EARLY   MEDIAEVAL   WARS
Gregory of Tours. Suffice it to say that he reduced
and annexed the 'Kingdom of Syagrius* (a.d. 486);
that he crushed and expelled the Alemans in two
tremendous wars (a.d. 496 and 505-507); that he
drove the Visigoths wholly out of Gaul, save for
the narrow strip of Mediterranean coast known as
Septimania, thus acquiring the vast region between
the Loire and the Pyrenees; and that, finally,
shortly before his death, by a complicated process
of double-dealing and assassination, he established
his authority over Ripuarian as well as Salian
Franks. Gregory of Tours, having duly recorded
the list of Clovis's perfidies and atrocities, makes
the remark, strange for even a sixth-century bishop:
'Thus day by day God brought low his enemies
before him, so that they submitted to him, and
increased his Kingdom, because he walked before
Him with an upright heart and did that which was
pleasing in His sight/
The ground for Gregory's amazing eulogy was
that Clovis in a.d. 496 had professed conversion from
Paganism to Catholic Christianity.* In this politic
move Clovis displayed high statesmanly wisdom.
The Prankish conquerors of Gaul were singularly
few in numbers compared with the multitudes of
the peoples whom they subdued. Clovis realised
* Clovis was at this time the only Catholic king in existence I
The other Barbarian monarchs were either Pagan or Arian; the
Byzantine Emperor was a Monophysite heretic.
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