Henry[a] (died 28 August 886) was the leading military commander of the last years of theCarolingian Empire. He was commander-in-chief under KingsLouis the Younger andCharles the Fat. His early career was mostly restricted toEast Francia, his homeland, but after Charles inheritedWest Francia in 884 he was increasingly active there. During his time, raids by theVikings (mainlyDanes) peaked in Francia. The sources describe at least eight separate campaigns waged by Henry against the Vikings, most of them successful.
Henry is described in the sources as aSaxon,Frank orThuringian. His title is given variously ascount (Latincomes),margrave (marchensis) orduke (dux). The territory he governed is described variously in the sources asFrancia,Neustria orAustrasia, perhaps indicating that his military command covered most of the north of the empire from theBreton March in the west toFrisia andSaxony in the east.
Henry's family has been called thePopponids because the name Poppo was particularly common among them.[1] The Popponids later came to be better known as the (Elder) House ofBabenberg. It is speculated that he was a son of CountPoppo of Grapfeld,[2] or perhaps of Poppo's son, Christian I of Grapfeld, and his wife, Heilwig.[3] His brother wasPoppo, Duke of Thuringia.[4] The Popponids were probably related to theHattonids, and Henry may have "inherited" his positions in Saxony (fromBanzleib) and in Austrasia (from Banzleib's brother Adalbert).[3]
Henry's wife was possibly Ingeltrude, the daughter ofEberhard of Friuli; a memorial book of theabbey of Reichenau names a Henry (Heimirich) and an Ingeltrude (Engildrud) side by side.[5]
Henry had three sons, and probably at least one daughter. His sons all died during the so-calledBabenberg feud with the rivalConradine family:[6][7]
Widukind of Corvey calls Adalbert a "close relative through his sister" of KingHenry I of Germany, which led Emil Kimpen to conclude that Henry I's mother,Hathui (Hedwig, Hadewig), was Adalbert's sister and Duke Henry's daughter. This suggestion has been widely accepted, not least because it explains the adoption of the name Henry by Henry I's family, theLiudolfings.[1] In this case, it is through Duke Henry that the name ultimately entered the East Frankish (German) and West Frankish (French) royal families, theOttonians andCapetians. Hathui married DukeOtto of Saxony. Their son, Henry I, had a daughter,Hedwig, named after her grandmother, who marriedHugh the Great and became the mother ofHenry I, Duke of Burgundy, and great-grandmother of KingHenry I of France.[8][7]
TheHouse of Babenberg, which governed theMarch of Austria from 976 until 1246, is generally regarded as descending from the Popponids, possibly through an unnamed daughter of Henry. The names of the children (Henry,Ernest,Poppo,Adalbert and Leopold) of the first known Babenberger, MargraveLeopold I, are strongly suggestive of a link with Henry.[9]
Henry is described byAbbo Cernuus in hisBella Parisiacae urbis as aSaxon. It is more likely he was aThuringian.[10]
Henry is described by theAnnals of Fulda as the "leader of the army" (princeps militiae) of Louis the Younger when the latter rebelled against his father, KingLouis the German, in 866. Louis was joined in his revolt by his younger brother, Charles the Fat. The brothers may have been upset by the grant ofBavaria to their older brother,Carloman, as a sub-kingdom in 864. During the short revolt, Louis sent Henry on a mission to DukeRastislav of Moravia. The rebellion was soon patched up, however, and Louis receivedSaxony as a sub-kingdom, while Charles gotAlemannia.[11]
In 871, a Saxon vassal of Henry's was blinded on the orders of Louis the German, which prompted Louis the Younger and Charles to temporarily cut off relations with their father in solidarity with Henry.[12][13] Nothing is known of Henry's reaction to this incident.[14] It has been suggested that Louis the German took advantage of his sons' insubordination to remove Henry from power in Saxony and replace him with DukeBruno (brother of the aforementioned Otto, who probably married Henry's daughter).[15]
In 876, Louis the German died and his sons became kings in full in their respective sub-kingdoms. Henry remained in the service of Louis the Younger. In 880, he was sent with CountAdalhard of Metz to make war on CountTheobald of Arles, the chief commander of the army ofHugh of Lotharingia, Louis's second cousin who had been excluded from the succession. According to theAnnals of Fulda, Henry won a "bloody victory". The victorious army then joined the rest of Louis the Younger's forces and marched onMâcon, which they took from the rebel leaderBoso, who had made himself king inBurgundy and Provence in opposition to the Carolingians.[16]
Louis the Younger died in January 882 and was succeeded by Charles the Fat, who was made Emperor of the Carolingian realm the year before and reunited the East Frankish kingdom of his father Louis the German. Under Charles, Henry's career was a succession of battles with Viking raiders. Charles almost immediately sent Henry with an army tobesiege Asselt, where an army of Vikings was encamped. According to theAnnals of Fulda, Henry and Charles's nephewArnulf led the advance guard, with Henry in charge of theFrankish contingent and Arnulf leading theBavarian troops.[17] Charles arrived with the main force in May 882.[18]
Having received oaths from the Viking leaders, the siege of Asselt was considered a success and the Frankish army withdrew. After spending some time at his Christmas court in 882, the emperor sent Henry against some Vikings who had raidedDeventer. According to theAnnals of Fulda, Henry "settled matters as well as he could, and returned."[19] In late 883, Henry marched against the Vikings again, inflicting severe losses on them. According to theAnnals of Fulda, "it is said that not one escaped". Henry, however, was wounded in the fighting.[20]
In 884, Henry won two more victories over the Vikings, slaughtering them "wherever they wanted to go to plunder", according to the annalist of Fulda. Some Vikings who had been harrying West Francia then overwintered in theHesbaye in 884–85. In early 885, Henry and ArchbishopLiutbert of Mainz surprised them in their camp. The survivors fled by night, leaving their plunder behind.[21] Henry and Liutbert are the most prominent men (after the Carolingian kings) in the latter part of the Mainz recension of theAnnals of Fulda. This is probably because its author was a partisan of Louis the Younger, as Henry and Liutbert had been Louis's chief advisors.[22]
In 885,Godfrid, one of the Viking leaders at Asselt who had sworn oaths to Charles, taken baptism and receivedFrisia, was accused of plotting with the emperor’s cousin Hugh to seizeLotharingia. Henry tricked him into a meeting and killed him with his followers.[13][7] According to theAnnals of Saint-Vaast, one of Godfrid's followers,Gerolf, defected and plotted Godfrid's downfall with Henry.[23] Henry then captured Hugh atGondreville and handed him over to the emperor, who had him blinded and imprisoned in themonastery of Saint Gall.[24]
In 885, a large Viking forcelaid siege to Paris. The defence of the city fell to BishopJoscelin and CountOdo. According to theAnnals of Saint-Vaast, after the Vikings destroyed one of Paris's towers, Joscelin sent CountErkenger of Melun to East Francia with specific instructions to ask Henry to come with an army.[23]
As a result, in 886 Henry led the first army to relieve the siege. it was in the field from 9 February until 1 May, but its only actions were skirmishes with Vikings who occasionally strayed too far from their fortifications. By July, Charles himself was leading a huge army towards Paris. Henry was again sent off with an advance guard while the emperor was still atMetz. It was during this expedition that Henry's horse fell into a trap nearQuierzy and he was cut off from his men and killed on 28 August. The same basic account of Henry's death is found in theAnnals of Saint-Vaast, the chronicle ofRegino of Prüm and theAnnals of Fulda.[25]
The deaths of Hugh and Henry in August placed Count Odo in a preeminent position in West Francia. While writers looking back tended to see him as succeeding his brotherRobert the Strong directly, he did not in fact do so. Rather, the sudden deaths of Hugh and Henry followed by that of the Emperor Charles less than two years later left a vacuum in the West that Odo was able to take advantage of to have himself elected king in 888.[26]
TheAnnals of Fulda appear to assign blame for Henry's death when recording that he was "abandoned by his men".[25] Regino records that Henry was buried in theAbbey of Saint-Médard de Soissons. An eight-distich epitaph for Henry was added by an eleventh-century hand to a copy of Regino's chronicle. A marginal note[b] beside Regino's account of Henry's death directs the reader to the epitaph, which appears at the end of the manuscript.[27][c]
By 871, according to theAnnals of Fulda, Henry was acount (Latincomes), a title the annalist prefers for him until the end of his life, even after he had attained higher rank. By contrast, Regino of Prüm, usually calls Henry aduke (dux), a title implying military command and the control of territory much larger than a county.[12][13] Under the year 885, theAnnals of Saint Vaast call Henry the Duke of the Austrasians (dux Austrasiorum).[23]
TheAnnals of Fulda describe Henry in 886 as "the margrave of the Franks, who held Neustria at that time" (marchensis Francorum, qui in id tempus Niustriam tenuit).[29] This has been interpreted as "a generalised military responsibility which included Neustria".[26]Karl Ferdinand Werner goes further, saying that "in all the Frankish kingdoms properly so-called," that is, in Austrasia, Neustria andFranconia,[d] "Charles gave all powers to his commander-in-chief Henry."[8]
On the other hand,Donald Jackman sees Henry's final command as restricted to Neustria proper, where he succeededHugh the Abbot after the latter's death on 12 May 886.[15] According to Henry's epitaph, he was "triarch" (triarchos) of the Saxons, Franks and Frisians, which may mean that he ruled over them simultaneously or in succession. Rule over Frisia may have indicated in fact a march in western Saxony bordering Frisia.[3] Jackman favours three successive marcher commands for Duke Henry, while Matthias Becher suggests thattriarchos is a corruption oftrimarchio (three-times margrave) under the influence ofdemarchus (people-ruler) and indicates that Henry acquired multiple marches simultaneously. There is no question that Henry in the reign of Charles the Fat was second only to the king in power.[30]
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