Remarks:
Clovis I, the Great or "the Riparian", a heroic "barbarian" and pagan (Arian) Chief of the Salian Franks,was 15 years old when he succeeded his father, Childeric, as King of the Salian Franks of Tournai. He eventually was recognized as a ruler by the Gallo-Romans. He brought the other Frankish tribes under his rule, leading the Franks on campaigns that brought all of northern Gaul under his rule by 494, becoming known as the King of Soissons, as the Roman Empire crumbled. He is considered the Merovingian founder of the Frankish kingdom that dominated much of western Europe the early Middle Ages. He consolidated into a single Dominion the Salian Franks along the Northern Rhine River, with the Riparian Franks on the Lower Rhine River. At Soissons in 486, Clovis, capturing the town of Blois, defeated Syagrius, son of Aegidius, the last Roman Governor in Northern Gaul and established his power at least as far south as Paris by 494, subjugating successively the Confederation of Germanic Tribes, the Burgundians, the Arian-Visigoths of Aquitaine, and the Riparian Franks. He married Princess Clothilda of Burgundy, a Catholic, in 492. With great pomp in a ceremony on Christmans Day 496, Bishop (later St.) Regimius of Rheims baptized Clovis with the words: "Bow thy head O Sicambrian. Adore what thou hast burned and burn what thou hast adored." The Sainte Ampoule of Rheims is the vase (ampulla) which, by legend or miracle, was brought from heaven by a dove to provide the missing chrism for the baptismal ceremony. The Sainte Ampoule of Rheims, preserved in the treaury of the cathedral of Rheims, was used for the coronation of the kings of France from Philip Augustus to Charles X. Clovis brought the mass adoption of Christianity to the Frankish kingdom. He made Paris the capital of the Frankish kingdom. In 500 Clovis was involved in a dispute between the Burgundian Kings, Gunobad and Godegisel in which Godegisel betrayed his own brother to Clovis at Dijon. Their niece, Clovis' wife, interceded and though victorious Clovis afterwards made an alliance with Gunobad. In 509 Clovis annexed the Riparian Frankish kingdom of Cologne and succeeded Siegbert and Cloderic, partly by right of birth, partly by popular choice.