* Sigebert I, king of Austrasia, marries Brunhilda, and Chilperic I marries Galswintha, both daughters of the Visigothic king Athanagild.

In 613, several leading magnates of Austrasia and Burgundy abandoned Brunhilda, the great-grandmother and regent of their king, Sigebert II, and turned to Chlothar II of Neustria for support, promising not to rise in defense of the queen-regent and recognizing Chlothar as rightful regent and guardian of the young king.

At that time, Warnachar, mayor of the palace of Austrasia, and Rado, mayor of the palace of Burgundy, abandoned the cause of Brunhilda and her great-grandson, Sigebert II, and the entire realm was delivered into Chlothar's hands.

In that year, Chlothar II became the first king of all the Franks since his grandfather Chlothar I died in 561 by ordering the murder of the infant Sigebert II ( son of Theuderic ), whom the aging Brunhilda had attempted to set on the thrones of Austrasia and Burgundy, causing a rebellion among the nobility.

When Sigebert married Brunhilda, daughter of the Visigothic sovereign in Spain ( Athanagild ), Chilperic also wished to make a brilliant marriage.

Galswintha's sister, the wife of Sigebert, Brunhilda, incited her husband to war and the conflict between the two queens continued to plague relations until the next century.

In 587, the Treaty of Andelot — the text of which explicitly refers to the entire Frankish realm as Francia — between Brunhilda and Guntram secured his protection of her young son Childebert II, who had succeeded the assassinated Sigebert ( 575 ).

During the brief minority of Sigebert II, the office of the mayor of the palace, which had for sometime been visible in the kingdoms of the Franks, came to the fore in its internal politics, with a faction of nobles coalescing around the persons of Warnachar, Rado, and Pepin of Landen, to give the kingdom over to Chlothar in order to remove Brunhilda, the young king's regent, from power.

Marriage of Sigebert and Brunhilda, Grandes Chroniques de France, from a MS of the fifteenth century ( Bibliothèque nationale de France ).

: Now when king Sigebert saw that his brothers were taking wives unworthy of them, and to their disgrace were actually marrying slave women, he sent an embassy into Spain and with many gifts asked for Brunhilda, daughter of king Athanagild.

His queen Goiswintha gave him two daughters — Brunhilda and the murdered Galswintha — who were married to two Merovingian brother-kings: Sigebert I of Austrasia and Chilperic, king of the Neustrian Franks.

Although Gregory of Tours states the reasons for this was that Sigebert disdained the prevalent practice of " taking wives who were completely unworthy of them ", and sought the beautiful and cultured Brunhilda, while Chilperic married her sister out of sibling rivalry, Ian Wood points out that the circumstances and the scale of the morgengab suggest that the situation was more complex.

Fredegund is said to have ordered the assassination of Sigebert I of Austrasia in 575 and also to have made attempts on the lives of Sigebert's son Childebert II, her brother-in-law Guntram, king of Burgundy, and Brunhilda.

Brunhilda ( c. 543 – 613 ) was a Visigothic princess, married to king Sigebert I of Austrasia who ruled the eastern kingdoms of Austrasia and Burgundy in the names of her sons and grandsons.

Between 567 and 570, Brunhilda bore Sigebert three children: Ingund, Chlodosind, and Childebert.

The people of Paris hailed Sigebert as a conqueror when he arrived with Brunhilda and their children.

But Warnachar and Rado, mayor of the palace of Burgundy, along with Pepin of Landen and Arnulf of Metz, resentful of her regency, abandoned the cause of Brunhilda over the young king and joined with her old antagonist Clotaire II, promising not to rise in defence of the queen-regent and recognising Clotaire as rightful regent and guardian of Sigebert.

Brunhilda, with Sigebert, met Clotaire's army on the Aisne, but the dukes yet again betrayed her: the Patrician Aletheus, Duke Rocco, and Duke Sigvald deserted her and she and her king had to flee.

Brunhilda was raised as an Arian Christian, but upon her marriage to Sigebert, converted to Roman Catholicism.

But Warnachar and Rado, mayor of the palace of Burgundy, abandoned the cause of Brunhilda and the young king and joined with Clotaire II of Neustria, promising not to rise in defence of the queen-regent and recognising Clotaire as rightful regent and guardian of Sigebert.

Brunhilda and Sigebert met Clotaire's army on the Aisne, but the Patrician Aletheus, Duke Rocco, and Duke Sigvald deserted the host and the grand old woman and her king had to flee.

Internecine feuding occurred during the reigns of the brothers Sigebert I and Chilperic I, which was largely fuelled by the rivalry of their queens, Brunhilda and Fredegunda and which continued during the reigns of their sons and their grandsons.

The next mayor, Protadius, a partisan of Brunhilda, encouraged war with Austrasia, but the nobles assassinated him and battle was never met, a pact being enforced by Theuderic's men.

This led to the delivery of Brunhilda into Chlothar's hands, his thirst for vengeance leading to his formidable old aunt enduring the agony of the rack for three whole days, before suffering a horrific death, dragged to death by an unbroken horse.

Warnachar was himself already the mayor of the palace of Austrasia, while Rado and Pepin were to find themselves rewarded with mayoral offices after Chlothar's coup succeeded and Brunhilda and the ten-year old king were killed.

" Then the army of the Franks and Burgundians joined into one, all shouted together that death would be most fitting for the very wicked Brunhilda.

As far as historicity can be ascertained, Attila, Jörmunrekkr and Brynhildr actually existed, taking Brynhildr to be partly based on Brunhilda of Austrasia, but the chronology has been reversed in the poems.

In 599 they routed his forces at Dormelles and seized the Dentelin, but they then fell foul of each other and the remainder of their time on the thrones was spent in infighting, often incited by their grandmother Brunhilda, who, angered over her expulsion from Theudebert's court, convinced Theuderic to unseat him and kill him.

Brunhilda was buried in the Abbaye de St. Martin at Autun that she founded in 602 on the spot where the bishop of Tours had cut down a beech-tree that served as an object of pagan worship.

Brunhilda was tortured on the rack for three days before being ripped apart between four horses, thus ending the long and bloody feud between Austrasia and Neustria, and reuniting the two kingdoms.

He received the kingdom of Austrasia plus the cities ( civitates ) of Poitiers, Tours, Vellay, Bordeaux, and Châteaudun, as well as the Champagne, the Auvergne, and Transjurane Alemannia, on the death of his father in 595, but was dominated by his grandmother Brunhilda, whom he succeeded in driving away in 599.

The man who ordered Protadius ' execution, Duke Uncelen, was soon arrested by Brunhilda and tortured and executed.

After his mother's death and burial in Saint Denis Basilica in Paris ( 597 ), Clotaire II continued the struggle against Queen Brunhilda of Austrasia, and finally triumphed in 613 when Brunhilda's own followers betrayed the old queen into his hands.

He was then only five years old, and during his long minority the power was disputed between his mother Brunhilda and the nobles.

Although she did not live to see it, her son's execution of Brunhilda bore the mark of Fredegund's hatred: Clothar II had the old queen, now in her sixties, stretched in agony upon the rack for three entire days, then watched her meet her death chained between four horses that were goaded to the four points of the compass, tearing her body asunder.

Finally, in 613, a rebellion by the nobility against Brunhilda saw her betrayed and handed over to her nephew and foe of Neustria, Chlothar II.

The rule of Austrasia came into the hands of Brunhilda, the grandmother of Theudebert, who ruled also in Burgundy in the name of her great-grandchildren.

Brunhilda avoided her sister's fate, and became a central figure of Frankish history for the remainder of the sixth century.

Galswintha's death aroused the enmity of her sister Brunhilda against Chilperic, bringing about 40 years of warfare between the Frankish kingdoms of Austrasia and Neustria.

Gregory of Tours suggests that he proposed because he envied his brother's marriage to Brunhilda ; however, Galswintha ordered him to purge his court of prostitutes and mistresses, and he soon grew tired of her.

Brunhilda so detested Fredegund for the death of her sister — and this hatred was so fiercely reciprocated — that the two queens persuaded their husbands to go to war.

Germanus wrote to Brunhilda, asking her to persuade her husband to restore the peace and to spare his brother.

Brunhilda now tried to seize the regency of Austrasia in the name of her son Childebert II, but she was resisted fiercely by her nobles and had to retire briefly to the court of Guntram of Burgundy before obtaining her goal.