ABSTRACT
This chapter considers why so much of Europe, outside the Byzantine Empire and Muslim Spain, came to be divided into kingdoms named after, and seemingly dominated by, particular peoples. It deals with the problems of how and why peoples developed in the context of the end of the Roman Empire in the West and the emergence of the barbarian kingdoms. A number of the rulers of barbarian kingdoms produced codes of law at quite an early date in their history. Thus Clovis, king of the Franks, produced the Salic law in the early sixth century. Marks and fashions could be used to denote membership of a particular people, such as weapons which were distinctive of a people, hair-styles and costumes, and jewellery which might be similarly distinctive. The sixth-century scholar in Spain, Isidore of Seville, connected the name 'Frank' with the use by the Franks of a throwing axe called a francisca.
