Fredegar (Pseudo)

FREDEGARIO (PSEUDO). — Under this name, no older than the sixteenth century (it is thought to be either the Latin form of the surname of the humanist Freher or an invention of the historian Goldast), it has been agreed to designate a Chronicle of the Franks extending from 584 to 652, followed by several chapters concerning general history, which comes to an end around 660 (ed. Br. Krusch, in MGH, Scriptores verum Merovingicarum, II, pp. 18–193). Three anonymous authors worked on it, two of Burgundian origin (the first, very well acquainted with the events he recounts, stops in 613 or 616; the second in 642) and one of Austrasian origin. The only thing they have in common is their exceedingly barbarous language. Despite the partisanship found in it, this Chronicle is a first-rate source for Merovingian history. In the manuscripts that contain it, it forms part of a collection comprising the chronicles of St. Jerome and of Hydatius, the Liber generationis, the chronicle of Isidore of Seville, the Historia epitomata, and finally, in sixth place (Cheltenham manuscript of Berlin: In Nomine Domini Jhesu Christi, incipit Chronica sexta) or in fourth place (Paris manuscript: Incipium capetolaris cronica libri quarti), the chronicle of F. himself. The Chronicle of pseudo-F. was subsequently continued to 768 by various authors and carried on by the Royal Annals to 829.