Balthild of Francia

"Slave, Merovingian queen, regent, and banished widow, Queen Balthild (d. 680) was a Catholic saint to the French, and murderer and "Jezebel" to the English. She was an important figure in her time. Yet, because of the remote time period, and the specialized nature of the sources, she is little known outside the field of Merovingian studies. This book (Balthild of Francia) seeks to remedy that obscurity through a cultural biography that explores the life and times of a queen who lived at the end of the late Roman era when the Frankish elite were connected by trade, religion, and political aspirations to the Mediterranean and Byzantine world. Balthild was a slave bought for a "low price" who, as queen regent, prohibited the slave trade in her kingdom and undertook policies aimed at mitigating the suffering of those who, like herself, had suffered dislocation from home and the lack of protection. The documentary and material sources for the life and times of this seventh-century queen are exceptionally well preserved. Indeed, as a result of new scientific methods and new approaches to archaeology, she is someone about whose life and environment we continue to know more"--