The history of Bavaria stretches from its earliest settlement and its formation as a stem duchy in the 6th century through its inclusion in the Holy Roman Empire to its status as an independent kingdom and finally as a large Bundesland (state) of the Federal Republic of Germany. In the Iron Age, it was settled by Celtic-influenced peoples such as the Raetians and Vindelici, by the 1st century BC, the part south of the Danube was conquered and incorporated into the Roman Empire, and roughly corresponded to the Roman province of Raetia.
Early settlements and Roman Raetia
There have been numerous palaeolithic discoveries in Bavaria. The earliest inhabitants known from surviving written sources were culturally Celts, their civilization corresponding to the widespread La Tène culture. The Raeti however, who lived in the Alpine regions, spoke a language related to Etruscan, and the Romans believed that they had migrated from Italy.
The Roman Empire under Augustus made the Danube, which runs through Bavaria, its northern boundary, meaning that a large part of Bavaria became Roman. What is now southern Bavaria was roughly equivalent to the Roman province of Raetia. The northern part of Raetia was inhabited by the Vindelici, who Strabo described as living on high plateaus. He also notes that the Boii originally lived in plains overlooked by the Raeti and Vindelici, and the lands of these three peoples once stretched as far west as Lake Constance.Strabo 4.6 and 7.2 The Boii however, were no longer mentioned in later Roman accounts of Raetia. The main Roman city in Raetia was Augusta Vindelicorum, modern Augsburg. Modern-day Regensburg (Radasbona, or Castra Regina) and Passau (Boiodurum named after the Boii) were fortified frontier positions on the Danube. Until the Marcomannic Wars, north of the Danubian border in Raetia lived the Germanic Hermunduri who arrived in the region during Roman times. After the Roman victories in those Marcomannic wars the Armalausi and the Suebian Juthungi lived immediately north of the Danube until the fifth century. Further north near the Main river, where the Chatti had once lived, the Allemanni first appeared in the third century. They eventually moved further west, and southwards, establishing themselves to the west of Bavaria. In the north of Bavaria, in the Main region, they were replaced by the Burgundians already in the third century, who also subsequently moved westwards.
Migrations and early medieval period
During the fifth century, the Romanized population of Raetia and neighbouring Noricum (roughly Austria) were increasingly disconnected from the central government in Italy, and came increasingly under the influence of non-Roman tribes, some of whom appear in records for the first time in this period. To the east of Noricum in Roman Pannonia, large numbers of Huns, Alans and Goths settled after 378. In 384 Valentinian II's military leader Bauto allowed Alans and Huns to enter Raetia from the east and fight the Juthungi who were now in Raetia. They were told to withdraw when their ransacking of the Alemanni came too close to the Rhine and Gaul.Ambrose, Political letters and speeches, Letter 30. (Liebeschuetz ed. p.355) In about 430 the Roman general Aëtius defeated rebels and Juthungi in the Roman provinces of Raetia and Noricum, but this was the last mention of the Juthungi. citing: Sidonius, Carmen 7; Chronica Gallica of 452 p.658 Mommsen ed. under 430-431; Hydatius, Chronicle, under 430. There are indications that the Thuringi were established in northern Bavaria in the fifth century, although in the sixth century their kingdom was restricted to an area further north, and the Franks began to take control of the region.
In surviving records, the Bavarian name was first perhaps mentioned in a Frankish list of peoples, which existed by about 520 AD. The 6th century writer Jordanes, described them as having already ruling territory east of the Allemani in about 470. A remark by Venantius Fortunatus follows in his description of his travels from Ravenna to Tours (565–571), in which he had crossed the lands of the Bavarians, referring to the dangers of travel in the region: "If the road is clear and if the Bavarian does not stop you [...] then travel across the Alps". Although new, the name of the Bavarians (Latin Baiovarii) has its roots in the region. The Celtic Boii had lived on both sides of the Danube before the Roman conquest, stretching into part of Bavaria. During Roman times their name was already the basis of the regional name Bohemia, which lies to the east of modern Bavaria in the Czech Republic. The second century geographer Claudius Ptolemy mentioned a "large people" known as the "'Baimoi", living near the Danube north of modern Budapest. Within Roman Pannonia there was also a civitas of the Boii. It lay on the Danube near present day Vienna, in the north west of the Roman province of Pannonia, bordering on Noricum. The ending "-varii" is Germanic and was used in order to describe peoples living in specific geographical areas. Similar Germanic ethnic names were created in other regions, for example the Angrivarii and Ampsivarii in northern Germany, and the Cantware in Kent.
Archaeological evidence dating from the 5th and 6th centuries points to social and cultural influences from several regions and peoples in Bavaria, such as Alamanni, Lombards, Thuringians, Goths, Bohemian Slavs and the local Romanised population. Recent research by Wolfram and Pohl (1990) has moved away from searching for specific geographical origins of the Bavarians. It is now thought that the tribal ethnicity was established by the process of ethnogenesis, whereby an ethnic identity is formed because political and social pressures make a coherent identity necessary.
The stem duchy of Bavaria
Bavaria and the Agilolfings under Frankish overlordship The Bavarians soon came under the dominion of the Franks, probably without a serious struggle. The Franks regarded this border area as a buffer zone against peoples to the east, such as the Avars and the Slavs, and as a source of manpower for the army. Sometime around 550 AD they put it under the administration of a duke – possibly Frankish or possibly chosen from amongst the local leading families – who was supposed to act as a regional governor for the Frankish king. The first duke known was Garibald I, a member of the powerful Agilolfing family. This was the beginning of a series of Agilolfing dukes that was to last until 788 AD.
For a century and a half, a succession of dukes resisted the inroads of the Slavs on their eastern frontier and by the time of Duke Theodo I, who died in 717, had achieved complete independence from the feeble Frankish kings. When Charles Martel became the virtual ruler of the Frankish realm he brought the Bavarians into strict dependence and deposed two dukes successively for contumacy. His son and successor Pepin the Short likewise maintained Frankish authority. Several marriages took place between the family to which he belonged and the Agilolfings, who were united in a similar manner with the kings of the Lombards. The ease with which the Franks suppressed various risings gives colour to the supposition that family quarrels rather than the revolt of an oppressed people motivated the rebellions.
Bavarian law was committed to writing between the years 739 AD and 748 AD. Supplementary clauses, added afterward, bear evidence of Frankish influence. Thus, while the duchy belongs to the Agilolfing family, the duke must be chosen by the people and his election confirmed by the Frankish king, to whom he owes fealty. The duke has a fivefold weregild, summons the nobles and clergy for purposes of deliberation, calls out the host, administers justice, and regulates finance. Five noble families exist, possibly representing former divisions of the people. Subordinate to the nobles we find the freeborn and then the freedmen. The law divided the country into gaits or counties, under their counts, assisted by judges responsible for declaring the law.
Christianity Christianity had lingered in Bavaria from Roman times, but a new era set in when Bishop Rupert of Worms came to the county at the invitation of Duke Theodo I in 696. He founded several monasteries, as did Bishop Emmeran of Poitiers, with the result that before long, most of the people professed Christianity and relations commenced between Bavaria and Rome. The 8th century witnessed indeed a heathen reaction, but the arrival of Saint Boniface in Bavaria during c. 734 AD checked apostasy. Boniface organised the Bavarian church and founded or restored bishoprics at Salzburg, Freising, Regensburg and Passau.
Tassilo III, who became duke of the Bavarians in 749, recognized the supremacy of the Frankish king, Pepin the Short in 757 AD, but soon afterward refused to furnish a contribution to the war in Aquitaine. Moreover, during the early years of the reign of Charlemagne, Tassilo gave decisions in ecclesiastical and civil causes in his own name, refused to appear in the assemblies of the Franks, and in general acted as an independent ruler. His control of the Alpine passes, and his position as an ally of the Avars and as a son-in-law of the Lombard king Desiderius, became so troublesome to the Frankish kingdom that Charlemagne determined to crush him.
The details of this contest remain obscure. Tassilo appears to have done homage in 781 AD and again in 787 AD, probably owing to the presence of Frankish armies. But further trouble soon arose, and in 788 AD, the Franks summoned the duke to Ingelheim and sentenced him to death on a charge of treachery. The King, however, pardoned Tassilo who entered a monastery and formally renounced his duchy at Frankfurt in 794.
Gerold, a brother-in-law of Charlemagne, ruled Bavaria till his death in a battle with the Avars in 799, when Frankish counts took over the administration and assimilated the land with the rest of the Carolingian empire. Measures taken by Charlemagne for the intellectual progress and material welfare of his realm improved conditions. The Bavarians offered no resistance to the change which thus abolished their duchy. Their incorporation with the Frankish dominions, due mainly to the unifying influence of the church, appeared already so complete that Charlemagne did not find it necessary to issue more than two capitularies dealing especially with Bavarian affairs.
The Duchy during the Carolingian period
The history of Bavaria for the ensuing century intertwines with that of the Carolingian empire. Bavaria, given during the partition of 817 AD to the king of the East Franks, Louis the German, formed a part of the larger territories confirmed to him in 843 AD by the Treaty of Verdun. Louis made Regensburg the center of his government and actively developed Bavaria, providing for its security by numerous campaigns against the Slavs. When he divided his possessions in 865 AD, it passed to his eldest son, Carloman, who had already managed its administration, and after his death in 880 AD, it became a part of the extensive territories of the emperor, Charles the Fat. This ruler left its defense to Arnulf, an illegitimate son of Carloman. Mainly due to the support of the Bavarians, Arnulf could take the field against Charles in 887 AD and secure his own election as a German king in the following year. In 899 AD, Bavaria passed to Louis the Child, during whose reign continuous Hungarian ravages occurred. Resistance to these inroads became gradually feebler, and tradition has it that on 5 July 907 almost the whole of the Bavarian tribe perished in the Battle of Pressburg against them.