in the fourth and fifth centuries, whether between the German
conquerors and the last forces of the empire, or between the
nations which had occupied different portions of Gaul, until
the Franks remained sole masters of the country, two races,
two populations, which had nothing in common but religion,
appear forcibly brought together, and, as it were, face to
face with each other, in one political community. The
Gallo-Roman population presents under the same law very
different and very unequal conditions; the barbarian
population comprises, together with its own peculiar
classifications of ranks and conditions, distinct laws and
nationalities. In the first we find citizens absolutely free,
coloni, or husbandmen belonging to the lands of a proprietor,
and domestic slaves deprived of all civil rights; in the
second, we see the Frankish race divided into two tribes, each
having its own peculiar law [the law of the Salic Franks or Salic
law, and the law of the Ripuarian Franks or Ripuarian law];
the Burgundians, the Goths, and the rest of the Teutonic
races, who became subjected, either of their own accord or by
force, to, the Frankish empire, governed by other and entirely
different laws; but among them all, as well as among the
Franks, we find at least three social conditions--two degrees
of liberty, and slavery.
{1414}
Among these incongruous states of existence, the criminal law
of the dominant race established, by means of the scale of
damages for crime or personal injury, a kind of hierarchy--
the starting-point of that movement towards an assimilation
and gradual transformation, which, after the lapse of four
centuries, from the fifth to the tenth, gave rise to the
society of the feudal times. The first rank in the civil order
belonged to the man of Frankish origin, and to the Barbarian who
lived under the law of the Franks; in the second rank was
placed the Barbarian, who lived under the law of his own
country; next came the native freeman and proprietor, the
Roman possessor, and, in the same degree, the Lidus or German
colonus; after them, the Roman tributary--i. e., the native
colonus; and, last of all, the slave, without distinction of
origin. These various classes, separated on the one hand by
distance of rank, on the other by difference of laws, manners,
and language, were far from being equally distributed between
the cities and the rural districts. All that was elevated in
the Gallo-Roman population, of whatever character it might be,
was found in the cities, where its noble, rich, and
industrious families dwelt, surrounded by their domestic
slaves; and, among the people of that race, the only constant
residents in the country were the half-servile coloni and the
agricultural slaves. On the contrary, the superior class of
the German population established itself in the country, where
each family, independent and proprietary, was maintained on
its own domain by the labour of the Lidi whom it had brought
thither, or of the old race of coloni who belonged to the
soil. The only Germans who resided in the cities were a small
number of officers in the service of the Crown, and of
individuals without family and patrimony, who, in spite of
their original habits, sought a livelihood by following some
employment. The social superiority of the dominant race rooted
itself firmly in the localities inhabited by them, and passed,
as has been already remarked, from the cities to the rural
districts. By degrees, also, it came to pass that the latter
drew off from the former the upper portion of their
population, who, in order to raise themselves still higher,
and to mix with the conquerors, imitated, as far as they were
able, their mode of life. ... While Barbarism was thus
occupying or usurping all the vantage points of the social
state, and civil life in the intermediate classes was arrested
in its progress, and sinking gradually to the lowest
condition, even to that of personal servitude, an ameliorating
movement already commenced before the fall of the empire,
still continued, and declared itself more and more loudly. The
dogma of a common brotherhood in the eyes of God, and of one
sole redemption for all mankind, preached by the Church to the
faithful of every race, touched the heart and awakened the
mind in favour of the slave, and, in consequence,
enfranchisements became more frequent, or a treatment more
humane was adopted on the part of the masters, whether Gauls
or Germans by origin. The latter, moreover, had imported from
their country, where the mode of life was simple and without
luxury, usages favourable to a modified slavery. The rich
barbarian was waited upon by free persons--by the children of
his relatives, his clients and his friends; the tendency of
his national manners, different from that of the Roman,
induced him to send the slave out of his house, and to
establish him as a labourer or artisan on some portion of land
to which he then became permanently attached, and the
destination of which he followed, whether it were inherited or
sold. ... Domestic slavery made the man a chattel, a mere
piece of moveable property. The slave, settled on a spot of
land, from that time entered into the category of real
property. At the same time that this last class, which
properly bore the name of serfs, was increased at the expense
of the first, the classes of the coloni and Lidi would
naturally multiply simultaneously, by the very casualties of
ruin and adverse circumstances which, at a period of incessant
commotions, injured the condition of the freemen. ... In the
very heart of the Barbarian society, the class of small
proprietors, which had originally formed its strength and
glory, decreased, and finally became extinct by sinking into
vassalage, or a state of still more ignoble dependence, which
partook more or less of the character of actual servitude. ...
The freemen depressed towards servitude met the slave who had
reached a sort of half liberty. Thus, through the whole extent
of Gaul, was formed a vast body of agricultural labourers and
rural artisans, whose lot, though never uniform, was brought
more and more to a level of equality; and the creative wants
of society produced a new sphere of industry in the country,
while the cities remained stationary, or sank more and more
into decay. ... On every large estate where improvement
flourished, the cabins of those employed, Lidi, coloni or
slaves, grouped as necessity or convenience suggested, were
multiplied and peopled more numerously, till they assumed the
form of a hamlet. When these hamlets were situated in a
favourable position ... they continued to increase till they
became villages. ... The building of a church soon raised the
village to the rank of a parish; and, as a consequence, the
new parish took its place among the rural circonscriptions.
... Thence sprung, altogether spontaneously, under the
sanction of the intendant, joined to that of the priest, rude
outlines of a municipal organization, in which the church
became the depository of the acts which, in accordance with
the Roman law, were inscribed on the registers of the city. It
is in this way that beyond the towns, the cities, and the
boroughs, where the remains of the old social condition
lingered in an increasing state of degradation, elements of
future improvement were formed. ... This modification, already
considerably advanced in the ninth century, was completed in
the course of the tenth. At that period, the last class of the
Gallo-Frankish society disappeared--viz., that of persons
held as chattels, bought, exchanged, transferred from one
place to another, like any other kind of moveable goods. The
slave now belonged to the soil rather than to the person; his
service, hitherto arbitrary, was changed into customary dues
and regulated employment; he had a settled abode, and, in
consequence, a right of possession in the soil on which he was
dependent. This is the earliest form in which we distinctly
trace the first impress of the modern world upon the civil
state.
{1415}
The word serf henceforward took its definite meaning; it
became the generic name of a mixed condition of servitude and
freedom, in which we find blended together the states of the
colonus and Lidus--two names which occur less and less
frequently in the tenth century, till they entirely disappear.
This century, the point to which all the social efforts of the
four preceding ones which had elapsed since the Frankish
conquest had been tending, saw the intestine struggle between
the Roman and German manners brought to a conclusion by an
important revolution. The latter definitively prevailed, and
from their triumph arose the feudal system; that is to say, a
new form of the state, a new constitution of property and
domestic life, a parcelling out of the sovereignty and
jurisdiction, all the public powers transformed into demesnial
privileges, the idea of nobility devoted to the profession of
arms, and that of ignobility to industry and labour. By a
remarkable coincidence, the complete establishment of this
system is the epoch when the distinction of races terminates
in Frankish Gaul--when all the legal consequences of
diversity of origin between Barbarians and Romans, conquerors
and subjects, disappear. The law ceases to be personal, and
becomes local; the German codes and the Roman code itself are
replaced by custom; it is the territory and not the descent
which distinguishes the inhabitant of the Gallic soil;
finally, instead of national distinctions, one mixed
population appears, to which the historian is able
henceforward to give the name of French."
_A. Thierry,
Formation and Progress of the Tiers État in France,
volume 1, chapter 1._
GAUL: A. D. 412-453.
The mixed administration, Roman and barbarian.
"A prætorian prefect still resided at Trèves; a vicar of the
seventeen Gallic provinces at Aries: each of these provinces
had its Roman duke; each of the hundred and fifteen cities of
Gaul had its count; each city its curia, or municipality. But,
collaterally with this Roman organisation, the barbarians,
assembled in their 'mallum,' of which their kings were
presidents, decided on peace and war, made laws, or
administered justice. Each division of the army had its Graf
Jarl, or Count; each subdivision its centenary, or
hundred-man; and all these fractions of the free population
had the same right of deciding by suffrage in their own
mallums, or peculiar courts, all their common affairs. In
cases of opposition between the barbarian and the Roman
jurisdiction, the overbearing arrogance of the one, and the
abject baseness of the other, soon decided the question of
supremacy. In some provinces the two powers were not
concurrent: there were no barbarians between the Loire and the
Meuse, nor between the Alps and the Rhone; but the feebleness
of the Roman government was only the more conspicuous. A few
great proprietors cultivated a part of the province with the
aid of slaves; the rest was desert, or only inhabited by
Bagaudæ, runaway slaves, who lived by robbery. Some towns
still maintained a show of opulence, but not one gave the
slightest sign of strength; not one enrolled its militia, nor
repaired its fortifications. ... Honorius wished to confer on
the cities of southern Gaul a diet, at which they might have
deliberated on public affairs: he did not even find public
spirit enough to accept the offered privilege."
_J. C. L. de Sismondi,
Fall of the Roman Empire,
chapter 7 (volume 1)._
GAUL: A. D. 451.
Attila's invasion.
See HUNS: A. D. 451.
GAUL: A. D. 453-484.
Extension of the Visigothic kingdom.
See GOTHS (VISIGOTHS): A. D. 453-484.
GAUL: A. D. 457-486.
The last Roman sovereignty.
The last definite survival of Roman sovereignty in Gaul
lingered until 486 in a district north of the Seine, between
the Marne and the Oise, which had Soissons for its capital. It
was maintained there, in the first instance, by Ægidius, a
Gallic noble whom Marjorian, one of the last of the emperors
at Rome, made Master-General of Gaul. The respect commanded by
Ægidius among the surrounding barbarians was so great that the
Salian Franks invited him to rule over them, in place of a
licentious young king, Childeric, whom they had driven into
exile. He was king of these Franks, according to Gregory of
Tours, for eight years (457-464), until he died. Childeric
then returned, was reinstated in his kingdom and became the
father of Clovis (or Chlodwig), the founder of the great Frank
monarchy. But a son of Ægidius, named Syagrius, was still the
inheritor of a kingdom, known as, the "Kingdom of Syagrius,"
embracing, as has been said, the country around Soissons,
between the Seine, the Marne and the Oise, and also including,
in the opinion of some writers, Troyes and Auxerre. The first
exploit of Clovis--the beginning of his career of
conquest--was the overthrow of this "king of the Romans," as
Syagrius was called, in a decisive battle fought at Soissons,
A. D. 486, and the incorporation of his kingdom into the Frank
dominions. Syagrius escaped to Toulouse, but was surrendered
to Clovis and put to death.
_P. Godwin,
History of France: Ancient Gaul,
book 3, chapter 11._
ALSO IN:
_W. C. Perry,
The Franks,
chapter 2._
GAUL: A. D. 474.
Invasion of Ostrogoths.
See GOTHS (OSTROGOTHS): A. D. 473-474.
GAUL: A. D. 507-509.
Expulsion of the Visigoths.
See GOTHS (VISIGOTHS): A. D. 507-509.
GAUL: A. D. 540.
Formal relinquishment of the country to the Franks by
Justinian.
See FRANKS: A. D. 539-553.
GAULS.
"The Gauls, properly so called, the Galatæ of the Greeks, the
Galli of the Romans, and the Gael of modern history, formed
the van of the great Celtic migration which had poured
westward at various intervals during many hundred years. ...
Having overrun the south of Gaul and penetrated into Spain,
they lost a part of the territory thus acquired, and the
restoration of the Iberian fugitives to Aquitania placed a
barrier between the Celts in Spain and their brethren whom
they had left behind them in the north. In the time of the
Romans the Galli were found established in the centre and east
of the country denominated Gaul, forming for the most part a
great confederation, at the head of which stood the Arverni.
It was the policy of the Romans to raise the Ædui into
competition with this dominant tribe. ... The Arverni, whose
name is retained in the modern appellation of Auvergne,
occupied a large district in the middle and south of Gaul, and
were surrounded by tributary or dependent clans. The Ædui lay
more to the north and east, and the centre of their
possessions is marked by the position of their capital
Bibracte, the modern Autun, situated in the highlands which
separate the waters of the Loire, the Seine and the Saone. ...
{1416}
Other Gallic tribes stretched beyond the Saone: the Sequani,
who afterwards made an attempt to usurp this coveted
preeminence (the valley of the Doubs formed the centre of the
Sequanese territory, which reached to the Jura and the Rhine);
the Helvetii and other mountain races, whose scanty pastures
extended to the sources of the Rhine; the Allobroges, who
dwelt upon the Isere and Rhone, and who were the first of
their race to meet and the first to succumb before the prowess
of the Roman legions. According to the classification both of
Cæsar and Strabo, the Turones, Pictones and Santones must be
comprised under the same general denomination."
_C. Merivale,
History of the Romans,
chapter 5 (volume 1)._
See, also, CELTS.
GAUL: B. C. 390-347.
Invasions of Italy.
Destruction of Rome.
See ROME: B. C. 390-347.
GAUL: B. C. 295-191.
Roman conquest of the Cisalpine tribes.
See ROME: B. C. 295-191.
GAUL: B. C. 280-279.
Invasion of Greece.
In the year 280 B. C. the Gauls, who had long before passed
from northern Italy around the Adriatic to its eastern coast,
made their first appearance in Macedonia and northern Greece.
The Macedonian throne was occupied at the time by the infamous
usurper, Ptolemy Ceraunus (see MACEDONIA: B. C. 297-280), and
the Celtic savages did one good service to Greece by slaying
him, in the single battle that was fought. The whole open
country was abandoned to them, for a time, and they swept it,
as far southward as the valley of the Peneus, in Thessaly; but
the walled cities were safe. After ravaging the country for
some months the Gauls appear to have retired; but it was only
to return again the next year in more formidable numbers and
under a chief, Brennus, of more vigor and capability. On this
occasion the country suffered fearfully from the barbaric
swarm, but defended itself with something like the spirit of
the Greece of two centuries before. The Ætolians were
conspicuous in the struggle; the Peloponnesian states gave
little assistance. The policy of defense was much the same as
at the time of the Persian invasion, and the enemy was
confronted in force at the pass of Thermopylæ. Brennus made a
more desperate attempt to force the pass than Xerxes had done
and was beaten back with a tremendous slaughter of his Gauls.
But he found traitors, as Xerxes had done, to guide him over
the mountains, and the Greeks at Thermopylæ, surrounded by the
enemy, could only escape by sea. The Gauls marched on Delphi,
eager for the plunder of the great temple, and there they met
with some fatal disaster. Precisely what occurred is not
known. According to the Greeks, the god protected his
sanctuary, and the accounts they have left are full of
miracles and prodigies--of earthquakes, lightnings, tempests,
and disease. The only clear facts seem to be that Delphi was
successfully defended; that the Gauls retreated in disorder
and were destroyed in vast numbers before the remnant of them
got away from the country. Brennus is said to have killed
himself to escape the wrath of his people for the failure of
the expedition. One large body of the great army had separated
from the rest and gone eastward into Thrace, before the
catastrophe occurred. These subsequently passed over to Asia
and pursued there an adventurous career, leaving a historic
name in the country.
See GALATIA.
_C. Thirlwall,
History of Greece,
chapter 60._
----------GAUL: End----------
GAULS, Præfect of the.
See PRÆTORIAN PRÆFECTS.
GAUSARAPOS, OR GUUCHIES, The.
See AMERICAN ABORIGINES: PAMPAS TRIBES.
GAVELKIND, Irish.
"The Irish law of succession in landed property, known as that
of Irish gavelkind, was a logical consequence of the theory of
tribal ownership. If a member of the tribe died, his piece of
land did not descend by right to his eldest son, or even to
all his children equally. Originally, it reverted to its sole
absolute owner, the tribe, every member of which had a right
to use proportionate to his tribal status. This was
undoubtedly the essential principle of inheritance by
gavelkind."
_S. Bryant,
Celtic Ireland,
chapter 6._
ALSO IN:
_Sir H. Maine,
Early History of Institutions,
lecture 7._
GAVELKIND, Kentish.
See FEUDAL TENURES.
GAVEREN, Battle of (1453).
See GHENT: A. D. 1451-1453.
GAZA: Early history.
See PHILISTINES.
GAZA: B. C. 332.
Siege by Alexander.
In his march from Phœnicia to Egypt (see MACEDONIA, &c.: B. C.
334-330), Alexander the Great was compelled to pause for
several months and lay siege to the ancient Philistine city of
Gaza. It was defended for the Persian king by a brave eunuch
named Batis. In the course of the siege, Alexander received a
severe wound in the shoulder, which irritated his savage
temper. When the town was at length taken by storm, he gave no
quarter. Its male inhabitants were put to the sword and the
women and children sold to slavery. The eunuch Batis, being
captured alive, but wounded, was dragged by the feet at the
tail of a chariot, driven at full speed by Alexander himself.
The "greatest of conquerors" proved himself often enough, in
this way, to be the greatest of barbarians--in his age.
_G. Grote,
History of Greece,
part 2, chapter 93._
GAZA: B. C. 312.
Battle between Ptolemy and Demetrius.
See MACEDONIA: B. C. 315-310.
GAZA: B. C. 100.
Destruction by Alexander Jannæus.
Gaza having sided with the Egyptian king, in a war between
Alexander Jannæus, one of the Asmonean kings of the Jews, and
Ptolemy Lathyrus of Egypt and Cyprus, the former laid siege to
the city, about 100 B. C., and acquired possession of it after
several months, through treachery. He took his revenge by
massacring the inhabitants and reducing the city to ruins. It
was rebuilt not long afterwards by the Romans.
_G. Long,
Decline of the Roman Republic,
volume 3, chapter 9._
GAZA: A. D. 1516.
Defeat of the Mamelukes by the Turks.
See TURKS: A. D. 1481-1520.
----------GAZA: End----------
GAZACA.
See ECBATANA.
GAZARI, The.
See CATHARISTS.
GAZNEVIDES, OR GHAZNEVIDES.
See TURKS: A. D. 999-1183.
GEARY ACT, The.
See UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1892.
GEDDES, Jenny, and her stool.
See SCOTLAND: A. D. 1637.
{1417}
GEDROSIANS, The.
"Close to the Indus, and beyond the bare, hot, treeless shores
of the ocean, the southern part of the plain [of eastern Iran]
consists of sandy flats, in which nothing grows but prickly
herbs and a few palms. The springs are a day's journey from
each other, and often more. This region was possessed by a
people whom Herodotus calls Sattagydæ and the companions of
Alexander of Macedonia, Gedrosians. ... Neighbours of the
Gandarians, who, as we know, dwelt on the right bank of the
Indus down to the Cabul, the Gedrosians led a wandering,
predatory life; under the Persian kings, they were united into
one satrapy with the Gandarians."
_M. Duncker,
History of Antiquity,
book 7, chapter 1 (volume 5)._
GEIZA II., King of Hungary, A. D. 1141-1160.
GELA, Founding of.
See SYRACUSE, FOUNDING OF.
GELASIUS II., Pope, A. D. 1118-1119.
GELEONTES.
See PHYLÆ.
GELHEIM, Battle of (1298).
See GERMANY: A. D. 1273-1308.
GELONI, The.
An ancient colony of Greeks intermixed with natives which
shared the country of the Budini, on the steppes between the
Ural Mountains and the Caspian Sea.
_G. Grote, History of Greece,
part 2, volume 3, chapter 17._
GELVES, Battle of (1510).
See BARBARY STATES: A. D. 1505-1510.
GEMARA, The.
See TALMUD.
GEMBLOURS, Battle of (1578).
See NETHERLANDS: A. D. 1577-1581.
GEMEINDE.--GEMEINDERATH.
See SWITZERLAND: A. D. 1848-1890.
GEMOT.
A meeting, assembly, council, moot.
See WITENAGEMOT.
GENABUM, OR CENABUM.
The principal town of the Gallic tribe called the Carnutes;
identified by most archæologists with the modern city of
Orleans, France, though some think its site was at Gien.
See GAUL, CÆSAR'S CONQUEST OF.
GENAUNI, The.
See RHÆTIANS.
GENERAL PRIVILEGE OF ARAGON.
See CORTES, THE EARLY SPANISH.
GENERALS, Execution of the Athenian.
See GREECE: B. C. 406.
GENET, "Citizen," the mission of.
See UNITED STATES OF AMERICA: A. D. 1793.
GENEVA: Beginnings of the city.
See HELVETII, THE ARRESTED MIGRATION OF THE.
GENEVA: A. D. 500.
Under the Burgundians.
See BURGUNDIANS: A. D. 500.
GENEVA: 10th Century.
In the kingdom of Arles.
See BURGUNDY: A. D. 843-933.
GENEVA: A. D. 1401.
Acquisition of the Genevois, or County, by the House of Savoy.
The city surrounded.
See SAVOY: 11TH-15TH CENTURIES.
GENEVA: A. D. 1504-1535.
The emancipation of the city from the Vidomme and the
Prince-Bishop.
Triumph of the Reformation.
"Geneva was nominally a free city of the Empire, but had in
reality been governed for some centuries by its own bishop,
associated with a committee of lay-assessors, and controlled
by the general body of the citizens, in whose hands the
ultimate power of taxation, and of election of the magistrates
and regulation of the police, rested. The prince-bishop did
not exercise his temporal jurisdiction directly, but through
an officer called the Vidomme (vice-dominus), whose rights had
in the 15th century become hereditary in the dukes of Savoy.
These rights appear to have been exercised without any
considerable attempt at encroachment till the beginning of the
following century, when Charles III. succeeded to the ducal
crown (1504). To his ambition the bishop, John, a weak and
willing tool of the Savoy family, to which he was nearly
allied, ceded everything; and the result was a tyrannical
attempt to destroy the liberties of the Genevese. The Assembly
of the citizens rose in arms; a bitter and sanguinary contest
ensued between the Eidgenossen [Confederates] or Patriot party
on the one side, and the Mamelukes or monarchical party on the
other side. By the help of the free Helvetian states,
particularly Berne and Friburg, the Patriots triumphed, the
friends of Savoy were banished, the Vidommate abolished, and
its powers transferred to a board of magistrates. The conduct
of the bishops in this conflict ... helped greatly, as may be
imagined, to shake the old hierarchical authority in Geneva;
and when, in 1532, Farel first made his appearance in the
city, he found a party not indisposed to join him in his eager
and zealous projects of reform. He had a hard fight for it,
however, and was at first obliged to yield, and leave the city
for a time; and it was not till August 1535 that he and Viret
and Froment succeeded in abolishing the mass, and establishing
the Protestant faith."
_J. Tulloch,
Leaders of the Reformation,
pages 161-162._
ALSO IN:
_J. Planta,
History of the Helvetic Confederacy,
book 2, chapter 6 (volume 2)._
_I. Spon,
History of the City and State of Geneva,
book 2._
See, also, SWITZERLAND: A. D. 1531-1648.
GENEVA: A. D. 1536.
The coming of Calvin.
See PAPACY: A. D. 1521-1535.
GENEVA: A. D. 1536-1564.
Calvin's Ecclesiastical State.