thern Europe, Charlemagne conducted thirty-one campaigns
against the Saxons, Frisons, Bavarians, Avars, Slavons, and Danes; in
Italy, five against the Lombards; in Spain, Corsica, and Sardinia, twelve
against the Arabs; two against the Greeks; and three in Gaul itself,
against the Aquitanians and the Britons; in all, fifty-three expeditions;
amongst which those he undertook against the Saxons, the Lombards, and
the Arabs, were long and difficult wars. It is undesirable to recount
them in detail, for the relation would be monotonous and useless; but it
is obligatory to make fully known their causes, their characteristic
incidents, and their results.

It has already been seen that, under the last Merovingian kings, the
Saxons were, on the right bank of the Rhine, in frequent collision with
the Franks, especially with the Austrasian Franks, whose territory they
were continually threatening and often invading. Pepin the Short had
more than once hurled them back far from the very uncertain frontiers of
Germanic Austrasia; and, on becoming king, he dealt his blows still
farther, and entered, in his turn, Saxony itself. "In spite of the
Saxons' stout resistance," says Eginhard (_Annales,_ t. i., p. 135), "he
pierced through the points they had fortified to bar entrance into their
country, and, after having fought here and there battles wherein fell
many Saxons, he forced them to promise that they would submit to his
rule; and that, every year, to do him honor, they would send to the
general assembly of the Franks a present of three hundred horses. When
these conventions were once settled, he insisted, to insure their
performance, upon placing them under the guarantee of rites peculiar to
the Saxons; then he returned with his army to Gaul."

[Illustration: Charlemagne at the Head of his Army----212]

Charlemagne did not confine himself to resuming his father's work; he
before long changed its character and its scope. In 772, being left sole
master of France after the death of his brother Carloman, he convoked at
Worms the general assembly of the Franks, "and took," says Eginhard, "the
resolution of going and carrying war into Saxony. He invaded it without
delay, laid it waste with fire and sword, made himself master of the fort
of Ehresburg, and threw down the idol that the Saxons called _Irminsul_."
And in what place was this first victory of Charlemagne won? Near the
sources of the Lippe, just where, more than seven c