepin of Heristal, duke and mayor of the palace of Austrasia, victorious over Bertaire, mayor of the palace of Neustria, it was a question of something very different from mere rivalry between the two Frankish dominions and their chiefs.
Gallo-Roman feeling was more prevalent in Neustria, Germanic in Austrasia. The majority of the Neustrian mayors supported the interests of royalty, the Austrasian those of the aristocracy of landholders and warriors.
Shortly before his death he divided his power between his sons Carlmann and Pepin, giving Austrasia to the one, Neustria to the other. But Carlmann abdicated to become a monk and Pepin his junior was left to continue the work of their father single-handed.
Pépin the Short had more than once hurled them back far from the very uncertain frontiers of Germanic Austrasia; and, on becoming king, he dealt his blows still farther, and entered, in his turn, Saxony itself.
As she had predicted, the Merovingian dynasty lasted three hundred years, when it was overturned by one Pepin of Heristal, the smallest man of his day at least, so tradition tells. At the death of Clovis his sons split up the kingdom, and from that epoch a deadly war was waged between the rival kingdoms of Neustria and Austrasia, the west and the east.
The Neustrians commenced the revolt by expelling Theodebald and his mother, and choosing for their ruler a Mayor of the Palace named Raginfred. They then attacked Austrasia, which had not joined in the revolt. It was without fitting defences, and had no able man to direct its resistance against this assault. What course should the Austrasians take?
It was not, however, her dissolute life which proved fatal to her, but the design which she showed to erect a firm monarchy in Austrasia and Neustria, by putting down the overgrown power of the nobles.
The Neustrians had the same prejudice; and, accordingly, while Charles in the one district, and Raginfred in the other, virtually governed, their respective tools were Clothaire IV., King of Austrasia, and Chilperic II., King of Neustria, two descendents of the old dynasty. These events took place in A.D. 716. The two countries now prepared for war.
His eldest son Hermenegild, who was invested by his father with the royal diadem, and the fair principality of Btica, contracted an honorable and orthodox alliance with a Merovingian princess, the daughter of Sigebert, king of Austrasia, and of the famous Brunechild.
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