FROM THE SETTLEMENT OF THE FRANKS TO THE SUBJUGATION OF FRIESLAND
A.D. 250--800
From this epoch we must trace the progress of a totally new and
distinct population in the Netherlands. The Batavians being
annihilated, almost without resistance, the low countries contained
only the free people of the German race. But these people did not
completely sympathize together so as to form one consolidated
nation. The Salians, and the other petty tribes of Franks, their
allies, were essentially warlike, and appeared precisely the same
as the original inhabitants of the high grounds. The Menapians
and the Frisons, on the contrary, lost nothing of their spirit
of commerce and industry. The result of this diversity was a
separation between the Franks and the Menapians. While the latter,
under the name of Armoricans, joined themselves more closely
with the people who bordered the Channel, the Frisons associated
themselves with the tribes settled on the limits of the German
Ocean, and formed with them a connection celebrated under the
title of the Saxon League. Thus was formed on all points a union
between the maritime races against the inland inhabitants; and
their mutual antipathy became more and more developed as the
decline of the Roman empire ended the former struggle between
liberty and conquest.
The Netherlands now became the earliest theatre of an entirely
new movement, the consequences of which were destined to affect
the whole world. This country was occupied toward the sea by
a people wholly maritime, excepting the narrow space between
the Rhine and the Vahal, of which the Salian Franks had become
possessed. The nature of this marshy soil, in comparison with the
sands of Westphalia, Guelders, and North Brabant, was not more
strikingly contrasted than was the character of their population.
The Franks, who had been for a while under the Roman sway, showed
a compound of the violence of savage life and the corruption
of civilized society. They were covetous and treacherous, but
made excellent soldiers; and at this epoch, which intervened
between the power of imperial Rome and that of Germany, the Frank
might be morally considered as a borderer on the frontiers of the
Middle Ages. The Saxon (and this name comprehends all the tribes
of the coast from the Rhine as far north as Denmark), uniting in
himself the distinctive qualities of German and navigator, was
moderate and sincere, but implacable in his rage. Neither of
these two races of men was excelled in point of courage; but
the number of Franks who still entered into the service of the
empire diminished the real force of this nation, and naturally
tended to disunite it. Therefore, in the subsequent shock of
people against people, the Saxons invariably gained the final
advantage.
They had no doubt often measured their strength in the most remote
times, since the Franks were but the descendants of the ancient
tribes of Sicambers and others, against whom the Batavians had
offered their assistance to Cæsar. Under Augustus, the inhabitants
of the coast had in the same way joined themselves with Drusus,
to oppose these their old enemies. It was also after having been
expelled by the Frisons from Guelders that the Salians had passed
the Rhine and the Meuse; but, in the fourth century, the two
peoples, recovering their strength, the struggle recommenced,
never to terminate--at least between the direct descendants of
each. It is believed that it was the Varni, a race of Saxons
nearly connected with those of England (and coming, like them,
from the coast of Denmark), who on this occasion struck the decisive
blow on the side of the Saxons. Embarking on board a numerous
fleet, they made a descent in the ancient isle of the Batavians,
at that time inhabited by the Salians, whom they completely
destroyed. Julian the Apostate, who was then with a numerous
army pursuing his career of early glory in these countries,
interfered for the purpose of preventing the expulsion, or at
least the utter destruction, of the vanquished; but his efforts
were unavailing. The Salians appear to have figured no more in
this part of the Low Countries.
The defeat of the Salians by a Saxon tribe is a fact on which no
doubt rests. The name of the victors is, however, questionable.
The Varni having remained settled near the mouths of the Rhine
till near the year 500, there is strong probability that they
were the people alluded to. But names and histories, which may on
this point appear of such little importance, acquire considerable
interest when we reflect that these Salians, driven from their
settlement, became the conquerors of France; that those Saxons
who forced them on their career of conquest were destined to
become the masters of England; and that these two petty tribes,
who battled so long for a corner of marshy earth, carried with
them their reciprocal antipathy while involuntarily deciding
the destiny of Europe.
The defeat of the Franks was fatal to those peoples who had become
incorporated with the Romans; for it was from them that the exiled
wanderers, still fierce in their ruin, and with arms in their hands,
demanded lands and herds; all, in short, which they themselves had
lost. From the middle of the fourth century to the end of the
fifth, there was a succession of invasions in this spirit, which
always ended by the subjugation of a part of the country; and which
was completed about the year 490, by Clovis making himself master
of almost the whole of Gaul. Under this new empire not a vestige
of the ancient nations of the Ardennes was left. The civilized
population either perished or was reduced to slavery, and all
the high grounds were added to the previous conquests of the
Salians.
But the maritime population, when once possessed of the whole
coast, did not seek to make the slightest progress toward the
interior. The element of their enterprise and the object of their
ambition was the ocean; and when this hardy and intrepid race
became too numerous for their narrow limits, expeditions and
colonies beyond the sea carried off their redundant population.
The Saxon warriors established themselves near the mouths of the
Loire; others, conducted by Hengist and Horsa, settled in Great
Britain. It will always remain problematical from what point
of the coast these adventurers departed; but many circumstances
tend to give weight to the opinion which pronounces those old
Saxons to have started from the Netherlands.
Paganism not being yet banished from these countries, the obscurity
which would have enveloped them is in some degree dispelled by the
recitals of the monks who went among them to preach Christianity.
We see in those records, and by the text of some of their early
laws, that this maritime people were more industrious, prosperous,
and happy, than those of France. The men were handsome and richly
clothed; and the land well cultivated, and abounding in fruits,
milk, and honey. The Saxon merchants carried their trade far
into the southern countries. In the meantime, the parts of the
Netherlands which belonged to France resembled a desert. The
monasteries which were there founded were established, according
to the words of their charters, amid immense solitudes; and the
French nobles only came into Brabant for the sport of bear-hunting
in its interminable forests. Thus, while the inhabitants of the
low lands, as far back as the light of history penetrates, appear
in a continual state of improvement, those of the high grounds,
after frequent vicissitudes, seem to sink into utter degeneracy
and subjugation. The latter wished to denaturalize themselves,
and become as though they were foreigners even on their native
soil; the former remained firm and faithful to their country
and to each other.
But the growth of French power menaced utter ruin to this interesting
race. Clovis had succeeded about the year 485 of our era, in
destroying the last remnants of Roman domination in Gaul. The
successors of these conquerors soon extended their empire from the
Pyrenees to the Rhine. They had continual contests with the free
population of the Low Countries, and their nearest neighbors. In the
commencement of the seventh century, the French king, Clotaire II.,
exterminated the chief part of the Saxons of Hanover and Westphalia;
and the historians of those barbarous times unanimously relate
that he caused to be beheaded every inhabitant of the vanquished
tribes who exceeded the height of his sword. The Saxon name was
thus nearly extinguished in those countries; and the remnant of
these various peoples adopted that of Frisons (Friesen), either
because they became really incorporated with that nation, or
merely that they recognized it for the most powerful of their
tribes. Friesland, to speak in the language of that age, extended
then from the Scheldt to the Weser, and formed a considerable
state. But the ascendency of France was every year becoming more
marked; and King Dagobert extended the limits of her power even
as far as Utrecht. The descendants of the Menapians, known at
that epoch by the different names of Menapians, Flemings, and
Toxandirans, fell one after another directly or indirectly under
the empire of the Merovingian princes; and the noblest family
which existed among the French--that which subsequently took the
name of Carlovingians--comprised in its dominions nearly the
whole of the southern and western parts of the Netherlands.
Between this family, whose chief was called duke of the Frontier
Marshes (_Dux_Brabantioe_), and the free tribes, united under
the common name of Frisons, the same struggle was maintained as
that which formerly existed between the Salians and the Saxons.
Toward the year 700, the French monarchy was torn by anarchy,
and, under "the lazy kings," lost much of its concentrated power;
but every dukedom formed an independent sovereignty, and of all
those that of Brabant was the most redoubtable. Nevertheless
the Frisons, under their king, Radbod, assumed for a moment the
superiority; and Utrecht, where the French had established
Christianity, fell again into the power of the pagans. Charles
Martell, at that time young, and but commencing his splendid
career, was defeated by the hostile king in the forest of the
Ardennes; and though, in subsequent conquests, he took an ample
revenge, Radbod still remained a powerful opponent. It is related
of this fierce monarch that he was converted by a Christian
missionary; but, at the moment in which he put his foot in the
water for the ceremony of baptism, he suddenly asked the priest
where all his old Frison companions in arms had gone after their
death? "To hell," replied the priest. "Well, then," said Radbod,
drawing back his foot from the water, "I would rather go to hell
with them, than to paradise with you and your fellow foreigners!"
and he refused to receive the rite of baptism, and remained a
pagan.
After the death of Radbod, in 719, Charles Martell, now become
duke of the Franks, mayor of the palace, or by whatever other of
his several titles he may be distinguished, finally triumphed over
the long-resisting Frisons. He labored to establish Christianity
among them; but they did not understand the French language, and
the lot of converting them was consequently reserved for the
English. St. Willebrod was the first missionary who met with
any success, about the latter end of the seventh century; but
it was not till toward the year 750 that this great mission was
finally accomplished by St. Boniface, archbishop of Mayence,
and the apostle of Germany. Yet the progress of Christianity,
and the establishment of a foreign sway, still met the partial
resistance which a conquered but not enervated people are always
capable of opposing to their masters. St. Boniface fell a victim
to this stubborn spirit. He perished a martyr to his zeal, but
perhaps a victim as well to the violent measures of his colleagues,
in Friesland, the very province which to this day preserves the
name.
The last avenger of Friesland liberty and of the national idols
was the illustrious Witikind, to whom the chronicles of his country
give the title of first azing, or judge. This intrepid chieftain
is considered as a compatriot, not only by the historians of
Friesland, but by those of Saxony; both, it would appear, having
equal claims to the honor; for the union between the two peoples
was constantly strengthened by intermarriages between the noblest
families of each. As long as Witikind remained a pagan and a
freeman, some doubt existed as to the final fate of Friesland;
but when by his conversion he became only a noble of the court
of Charlemagne, the slavery of his country was consummated.