Queens were an important part of the court as well. One of them, Balthild
(d.680), had once been one of the unwilling travelers from England. Purchased there
as a slave by the mayor of the palace of Neustria, she parlayed her beauty into
marriage with the king himself. (Merovingian kings often married slaves or women
captured in war. By avoiding wives with powerful kindred, they staved off challenges
to their royal authority.) Balthild’s biographer praised her for ministering to all the
men at court. When her husband, King Clovis II, died in 657, Balthild served as
regent for her minor sons, acting, in effect, as king during this time. Meanwhile, she
gave generously to churches and monasteries. By the end of her life, Balthild was
counted a saint.
Just as a king’s power radiated outward from his court, so too did aristocrats
command their own lordly centers. Like kings, they had many “homes” at one time,
scattered throughout Francia. Tending to their estates, honing their skills in the hunt,
aristocratic men regularly led armed retinues to war. They proved their worth in the
regular taking of booty and rewarded their faithful followers afterwards at generous
banquets.
And they bedded down. The bed—or rather the production of children—was the
focus of marriage, the key to the survival of aristocratic families and the transmission
of their property and power. Though churchmen had many ideas about the value of
marriage, they had nothing to do with the ceremony; no one married in a church.
Rather, marriage was a family affair, and a very expensive one. There was more than
one form of marriage: in the most formal, the husband-to-be gave his future bride a
handsome dowry of clothes, bedding, livestock, and land. Then, after the marriage
was consummated, he gave his wife a morning gift of furniture and perhaps the keys
to the house. Very rich men often had, in addition to their wife, one or more
“concubines” at the same time. These enjoyed a less formal type of marriage,
receiving a morning gift but no dowry.
The wife’s role was above all to maintain the family. A woman passed from one
family (that of her birth) to the next (that of her marriage) by parental fiat. When
they married, women left the legal protection of their father for that of their husband.
Did women have any freedom of action? Yes. For one thing, they had considerable
control over their dowries. Some participated in family land transactions: sales,
donations, exchanges, and the like. Upon the death of their husbands, widows
received a portion of the household property. Although inheritances generally went
from fathers to sons, many fathers left bequests to their daughters, who could then
dispose of their property more or less as they liked. In 632, for example, the nun
