CLOVIS, king of the Franks. — He was of royal stock and belonged to the tribe of the Salian Franks; he was born in 446, and at the age of fifteen he was already king. Reared in the pagan religion, he converted to Christianity after a battle against the Alemanni. He was baptized by St. Remigius, bishop of Reims, on 25 December 498 or 499. The act was certainly determined, in addition to personal motives and the influence of his wife, the most pious Clotilde, by political considerations, and it enabled the king to have the entire Roman population of Gaul at his side; between the two peoples there was no separation as elsewhere, but they enjoyed equal rights and all entered the army. Thus Clovis was able to achieve many conquests, especially that of the Visigothic kingdom, occupying even the capital Toulouse. He obtained from Byzantium the title of consul; with Theodoric, king of the Goths residing in Italy, he had many conflicts resolved with varying fortunes.
Clovis died in 511. He was a rough, primitive, violent man; he killed with his own hand anyone who stood in his way; he was driven by a lust for power; even in his religious sentiment he was impulsive and intolerant. Yet precisely for this reason he well expressed the character of the new forces in society and anticipated the outcome of the medieval work, which consisted in the fusion of Romans and barbarians within the bosom of the Catholic Church.