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|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 457–486 | |||||||||
![The Kingdom of Soissons in 476[1]](view_image.php?q=Kingdom_of_Soissons&sq=Envato&lang=en&file=File:Map_of_Gaul,_476_AD.png) The Kingdom of Soissons in 476[1] | |||||||||
| Status | Rump state of the Western Roman Empire | ||||||||
| Capital | Noviodunum (modern-day Soissons) | ||||||||
| Official languages | Latin | ||||||||
| Religion | Christianity, Gallo-Roman paganism and Germanic paganism | ||||||||
| Government | Military government under a hereditary monarchy | ||||||||
| Ruler | |||||||||
• 457–464 | Aegidius | ||||||||
• 464–486 | Syagrius | ||||||||
| Historical era | Late Antiquity | ||||||||
• Established | 457 | ||||||||
| 486 | |||||||||
| Area | |||||||||
• Total | 50,000[note 1] km2 (19,000 sq mi) | ||||||||
| Currency | Roman currency | ||||||||
| |||||||||
| Today part of | France | ||||||||
The Kingdom or Domain of Soissons is the historiographical name[2] for the de facto independent Roman[3] remnant of the Diocese of Gaul, which existed during late antiquity as a rump state of the Western Roman Empire until its conquest by the Franks in AD 486. Its capital was at Noviodunum, today the town of Soissons in France.
The rulers of the rump state, notably its final ruler Syagrius, were referred to as "kings of the Romans" (Latin: rex Romanorum) by the Germanic peoples surrounding Soissons, with the polity itself being identified as the Regnum Romanorum, "Kingdom of the Romans", by the Gallo-Roman historian Gregory of Tours. Whether the title of king was used by Syagrius himself or was applied to him by the barbarians surrounding his realm (in a similar way to how they referred to their own leaders as kings) is unknown.[4]
The emergence of a visibly autonomous Roman polity based around Noviodunum can be traced back to the appointment of Aegidius as magister militum of Roman Gaul by Emperor Majorian. When Majorian was killed on the orders of Ricimer in 461, Aegidius maintained his own power in the remnants of Roman Gaul against Franks to his east and Visigoths to his south.
Aegidius died in 464 or 465. His son Syagrius succeeded to the rule. In 486, Syagrius lost the Battle of Soissons to the Frankish king Clovis I and the domain was thereafter under the control of the Franks.
- ^ Bachrach, Bernard S. (1972). Merovingian Military Organization, 481–751. University of Minnesota Press. p. 3. ISBN 9780816657001.
By 481 the two peoples competing for predominance in this territory were the Visigoths in southwestern Gaul and the Burgundians in the southeast. Among the lesser groups contending for power were the Armorici (a loose confederation of Gallo-Romans, Britons, Alans, and erstwhile imperial soldiers with their families), who lived in the area between the Seine and the Loire. To the north, between the Seine and the Somme, was Syagrius's Roman kingdom of Soissons and to the east along the upper Rhine were settlements of Alamans. North of these was a small band of Thuringians. The remainder of the Rhineland and the area to the west were ruled by Frankish reguli or chieftains, who, with their warbands, were settled around Tournai, Cambrai, Cologne, and the other cities of the region.
- ^ Gajdzis, Krystian (2022-07-25). "The Romans Who Outlasted Their Empire". The History Inquiry. Retrieved 2023-11-09.
It should also be noted that the label of 'Kingdom' was a later historical invention meant to differentiate Aegidius' rump state from the remainder of the Western Roman Empire.
- ^ MacGeorge, Penny (2002). Late Roman Warlords. Oxford University Press. pp. 111–113. ISBN 0-19-925244-0. Retrieved September 23, 2013.
... he and his kingdom were recognisably Roman ...
- ^ Fanning, S. (1992). "Emperors and empires in fifth-century Gaul". In Drinkwater, John; Elton, Hugh (eds.). Fifth-Century Gaul: A Crisis of Identity?. Cambridge University Press. pp. 288–297.
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