killed in 807,
in a battle against Gerold, Duke of Suabia, and his tomb is still to be
seen at Ratisbon. Several families of Germany hold him for their
ancestor; and some French genealogists have, without solid ground,
discovered in him the grandfather of Robert the Strong,
great-grandfather of Hugh Capet. However that may be, after making
peace with Wittikind, Charlemagne had still, for several years, many
insurrections to repress and much rigor to exercise in Saxony, including
the removal of certain Saxon peoplets out of their country, and the
establishment of foreign colonists in the territories thus become
vacant; but the great war was at an end, and Charlemagne might consider
Saxony incorporated in his dominions.

He had still, in Germany and all around, many enemies to fight and many
campaigns to reopen. Even among the Germanic populations, which were
regarded as reduced under the sway of the King of the Franks, some, the
Frisians and Saxons, as well as others, were continually agitating for
the recovery of their independence. Farther off, toward the north, east,
and south, people differing in origin and language--Avars, Huns,
Slavons, Bulgarians, Danes, and Northmen--were still pressing or
beginning to press upon the frontiers of the Frankish dominion, for the
purpose of either penetrating within or settling at the threshold as
powerful and formidable neighbors. Charlemagne had plenty to do, with
the view at one time of checking their incursions, and at another of
destroying or hurling back to a distance their settlements; and he
brought his usual vigor and perseverance to bear on this second
struggle. But by the conquest of Saxony he had attained his direct
national object: the great flood of population from east to west came,
and broke against the Gallo-Franco-Germanic dominion as against an
insurmountable rampart.

This was not, however, Charlemagne's only great enterprise at this
epoch, nor the only great struggle he had to maintain. While he was
incessantly fighting in Germany, the work of policy commenced by his
father Pepin in Italy called for his care and his exertions. The new
King of the Lombards, Didier, and the new Pope, Adrian I, had entered
upon a new war; and Didier was besieging Rome, which was energetically
defended by the Pope and its inhabitants. In 773, Adrian invoked the aid
of the King of the Franks, whom his envoys succeeded, not without
difficulty, in finding at Thionville. Charlemagne c