Fredegarius (fl. 7th century AD)

Encyclopædia Orbis Latini

Fredegarius is the supposed author of a chronicle of Frankish history composed between 658 and 661. All the extant manuscripts of this chronicle are anonymous, and the attribution of it to "Fredegarius" dates from the edition of it by Claude Fauchet in 1579. The author set a fairly detailed history of his own times in the framework of a universal chronicle, drawing, for early Merovingian times, on information derived from the Historia Francorum of Gregory of Tours, which ends at the year 591, three years before Gregory's death. After 584 the so-called Fredegarius is an original source for events in the Frankish kingdoms until 642. Though written in barbarous Latin and excessively dull, it is of great importance because the author was writing of contemporary happenings and the chronicle is almost the sole literary source for this period. Differing hypotheses have been put forward concerning the nationality and career of the author; most students of the text consider him to be of Burgundian origin, but some suggest that he spent much of his life in Austrasia or at any rate that his sympathies were with the Austrasian mayors of the palace; others believe that he became an important official at the Neustrian court of Clotaire II.