The fact was that since the end of the ninth century, monarchy in France had been steadily losing ground. More and more, the sovereign had found himself incapable of fulfilling the social tasks assigned him, especially, what was most important in the eyes of contemporaries, upon whom lawlessness and disorder pressed intolerably, his task of defending and protecting order and security.
It was the height of the peril from the Northmen that Odo was chosen by the barons, who acclaimed in him the hero of the siege of Paris, the one man capable of making head against the pirates. And indeed it seemed just at first as though he would not fall short of the hopes entertained of him. In June 888 he surprised a whole band of Northmen at Montfaucon in the Argonne district. He had a thousand horsemen at most with him, while the Northmen were ten times as numerous. The impetuous onset of his troops overthrew the enemy; he himself fought in the foremost rank and in the thick of the mêlée received a blow from an axe which thrust his helmet back upon his shoulders. Instantly he ran his daring assailant through with his sword, and remained master of the field of battle. But the Northmen returned to the charge. A few weeks later they seized Meaux and threatened Paris. Again Odo hurried up with an army and covered the town. None the less, the Northmen wintered on the banks of the Loing, and in 889 again threatened Paris, when Odo found himself forced to purchase their withdrawal, just as Charles the Fat had done. In November 890 as the Northmen, after ravaging Brittany and the Cotentin, crossed the Seine and marched towards the valley of the Oise, Odo again hastened up to bar their way. He overtook them in the neighbourhood of Guerbigny, not far from Noyon. But the Northmen had a marsh and a brook between them and the king, and the latter was helpless to stay their course. At least he remained with his army on the banks of the Oise to protect the surrounding country. Strongly entrenched in their camp to the south of Noyon, the Northmen spread their ravages far to the north. In the early part of 891 Odo attempted to intercept a band of them returning, laden with booty from Arnulf's kingdom. He hoped to surprise them at Wallers, a few miles from Valenciennes, but once again they escaped him and broke away through the forests, leaving only their spoil in his hands.
Further to the west another contingent might be seen, settled at Amiens, under the leadership of the famous Hasting, in their turn pillaging the country and pushing their ravages as far as Artois. The king's energy shewed signs of slackening; after another failure near Amiens, he allowed himself to be surprised by the enemy in Vermandois where his army was put to flight (end of 891). In 896 he makes no more attempt at resistance, a handful of pirates ravage the banks of the Seine below Paris with impunity, and, ascending the Oise, take up their winter quarters near Compiègne, in the royal "villa" of Choisy-au-Bac.
