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Ebroin
Ebroin may also refer to Ebroin (bishop), a 9th-century bishop.

Ebroin (died 680 or 681) was the Frankish mayor of the palace of Neustria on two occasions; firstly from 658 to his deposition in 673 and secondly from 675 to his death in 680 or 681. In a violent and despotic career, he strove to impose the authority of Neustria, which was under his control, over Burgundy and Austrasia.

Following the failed coup of the Pippinid mayor Grimoald the Elder in Austrasia, the Merovingian court resided in Neustria. According to the Liber historiae Francorum, during the reign of Chlothar III the mayor Erchinoald of Neustria died. A council of Franks then elected Ebroin as his replacement.

The Life of Saint Eligius records that as of the middle 670s Ebroin had only one child, a son named Bobo; Bobo was then convalescing from an illness contracted during his adolescence. Based on that, Bobo was likely born c. 660.

The Venerable Bede (IV.1) took notice of an anecdote concerning Ebroin in 668. Bede tells that Ebroin waylaid an Englishman returning from Rome, for fear that the Byzantine Emperor ( Constans II, residing in Syracuse (Sicily)) was plotting an alliance against his rule. It follows that Ebroin by 668 had arrogated to himself the de facto rule of Neustria and so (in theory) "of the Franks"; it also follows that Ebroin had a streak of paranoia.

It remains unclear how direct was Ebroin's influence over the next four years (the Liber historiae may imply that Chlothar had roused himself by then), but when Chlothar died in 673 Ebroin was back in charge. Another brother Theuderic III was raised as king of Neustria, still viewed as the core kingdom "of the Franks".

Ebroin endeavoured to maintain at any rate the union of Neustria and Burgundy, but the great Burgundian nobles too wished to remain independent. They rose under bishop Leodegar (or Léger) of Autun, and defeated Ebroin and Theuderic. They decided to tonsure Ebroin, interning him in the monastery of Luxeuil. A proclamation was then issued to the effect that each kingdom should keep its own laws and customs, that there should be no further interchange of functionaries between the kingdoms, and that no one should again set up a tyranny like that of Ebroin. Soon, however, Leodegar too was defeated by Wulfoald and the Austrasians, and was himself confined at Luxeuil in 673.

When Childeric II was murdered at Bondi that year, by a disaffected Frank, Theoderic III was reinstalled as king in Neustria with Leudesius as his mayor. Ebroin and Leodegar took advantage of the confusion to leave the cloister, and soon found themselves once more face to face. Each looked for support to a different Merovingian king, Ebroin even proclaiming a false Merovingian imposter as sovereign. In a short time Ebroin caused Leudesius to be murdered and became mayor once again, now with a score to settle with Leodegar.

About 675 Ebroin reimposed his authority over Neustria and most of Burgundy, and induced the Duke of Champagne and the Bishops of Châlons and Valence to attack Autun. They invested the city, and forced it to surrender. Ebroin had Leodegar's eyes put out. Ebroin persuaded the king that Childeric's murder had occurred under Leodegar's instigation; and so the king had Leodegar additionally arrested, tried, and exiled. On 12 October 678 Ebroin had his enemy led away and murdered.

Ebroin meanwhile had defeated the Austrasians at Bois-du-Fay, near Laon, uniting France under Neustrian rule. His triumph, however, was short-lived; he was assassinated in 681, the victim of a combined attack of his numerous enemies.

In 684, Ansoald, bishop of Poitiers in Neustria, the homeland of Leudesius, commissioned a Life of Leodegar the Burgundian. It cast Ebroin as an enemy of God motivated by nothing but ambition and a lust for power. This biography became canonised in the Church to such an extent that Leodegar, too, was canonised - as Saint Leger. Tales of Ebroin's infamy were also found useful by the Austrasians, whose own ambitious mayoral family commissioned the continuations to the chronicle of Fredegar.

Ebroin (bishop)

Ebroin (died 850×54) was bishop of Poitiers from 839 to his death. He took on the administration of the county of Poitiers during a troubled period and continued to faithfully support King Charles the Bald.

In 835 Ebroin's cousin, Count Rorig I of Maine, petitioned King Pippin I for the monastery of Glanfeuil to be given to Ebroin. Glanfeuil had been placed under the authority of another relative of Ebroin's, Abbot Ingelbert of Saint-Pierre-des-Fossés, by the Emperor Louis the Pious in 833. In 844 Ebroin bestowed the office of abbot on Rorig's son Gauslin. On 14 July 847 Charles confirmed Ebroin's right of possession (ius [et] dominatio) of abbey, apparently without oversight from Fossés, and its heritability in his family.

In 839 Ebroin sided with Charles the Bald against Pippin II in the battle for the subkingdom of Aquitaine, which had been ruled by Pippin I, Charles' brother and Pippin's father, until his death in 838. According to the Vita Hludovici, Ebroin was Charles's advisor on Aquitainian affairs. Between Charles's first visit to Poitiers in April 839 and February 840, when the emperor left him in charge of conducting a campaign against Pippin II, Charles appointed Ebroin as his archchaplain.

Ebroin was among the leaders of the army being assembled to fight Pippin in northern Aquitaine 844. On 14 June 844, while on the march south to meet Charles in the south, the army was ambushed by Pippin's forces in the Angoumois. The king's uncle, Abbot Hugh, was killed, and Ebroin, along with Bishop Ragenar of Amiens and Abbot Lupus of Ferrières, was captured. Ebroin had been freed by December 844, when he attended the council of Ver. He helped negotiate the settlement of June 845, in which most of Aquitaine was ceded to Pippin in vassalage to Charles.

There is no record of Ebroin after 850. It is usually assumed that he died defending Poitiers from some rebels in 854. It is also possible that Charles's execution of a probable relative of Ebroin's, a certain Count Gauzbert, in March 853 pushed Ebroin into rebellion. He was replaced as archchaplain by Hilduin.