page_title: Kingdom of the Lombards
section_title: Bavarian dynasty
hierarchical_section_title: Kingdom of the Lombards / History / 7th century / Bavarian dynasty
caption_attribution_description: English: Cuninpert_688_700_king_of_the_Lombard_minted_in_Milan
context_page_description: The Kingdom of the Lombards also known as the Lombard Kingdom; later the Kingdom of Italy, was an early medieval state established by the Lombards, a Germanic people, on the Italian Peninsula in the latter part of the 6th century. The king was traditionally elected by the highest-ranking aristocrats, the dukes, as several attempts to establish a hereditary dynasty failed. The kingdom was subdivided into a varying number of duchies, ruled by semi-autonomous dukes, which were in turn subdivided into gastaldates at the municipal level. The capital of the kingdom and the center of its political life was Pavia in the modern northern Italian region of Lombardy.
  The Lombard invasion of Italy was opposed by the Byzantine Empire, which retained control of much of the peninsula until the mid-8th century. For most of the kingdom's history, the Byzantine-ruled Exarchate of Ravenna and Duchy of Rome separated the northern Lombard duchies, collectively known as Langobardia Maior, from the two large southern duchies of Spoleto and Benevento, which constituted Langobardia Minor. Because of this division, the southern duchies were considerably more autonomous than the smaller northern duchies.
context_section_description: After the short reign of the son of Rothari and his son Rodoald (652-653), the dukes elected Aripert I, Duke of Asti and grandson of Theodolinda, as the new king. The Bavarian dynasty returned to the throne, and the Catholic Aripert duly suppressed Arianism. At Aripert's death in 661, his will divided the kingdom between his two sons, Perctarit and Godepert. This method of succession was known from the Romans and Franks, but was a unique case among the Lombards. Perhaps because of this, a conflict broke out between Perctarit, who was based in Milan, and Godepert, who remained in Pavia. The Duke of Benevento, Grimoald, intervened with a substantial military force to support Godepert, but, as soon as he arrived in Pavia, he killed Godepert and took his place. Perctarit, clearly in danger, fled to the Avars.
  Grimoald was invested by the Lombard nobles, but still had to deal with the legitimate faction, which tried international alliances to return the throne to Perctarit. Grimoald, however, persuaded the Avars to return the deposed ruler. Perctarit, as soon as he returned to Italy, had to make an act of submission to the usurper before he could escape to the Franks of Neustria, who attacked Grimoald in 663. The new king, hated by Neustria because he was allied with the Franks of Austrasia, repulsed them at Refrancore, near Asti.
  Grimoald, who in 663 had also defeated an attempt to reconquer Italy by the Byzantine Emperor Constans II, exercised his sovereign powers with a fullness never attained by his predecessors.  He entrusted the Duchy of Benevento to his son Romuald, and assured the loyalty of the duchies of Spoleto and Friuli, by appointing their dukes. He favoured the integration of the different components of the kingdom, presenting an image modeled on that of his predecessor Rotari—wise legislator in adding new laws to the Edict, patron (building a church in Pavia dedicated to Saint Ambrose), and valiant warrior.
  With Grimoald's death in 671, his minor son Garibald assumed the throne, but Perctarit returned from exile and swiftly deposed him. He immediately came to an agreement with Grimoald's other son, Romualdo I of Benevento, who pledged loyalty in exchange for recognition of the autonomy of his duchy. Perctarit developed a policy in line with the tradition of his dynasty and supported the Catholic Church against Arianism and the chapters anathematized in the Three-Chapter Controversy. He sought and achieved peace with the Byzantines, who acknowledged Lombard sovereignty over most of Italy, and repressed the rebellion of the Duke of Trent, Alahis, although at the cost of hard territorial concessions to Alahis (including the Duchy of Brescia).
  Alahis rebelled again later, joining with the political opponents of the pro-Catholic Bavarian policy at Perctarit's death in 688. His son and successor Cunipert was initially defeated and forced to take refuge on the Isola Comacina - only in 689 did he manage to quash the rebellion, defeating and killing Alahis in the Battle of Coronate at the Adda.
  The crisis resulted from the divergence between the two regions of Langobardia Maior: Neustria, to the west, was loyal to the Bavarian rulers, pro-Catholic and supporters of the policy of reconciliation with Rome and Byzantium; on the other hand, Austria, to the east, identified with the traditional Lombard adherence to paganism and Arianism, and favored a more warlike policy.
  The dukes of Austria challenged the increasing "latinization" of customs, court practices, law and religion, which they believed accelerated the disintegration and loss of the Germanic identity of the Lombard people. The victory allowed Cuniperto, already long associated with the throne by his father, to continue the work of pacifying the kingdom, always with a pro-Catholic accent. A synod convened in Pavia in 698 sanctioned the reintegration of the three anathematized chapters into Catholicism.
caption: A coin of Cunipert (688-700), king of the Lombards, minted in Milan.
exif: {"Image ImageDescription": "", "Image Make": "SONY", "Image Model": "DSC-T10", "Image Orientation": "Horizontal (normal)", "Image DateTime": "2008:12:16 21:11:03", "Image YCbCrPositioning": "Co-sited", "Image ExifOffset": "2260", "Image PrintIM": "[80, 114, 105, 110, 116, 73, 77, 0, 48, 51, 48, 48, 0, 0, 2, 0, 2, 0, 1, 0, 0, 0, 1, 1, 1, 0, 0, 0]", "Image Padding": "[]", "Image OffsetSchema": "4140", "EXIF ExposureTime": "1/20", "EXIF FNumber": "43/10", "EXIF ExposureProgram": "Program Normal", "EXIF ISOSpeedRatings": "800", "EXIF ExifVersion": "0221", "EXIF DateTimeOriginal": "2008:12:16 21:11:03", "EXIF DateTimeDigitized": "2008:12:16 21:11:03", "EXIF ComponentsConfiguration": "YCbCr", "EXIF CompressedBitsPerPixel": "8", "EXIF ExposureBiasValue": "0", "EXIF MaxApertureValue": "29/8", "EXIF MeteringMode": "CenterWeightedAverage", "EXIF LightSource": "Unknown", "EXIF Flash": "Flash did not fire, compulsory flash mode", "EXIF FocalLength": "897/50", "EXIF FlashPixVersion": "0100", "EXIF ColorSpace": "sRGB", "EXIF ExifImageWidth": "3072", "EXIF ExifImageLength": "2304", "EXIF FileSource": "Digital Camera", "EXIF SceneType": "Directly Photographed", "EXIF CustomRendered": "Normal", "EXIF ExposureMode": "Auto Exposure", "EXIF WhiteBalance": "Auto", "EXIF SceneCaptureType": "Standard", "EXIF Contrast": "Normal", "EXIF Saturation": "Normal", "EXIF Sharpness": "Hard", "EXIF Padding": "[]", "EXIF OffsetSchema": "2068"}