waterways, dominating the trade and commerce of the region. The cités provided the
political, social, economic, and religious focus for the Frankish kingdom. In Gaul, most
of the cités that the Romans had not walled disappeared by the end of the 6th century.
In the Merovingian kingdoms, the cités were the centers of royal administration. From
these cities, the counts (comites), supported by garrisons of troops, presided over the local
administration for the kings, collecting taxes, administering justice, and assembling the
local levies for the royal army while also keeping a close eye on the powerful bishop.
Most of the royal mints were also located in these cities. Church life was focused on the
cité. It was the residence of the bishop and his assisting clergy, the home of the major
churches and the site of the major cults of the saints, whose festivals provided a strong
sense of cohesion for the surrounding population. Down to the mid-7th century, the
Merovingian kings resided in the cités, especially Paris, Rouen, Metz, Soissons, Tours,
and Orléans, which were the centers of their political activity.
Despite the overwhelmingly rural character of the population of the Frankish kingdom
as a whole, the cities exercised a preponderant role in its affairs. The control of the small
enclosed cities meant the control of the political, military, and ecclesiastical centers of
life, and warfare in this period was concerned largely with the capture and holding of the
cités.
Steven Fanning
[See also: BASTIDE; BOURGEOISIE; COMMUNE; TOWNS]
Bullough, Donald A. “Social and Economic Structure and Topography in the Early Medieval City.”
Settimane di studio del Centro Italiano di Studi sull’Alto Medioevo 21(1974): 351–99.
Ewig, Eugen. “Résidence et capitale pendant le haut moyen âge.” In Spätantikes und fränkisches
Gallien, Gesammelte Schriften (952–1973), ed. Harmut Atsma. 2 vols. Zurich and Munich:
Artemis, 1976, pp. 383–89.
James, Edward. The Origins of France from Clovis to the Capetians 500–1000. New York: St.
Martin, 1982.
Wood, Ian N. “Early Medieval Devotion in Town and Country.” In The Church in Town and
Countryside, ed. Derek Baker. Oxford: Blackwell, 1979, pp. 61–76.
CÎTEAUX
. Sixteen miles south-southeast of Dijon, Cîteaux is the mother house of the Cistercian
order, founded here in 1098 by Robert of Molesme (d. 1111), St. Albéric (d. 1109), and
St. Stephen Harding (d. 1134). The first years were difficult, but with the arrival of St.
Bernard in 1112 or 1113 fortune shone on the new foundation. He became abbot in 1115,
and soon the first four “daughters of Cîteaux” were born: La Ferté, Pontigny, Clairvaux,
and Morimond. By the turn of the 13th century, Cîteaux was “mother” to over 1,000
religious establishments in France alone. Little remains of the original abbey: a 12th-
century chapel now disaffected, a vaulted hall, and portions of the Gothic cloister.
William W.Kibler/William W.Clark
[See also: BERNARD OF CLAIRVAUX; CISTERCIAN ORDER; MONASTICISM;
PONTIGNY; ROBERT OF MOLESME; STEPHEN HARDING]
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