Page:The history of medieval Europe.djvu/157

GERMAN KINGDOMS IN THE WEST 121 established a truly absolute monarchy and alone among the German monarchs was strong enough to establish a direct male hereditary succession to the throne. He also forced the surrounding Moorish tribes to remain quiet, although they had previously made the Roman Empire a deal of trouble and were to resume their raids after his death. Theodoric, the East Goth, whom we have already had occasion to mention many times, was another dominant personality who wisely regulated affairs, not only in his own kingdom, but in some of the neighboring states, and who made marriage alliances with all four of the leading German states of his time, Vandals, Visigoths, Franks, and Burgundians. Clovis was another great king who, though inferior to Theodoric as a statesman, built up the Frankish power by his conquests. That power, however, was dimin- ished under his successors by the Frankish practice of equal division of the kingdom among all the sons of the previous ruler, who then usually fought and plotted against one another, or were frequently assassinated by some one else. One poor king made a public speech requesting intending assassins kindly to postpone their attacks for two or three years longer, until there should be some one old enough to succeed him. Among the Visigoths, too, especially after I the transfer of their rule to Spain, kings were murdered j at a rapid rate and the unruly Gothic nobles were very j obstreperous, although the monarchs tried to discourage I conspiracies by atrociously cruel punishments. These kings were usually glad to continue such Roman j administrative machinery as they found still in existence. The Vandals kept the old divisions into provinces Retention f and left many important offices in the hands of Roman ad- t. t-. ..-..« r ministration Romans. Roman municipalities and governors 01 provinces continued in southwestern Gaul under Visigothic rule. Theodoric was deferential to the Roman senate, still appointed consuls, and at his palace at Ravenna had a court much like that of Constantinople. The Frankish Kingdom, which developed later than the others, retained less of Roman methods of government. As a rule taxation,