Editing Clotilde (section)

==Biography==
[[File:Sainte clothilde.jpg|thumb|230px|St Clotilde at prayer (illuminated initial)]]

=== Early life ===
Clotilde, born around 474, was from Burgundy.{{Sfn|Butler|1995|p=462}} According to [[Hagiography|hagiographer]] [[Alban Butler]], the only source for Clotilde's biography, which was edited by Bruno Krusch before the 10th century, is mostly dependent upon a document written by a monk from [[Saint-Denis, Seine-Saint-Denis|Saint-Denis]] a couple of centuries earlier. Her history has also been pieced together by [[Gregory of Tours]] and [[Chronicle of Fredegar|Fredegarius]], and in certain hagiographies. Butler states that the most reliable source about her life is by Belgian historian [[Godefroid Kurth]], but David Hugh Farmer calls Gregory of Tours' hagiography about Clotilde "the principal source for her life" and said that a later hagiography "celebrated her as the saintly ancestor of the French kings".<ref name="farmer">{{Cite book |last=Farmer |first=David Hugh |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=_zJJtvK2_KsC&q=Clotilde |title=The Oxford Dictionary of Saints |date=1997 |publisher=Oxford University Press |isbn=9780192800589 |edition=4th |pages=95 |access-date=June 1, 2024}}</ref> Her history also appears in French hagiographies, but most of them were written before Kurth's.{{Sfn|Butler|1995|p=463}}

It seems Clotilde's grandfather was [[Gondioc]], who had four sons, [[Gundobad]], Clotilde's father [[Chilperic II of Burgundy]], [[Gundemar|Gondemar]], and [[Godegisel]].{{Sfn|Dunbar|1904|p=191}}{{Sfn|Baring-Gould|1897|p=23}} After Gondioc's death, Burgundy was divided up among them, but Gundobad gained power over Burgundy when he murdered his brothers. Gundobad also killed Clotide's brothers and her mother Caretena, who might have converted her husband to Christianity{{Sfn|McNamara|Halborg|Whatley|1992|p=38}} and was called "a remarkable woman" by [[Sidonius Apollinaris]] and [[Venantius Fortunatus]].<ref name="cathencyclopedia">{{Cite book |last=Kurth |first=Godefroid |url=http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/04066a.htm |title=The Catholic Encyclopedia |date=1908 |publisher=Robert Appleton Company |volume=4 |location=New York |chapter=St. Clotilda |access-date=31 May 2024}}</ref>{{Efn|As scholar JoAnne McNamara put it, Clothild and her mother "set a pattern for a chain of Catholic female missionaries to the courts of the pagan and Arian kings they married".{{sfn|McNamara|Halborg|Whatley|1992|p=38}}}} Clotilde and her sister, Sedeleuba (or Chrona), who became a nun and founded the church of Saint-Victor in [[Geneva]], were raised at the court of Gundobad. They were educated as Catholics, even though Gundobad, like most of the Burgundian kings, were [[Arianism|Arians]].{{Sfn|Dunbar|1904|pp=191-192}}<ref name="cathencyclopedia" />{{Efn|Gundobad's son was later converted to Catholicism, although he was killed by Clotilde's sons.{{sfn|McNamara|Halborg|Whatley|1992|p=39}}}} According to hagiographer [[Sabine Baring-Gould]], Clotilde "grew up full of piety and tenderness to sufferers".{{Sfn|Baring-Gould|1897|p=23}}

=== Later life and marriage ===
Shortly after Caretena's death, Clotilde and [[Clovis I]], the first [[List of Frankish kings|king of the Franks]], were married, in 492 or 493.<ref name="cathencyclopedia" />{{Sfn|Butler|1995|p=462}} As Farmer put it, Clovis was "impressed by her beauty and wisdom".<ref name="farmer" /> Their marriage, from the 6th century on, "was made the theme of epic narratives, in which the original facts were materially altered".<ref name="farmer" /> Clotilde's story fascinated later generations because it was "the centerpiece of a struggle between the old Catholic, Roman population against the [[Arianism]] of the Germanic tribes",{{Sfn|McNamara|Halborg|Whatley|1992|p=39}} although there is no evidence that Clovis was an Arian sympathizer before his marriage and conversion to Catholicism.{{Sfn|Dunbar|1904|p=192}} Clotilde had influence over Clovis and actively encouraged him to convert to Catholicism.{{Sfn|Butler|1995|p=462}}<ref name="farmer" /> He allowed the baptism of their oldest son, Ingomir, who died in infancy, and of their next son, Clodomir, but he blamed their oldest child's death on Clotilde's faith and resisted her attempts to convert him.<ref name="farmer" />{{Sfn|Butler|1995|p=462}} Clodomir also became ill, but recovered and they had five children in all: four sons, Ingomir; and Clodomir, Childebert, and Clotaire, who all became kings; and one daughter, named Clotilde after her mother.<ref name="cathencyclopedia" /> Clotilde's ''vita'' describes her daughter's life, who married a [[Visigoths|Visigothic]] man named Amalaric, who she unsuccessfully tried to convert to Catholicism{{Sfn|McNamara|Halborg|Whatley|1992|p=38}} and who "cruelly treated".{{Sfn|Butler|1995|p=462}} Little is known about her mother during Clovis' lifetime and about their marriage, but she might have been involved with his intervention of the quarrel between the Burgundian kings at the time and Clovis' support of [[Gundobad|Gondobad]].<ref name="cathencyclopedia" />{{Sfn|Butler|1995|p=462}}<ref name="farmer" /> Historian Godefroid Kurth said, about Clotilde, that she was "saddened by cruel trials".<ref name="cathencyclopedia" />

Clovis was baptized by [[Saint Remigius|St. Remigius]] at [[Reims]] in 496, along with 3,000 of the Frankish people, after a battle with the [[Alemanni]]. His army was losing, but he appealed to his wife's God for help, promising that if he won, he would accept the Christian faith.<ref name="cathencyclopedia" />{{Sfn|Butler|1995|p=29}}<ref name="farmer" />{{Sfn|Baring-Gould|1897|p=24}} According to tradition, while Clotilde was in prayer and as Clovis began to win the battle, an angel brought her three white lilies; Clovis later substituted lilies for the three frogs on the insignia on his battle shield.{{Sfn|Dunbar|1904|p=192}} Sabine Baring-Gould considers Clovis' conversion sincere and that it was not due to political considerations. Baring-Gould also did not believe that Clotilde did not influence Clovis to fight this war or others in order to revenge her family's death.{{Sfn|Baring-Gould|1897|p=25}} Clovis' subsequent military achievements against the Burgundians and Visigoths also do not seem to have been associated with Clotilde.<ref name="farmer" /> The Franks, due to Clotilde's influence, were Catholics for centuries.<ref name="cathencyclopedia" />

Clovis died in 511;{{Sfn|McNamara|Halborg|Whatley|1992|p=40}} Clotilde buried him at the [[Abbey of Saint Genevieve|Basilica of the Holy Apostles]], which later became the Church of Sainte-Geneviève, which they built together as a mausoleum honouring [[Genevieve|Saint Genevieve]], the patron saint of Paris. Genevieve might have been the first to suggest that Clovis build a church honouring [[Saint Peter]] and [[Paul the Apostle|Saint Paul]], which he built in deference to Clotilde's wishes; she completed the church after his death.<ref name="cathencyclopedia" /><ref>"Genovefa (423-502)". ''Sainted Women of the Dark Ages''. Edited and translated from ''Acta Sanctorum'' by McNamara, Jo Ann; Halborg, John E. Durham; with Whatley, E. Gordon, England: Duke University Press. 1992. p. 36. ISBN 0-8223-1200-X</ref>

[[File:Sainte Clotilde - gradient background 01.jpg|thumb|Statue of Saint Clotilde by [[Jean-Baptiste Claude Eugène Guillaume|Eugène Guillaume]] and [[Alexandre-Dominique Denuelle]]]]

=== Post-marriage and death ===
According to Kurth Godefriod in ''The Catholic Encyclopedia'', an epic about the Franks states that Clotilde incited her son [[Chlodomer]] to start a war with his cousin, [[Sigismund of Burgundy]], in order to avenge the death of her parents. Godefroid doubts the story is true, considers it a defamation against Clotilde, and states that she arranged a truce between Clovis and Gondebad, Sigismund's father.<ref name="cathencyclopedia" /> Butler agrees, stating that sources such as the writings of Gregory of Tours have been disproven, which has "vindicated the queen from charges of ferocity and vindictiveness, little in keeping with her saintly character".{{Sfn|Butler|1995|p=462}}{{Efn|Dunbar takes the opposite view (see pp. 192-`93), although she states that Clotilde led a virtuous life in her later years.}} According to Butler, Chlodomer captured and killed Sigismund, as well as his wife and children, but Chlodomer was killed by Sigismund's brother. Clotilde adopted her son's three young boys, but was induced to send the children to her other sons, who had the two oldest killed. The youngest boy, Clodoald, was saved and later became a monk in Paris, at the monastery in [[Nogent-sur-Marne]], which was later renamed in his honour.{{Sfn|Butler|1995|p=462}} According to Dunbar, the husband of Clotilde's daughter at one point sent a blood-stained veil to her brothers; her brother Childebert retaliated against him, pillaging his towns, and brought his sister away from her husband, but she died on the way to Paris.{{Sfn|Dunbar|1904|p=193}}

After the death of Clovis and her grandchildren, Clotilde left Paris and moved to [[Tours]], where spent most of her time near the tomb of [[Martin of Tours|Saint Martin of Tours]] and became closely associated with the [[Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Tours|diocese of Tours]];{{Sfn|McNamara|Halborg|Whatley|1992|p=40}}{{Sfn|Butler|1995|p=462}} according to Dunbar she and Clovis had a devotion to Saint Martin.{{Sfn|Dunbar|1904|p=193}} As Farmer reports, "Thenceforward she led a devout life".<ref name="farmer" /> According to Farmer, she became "totally detached from politics and power-struggles except through prayer".<ref name="farmer" /> Dunbar states that she "prayed and fasted and wept, and gave all she had to the poor".{{Sfn|Dunbar|1904|p=193}} 

Farmer states that Clotilde continued to have a political role in "the violent Merovingian world", mostly through her sons.<ref name="farmer" /> Gregory of Tours wrote that her prayers delayed a war between her two surviving sons; as Butler put it, "The very next day, as the armies were about to engage, there arose a tempest that all military operations had to be abandoned".{{Sfn|Butler|1995|p=462}} A month later, Clotilde died in Tours on 3 June 545 and was buried at the feet of St. Genevieve and beside Clovis and her older children, at the Basilica of the Holy Apostles. She was a widow for 34 years.<ref name="cathencyclopedia" />{{Sfn|Butler|1995|p=462}}{{Sfn|Dunbar|1904|p=193}} Her daughter died at about the same time.<ref name="farmer" />

[[File:Clotilde partageant le royaume entre ses fils.jpg|thumb|right|Clotilde and her sons, ''Grandes Chroniques de Saint-Denis'']]