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History of the Franks

St Gregory of Tours, tr. Dalton, 1927

Book 10, 19. Concerning the Expulsion of Egidius, Bishop of Reims

Sunnegisil¹ was once more delivered over to torture, and was daily flogged with rods and thongs. His wounds festered; but, as soon as the matter passed away and they began to close, they were reopened to renew his suffering. Under these torments he confessed himself guilty not only of the attempt to kill Childebert,² but of divers other crimes. In these confessions he even added that Egidius, bishop of Reims, had been the accomplice of Rauching, Ursio, and Berthefred in their plot to kill King Childebert.³ The bishop was instantly arrested and taken to Metz, though he was at the time much enfeebled by a long sickness. There he was kept in durance while the king ordered the bishops to be summoned to examine him; they were to meet at Verdun at the beginning of October. The king was blamed by the other bishops for having ordered this man to be carried off from his city and kept in durance without a hearing; whereupon he suffered Egidius to return to his city, but issued letters, as I have said, to all the bishops of his kingdom, requiring them to attend in the middle of November at the aforesaid city to deliberate upon the matter. It was a season of heavy and unceasing rains, the cold was unbearable, the roads were deep in mire, and the rivers overflowed their banks; but there might be no disobeying the king’s command. They met, and were obliged to go on to Metz, whither also the aforesaid Egidius was now present.

The king then declared him his enemy and a traitor to the country, and deputed the conduct of the prosecution to the ex-duke Ennodius.⁴ The duke’s first question was this: ‘Tell me, O bishop: with what aim didst thou forsake our king, in whose city thou didst enjoy episcopal dignity, to submit thee to the favour of Chilperic, who was ever proven the foe of our lord and king, who slew our lord’s father,⁵ condemned his mother⁶ to banishment, and overran his kingdom? How cometh it that in the very cities which, as I have said, he usurped by unjust invasion, thou didst receive at his hands a grant of domain lands?’ Egidius answered: ‘That I was the friend of King Chilperic I may not deny, but this friendship never grew to the prejudice of King Childebert. The estates⁷ of which thou speakest I received by deeds of gift from this my king.’ At this he openly produced them, but the king denied having granted them. Otto, referendary at the time, was now summoned; the documents bore a studied signature, and when he came he denied that it was written by him: in the execution of the document his handwriting had been counterfeited. On this charge the bishop was found guilty of deception. Next, letters of his to Chilperic were produced, in which were contained many offensive remarks about Queen Brunhild, likewise letters of Chilperic to the bishop, in which, among other things, the following passage occurred: ‘If the root of anything be not cut, the stalk that springeth from the earth will not wither.’ Here it was clearly the writer’s meaning that Brunhild must first be overcome and her son then struck down. The bishop denied that any such letters had been sent by him in his own name or that he had received any such answers from Chilperic. But a confidential servant of his was called who had preserved shorthand copies of the letters in the volumes of the bishop’s documents, so that there remained no doubt in the judges’ minds that they were sent by the accused. Further, agreements were produced purporting to be in the names of Kings Childebert and Chilperic, wherein it was written that after dethroning King Guntram they should divide his kingdom and his cities among themselves.⁸ The king denied that he was privy to any agreement of the kind, and cried: ‘Thou didst set my uncles against each other to the stirring up of civil war, whence it came that an army was set on foot, and the city of Bourges, the district of Étampes, and the town of Châteaumeillant were all laid waste and destroyed. In which war many were slain, whose souls, I trow, God’s judgement shall require at thy hands.’ This charge the bishop was unable to refute. For the documents were discovered together in one of the cases for papers in the muniment room of King Chilperic, and had passed into King Childebert’s possession after Chilperic’s death, when he took delivery of the treasures removed from Chelles, the royal estate in the territory of Paris.⁹ The discussion of these points was dragging out its tedious course when Epiphanius the abbot of the church of the holy Remigius, appeared, and gave evidence that Egidius had received two thousand pieces of gold and many things of price to keep him constant in his attachment to King Chilperic’s cause. Envoys who had been sent with the bishop to the aforesaid King Chilperic also gave evidence, saying: ‘He left us, and conferred for a long time alone with the king; we knew nothing of the purport of their conference until afterwards, when we learned of the above-mentioned devastation.’ The bishop denying these charges, the abbot, who had always been privy to his secret designs, named the place where the gold pieces were delivered, and the person who conveyed them. He narrated all in detail, just as it happened, exposing the plot for the destruction of King Guntram himself and of his kingdom. Convicted on these heads, Egidius now confessed his guilt. When the bishops summoned to judge him heard that, and saw that one of the Lord’s bishops had made himself the abettor of so many and great offences, they were sore afflicted, and begged a space of three days to take counsel together. They hoped that perchance Egidius, coming to his right mind, might find some means of clearing himself of the charges brought against him. On the morning of the third day they went in a body to the church, and asked the bishop, if he had any excuse, to declare it. But he in trouble of soul made answer: ‘Delay no longer to pass sentence on a guilty man. I confess that I deserve death on the charge of high treason, for I have ever opposed the interests of the king and his mother, and by my counsel again and again were waged wars which devastated many parts of Gaul.’ When they heard this the bishops bewailed the disgrace which had befallen their brother, and, though they succeeded in saving his life, they removed him from the priesthood, reading after from the canons the sanctions relating to his crimes. He was straightway taken to Argentoratum, now called Strasbourg,¹⁰ and condemned to exile, while Romulf, son of Duke Lupus,¹¹ already in priest’s orders, succeeded to his dignity; Epiphanius was removed from his functions as abbot of the church of the holy Remigius. Great weight of gold and silver was found in the treasure of Egidius. All that was the fruit of his own wicked schemes was removed to the royal treasury; but all the sums derived from dues and other sources of Church revenue was left untouched.

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