Austrasia in the context of "Metz"

The Saxons, sometimes called the Old Saxons or Continental Saxons, were a Germanic people of early medieval "Old" Saxony (Latin: Antiqua Saxonia) which became a Carolingian "stem duchy" in 804, in what is now northern Germany, between the lower Rhine and Elbe rivers. Many of their neighbours were, like them, speakers of West Germanic dialects, including both the Franks and Thuringians to the south, and the coastal Frisians and Angles to the north who were among the peoples who were originally referred to as "Saxons" in the context of early raiding and settlements in Roman Britain and Gaul. To their east were Obotrites and other Slavic-speaking peoples.

The political history of these continental Saxons is unclear until the 8th century and the conflict between their semi-legendary hero Widukind and the Frankish emperor Charlemagne. They do not appear to have been politically united until the generations of conflict leading up to that defeat, before which they were reportedly ruled by regional "satraps". Previous Frankish rulers of Austrasia, both Merovingian and Carolingian, fought numerous campaigns against Saxons, both in the west near the Lippe, Ems and Weser, and further east, near Thuringia and Bohemia, including the area which later medieval sources referred to as "North Swabia". Charlemagne conquered all the Saxons after winning the long Saxon Wars (772–804 AD) and forced them to convert to Christianity, annexing Saxony into the Carolingian domain. Under the Carolingian Franks, Saxony became a single duchy, fitting it within the basic political structure of the later Holy Roman Empire. The early rulers of this Duchy of Saxony expanded their territories—and therefore those of the Holy Roman Empire—to the east, at the expense of Slavic-speaking Wends.

The Pippinids and the Arnulfings were two Frankish aristocratic families from Austrasia during the Merovingian period. They dominated the office of mayor of the palace after 687 and eventually supplanted the Merovingians as kings in 751, founding the Carolingian dynasty.

The names "Pippinid" and "Arnulfing" are modern conventions, reflecting the families' descent from two contemporaries, Arnulf of Metz (died c. 640) and Pippin of Landen (died 640). The recurrence of the leading name Pippin in the family led the anonymous author of the Annals of Metz (c. 805) to call the family Pippinios, the earliest known designation for the family. In a strict sense, the Pippinids are the descendants of Pippin of Landen and the Arnulfings those of Arnulf of Metz. These groups only overlap via the marriage of Arnulf's son Ansegisel and Pippin's daughter Begga and their son, Pippin of Herstal and his descendants.

Under the Merovingian dynasty, the mayor of the palace or majordomo,(Latin: maior palatii or maior domus) was the manager of the household of the Frankish king. He was the head of the Merovingian administrative ladder and orchestrated the operation of the entire court. He was appointed by the king from among the magnates, the most powerful families. Austrasia, Neustria and Burgundy had their own mayor of the palace. After Chlothar II, who ruled over the entire Frankish Kingdom, had ordered the execution of Warnachar, the mayor of Burgundy, the magnates of Burgundy declared in 626 not to want their own mayor anymore. This declaration marks the effective end of the Burgundian court and the beginning of the Neustrian-Burgundian political alliance against Austrasian influence. The Austrasian magnates revolted and the Battle of Tertry of 687 became the Austrasian victory with Pepin of Herstal as their leader and the new mayor of the palace.

During the second half of the seventh century, the office evolved into the "power behind the throne". At that time the mayor of the palace held and wielded the real and effective power to make decisions affecting the kingdom, while the kings were increasingly reduced to performing merely ceremonial functions, which made them little more than figureheads (rois fainéants, 'do-nothing kings'). The office may be compared to that of the peshwa, shōgun, sarvadhikari, or prime minister, all of which have similarly been the real powers behind some ceremonial monarchs.

Pepin the Short (Latin: Pipinus; French: Pépin le Bref; German: Pippin der Kurze; c. 714 – 24 September 768) was King of the Franks from 751 until his death in 768. He was the first Carolingian to become king.

Pepin was the son of the Frankish prince Charles Martel and his wife Rotrude. Pepin's upbringing was distinguished by the ecclesiastical education he had received from the Christian monks of the Abbey Church of St. Denis, near Paris. In 741, after Pepin and his older brother Carloman besieged their half-brother Grifo (who did not accept their father's plans for succession) at Laon and imprisoned him in a monastery, he and Carloman succeeded their father as the Mayor of the Palace; In effect, Pepin reigned over Francia jointly with his elder brother, Carloman. Pepin ruled in Neustria, Burgundy, and Provence, while his older brother Carloman established himself in Austrasia, Alemannia, and Thuringia. The brothers were active in suppressing revolts led by the Bavarians, Aquitanians, Saxons, and the Alemanni in the early years of their reign. In 743, they ended the Frankish Interregnum [fr] by choosing Childeric III, who was to be the last Merovingian monarch, as figurehead King of the Franks.

Brunhilda (c. 543 – 613) was queen consort of Austrasia, part of Francia, by marriage to the Merovingian king Sigebert I of Austrasia, and regent for her son, grandson and great-grandson.

In her long and complicated career she ruled the eastern Frankish kingdoms of Austrasia and Burgundy for three periods as regent for her son Childebert II from 575 until 583; her grandsons Theudebert II and Theuderic II from 595 until 599; and her great-grandson Sigebert II in 613. The period was marked by tension between the royal house and the powerful nobles vying for power.

Lotharingia was a historical region and an early medieval polity that existed during the late Carolingian and early Ottonian, from the middle of the 9th to the middle of the 10th century. It was established in 855 by the Treaty of Prüm as a distinct kingdom within the Carolingian Empire, but abolished already in 869-870 when it was divided by the Treaty of Meerssen. It was territorially reunited in 880 by the Treaty of Ribemont, and reestablished as a kingdom from 895 to 900. Since 903 it was organized as a duchy, which existed up to 959, when it was divided into two distinct duchies: Upper Lotharingia (southern half), and Lower Lotharingia (northern half). The regional name Lotharingia means, approximately, "the land of Lothair", and was derived from the name of its first ruler, king Lothair II, who received this territory as his share of the Kingdom of Middle Francia. The region comprised present-day Lorraine (France), Luxembourg, parts of modern Germany west of the Rhine, most of Belgium, and the Netherlands.

Lotharingia resulted from the tripartite division in 855 of the kingdom of Middle Francia, which itself was formed after the threefold division of the Carolingian Empire by the Treaty of Verdun of 843. Conflict between East and West Francia over Lotharingia was based on the fact that these were the old Frankish homelands of Austrasia, so possession of them was a matter of great prestige to their kings as true claimant of Frankish imperial legacy.

Carloman (between 706 and 716 – 17 August 754) was the eldest son of Charles Martel, mayor of the palace and duke of the Franks, and his wife Chrotrud of Treves. On Charles's death (741), Carloman and his brother Pepin the Short succeeded to their father's legal positions, Carloman in Austrasia, and Pepin in Neustria. He was a member of the family later called the Carolingians and it can be argued that he was instrumental in consolidating their power at the expense of the ruling Merovingian kings of the Franks. He withdrew from public life in 747 to take up the monastic habit, "the first of a new type of saintly king", according to Norman Cantor, "more interested in religious devotion than royal power, who frequently appeared in the following three centuries and who was an indication of the growing impact of Christian piety on Germanic society".