Radbod, king of the Frisians
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Several kings named Radbod (Frisian Redbod or Redbad) were king of the Frisians, (dux in the Merovingian chronicles). Their descendant was Saint Radbod.
First attempts to Christianize and dominate Frisia
Under the protection of the Frankish king Dagobert I (622 - 638), the Christian missionaries Amandus (St. Amand) and Eligius (St. Eloi) attempted to extend Christianity into the region of the southern Frisians in what is now Flanders, with some success, but farther north the building of a church founded by Dagobert at Trajectum (Utrecht) was quite rightly resented as the thin edge of the political wedge, and the fierce pagan Frisians of the Zuider Zee attacked and captured this Christian Frankish outpost and burnt the church to the ground.
The first missionary to meet with any success among the Frisians was the English Wilfrid of York, who, being driven by a storm upon the coast, was hospitably received by the king, Adgild or Adgisl, and was allowed to preach Christianity in the land. Adgild appears to have submitted to the largely conceptual overlordship of the Frankish king, Dagobert II in 675, but under his successor, Radbod, an attempt was made to extirpate Christianity and to free the Frisians from the Frankish subjection associated with it. Radbod was, however, beaten by Pippin of Herstal in the battle of Dorstadt (689), and was compelled to cede West Frisia (Frisia Citerior, "Nearer Frisia" from the Scheldt to the Zuider Zee) to the Franks. Between 690 and 692 CE Utrecht also fell into the hands of Pepin. This gave the Franks control of the important gateways of trade from the Frankish hinterland to the North Sea via the river Rhine.
On Pippin's death in 714 Radbod took the initiative again. He forced Saint Willibrord and his monks to flee, and this time he advanced as far as Cologne, where he defeated the famous Charles Martel, Pippin's natural son in 716. During the second journey of St. Boniface to Rome, Wulfram is said to have preached in Frisia. He tried to convert Radbod, but not succeeding he returned to Fontanelle Eventually, however, Charles prevailed and compelled the Frisians to submit. Radbod died in 719, but for some years his successors struggled against the Frankish power. A final defeat was, however, inflicted upon them by Charles Martel in 734, which secured the supremacy of the Franks in the north, though it was not until the days of Charlemagne (785) that the subjection of the Frisians was temporarily effected.
With the onset of the Viking raids in 810, Frisia soon slipped out of the Frankish orbit again.
Meanwhile Christianity had been making conquests among the Frisians, mainly through the lifelong labors and preaching of the Englishman Willibrord, who came to Frisia in 692 and made Utrecht his headquarters. He was consecrated (695) at Rome archbishop of the Frisians, and on his return founded a number of bishoprics in the northern Netherlands, and continued his labors unremittingly until his death in 739.
It is an interesting fact that both Wilfrid and Willibrord appear to have found no difficulty from the first in preaching to the Frisians in their native dialect, which was so nearly allied to their own Anglo-Saxon tongue.
The see of Utrecht founded by Willibrord has remained the chief see of the Northern Netherlands from his day to our own. Friesland was likewise the scene of a portion of the missionary labors of a greater than Willibrord, the famous Boniface, the Apostle of the Germans, also an Englishman. It was at Dokkum in Friesland that he met a martyr's death (754).
When Rollo the Norman (died ca 932) was laying waste the lands of the Walgri and received supplies and men from the Christian king of the Angles, the Walgri called in reinforcements that included another Radbod:
- "However the Walgri estimating. on account of the abundant supply of grain that had been fetched that Rollo was going to linger in the Waal region for all time; called for Ragnar Long-neck, duke of Hesbaye. and Hainault. and for Radbod prince of the region of Frisia. and with the amassed army of those other districts; they attacked Rollo. As he had done many times he proceeded to war without hesitation; he killed many thousands of them; he chased both Ragnar Long-neck. and Radbod the Frisian. to their own strongholds." (Dudo of St. Quentin's Gesta Normannorum)
Christian missionaries in Frisia had done well. This Radbod, the king, had agreed to accept the new faith. As the day of his baptism drew near, however, the king voiced one nagging doubt: What had become of all his famed ancestors who had died without recourse to Christ? The monkish reply was swift and emphatic; all the heathens were writhing in hellish agony.
The king showed that the noble blood flowed through his veins. Proudly he responded "Then I would rather be suffering there with them than go to heaven with a pack of beggars." The baptism was cancelled, the priests were sent scurrying, and Frisia remained free of the dominance of the Church of Rome for many years to come.
External links
- Dudo of St. Quentin's Gesta Normannorum (http://www.the-orb.net/orb_done/dudo/dudindex.html): Chapter 9.
References
Encyclopaedia Britannica, 1911, provided some text and details.