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History of the Franks

St Gregory of Tours, tr. Dalton, 1927

Book 4, 51. Of the Death of Sigibert

In this year a blazing fire was seen to traverse the heaven like that already beheld before the death of Lothar.

Sigibert, after taking the cities situated south of Paris, pushed on as far as Rouen, intending to abandon these places to their enemies; but his own men prevented him from doing this. On his return, he entered Paris, where he was rejoined by Brunhild and his sons. Those Franks who were formerly subject to Childebert the elder now sent an embassy to Sigibert, proposing that they should transfer their allegiance from Chilperic, and that he should come among them to be made king. At this news he sent a force to besiege his brother in the aforesaid city,¹ and proposed himself to follow it with all speed. Thereupon the holy bishop Germanus said to him: ‘If thou departest with the intent not to slay thy brother, thou shalt return living and victorious; but if thou hast in thy heart aught else, thou shalt surely die. For so hath the Lord spoken by the mouth of Solomon: “If thou preparest a ditch for thy brother, thou shalt fall therein thyself.” ’² But the king, because of his sinfulness, would not hearken. And when he came to the royal villa named Vitry, the whole army was assembled, and placing him upon a shield,³ they elected him their king. Then two servitors whom Fredegund had bewitched came armed with the strong knives commonly called scramasaxes smeared with poison, and making as though they would speak with him on some matter, struck him from both sides. He uttered a cry, and fell, not long after giving up the ghost.⁴ There, too, fell his chamberlain Charegisel, and there was sorely wounded Sigila, who came long before from the country of the Goths. At a later time he fell into the hands of King Chilperic, when all his joints were burned with red-hot irons, and he ended his life torn limb from limb in cruel torture. Charegisel was no less frivolous in his conduct than serious in his avarice; he rose from a most lowly origin, and became powerful with the king by his flatteries. He was greedy for the wealth of others and tampered with wills; but his own end was such, that death left the thwarter of other men’s intentions no time to fulfil his own.

Chilperic was in perilous case, and knew not whether he might escape, or whether he should perish where he was, when messengers reached him with the news of his brother’s death. He now left Tournay with his queen and sons, arrayed his dead brother, and buried him in the village of Lambres. At a later time the body of Sigibert was removed to the church of the holy Médard at Soissons, which he had himself erected, and there buried by the side of his father Lothar. He died in the fourteenth year of his reign and the fortieth of his age. From the passing of Theudebert the elder to the death of Sigibert are counted twenty-nine years; between the death of Sigibert and that of his nephew Theudebert intervened eighteen days. Sigibert being dead, Childebert his son reigned in his stead.

From the Creation to the Flood were two thousand two hundred and forty-two years. From the Flood to Abraham, nine hundred and forty-two years. From Abraham to the departure of the Children of Israel from Egypt, four hundred and sixty-two years. From the departure of the Children of Israel from Egypt to the building of Solomon’s Temple, four hundred and eighty years. From the building of the Temple to its desolation and the exile into Babylon, three hundred and ninety years. From the exile to the Passion of our Lord, six hundred and sixty-eight years. From the Passion of our Lord to the passing of Saint Martin, four hundred and twelve years. From the passing of Martin to the death of King Clovis, one hundred and twelve years. From the death of King Clovis to the death of Theudebert, thirty-seven years. From the passing of Theudebert to the death of Sigibert, twenty-nine years. The sum of which is five thousand seven hundred and seventy-four years.⁵

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