ABSTRACT
Early medieval Gaul and Francia were shaped by their connections to the wider world. The present chapter outlines ways in which this took place in relation to key economic, political, and religious changes. In the first part, we see that horizons were affected by changes in both North Sea and Mediterranean trade networks, with different implications for north and south. The second part examines the influence of northern Germanic migration, conflict in the south with the Goth and Arabs, and flirtations with post-Roman ideas about empire, each of which gave new notions of shape and identity to political community. In the third section, this is contrasted with how communities dealt with being part of a “universal” Christian world defined not only by widely shared belief, ritual, and canon law but also by conflicts over heresies, paganisms, and Islam. Overall, the early Frankish kingdoms cannot be understood simply as a precursor to French history alone, as they were the product of more complex and expansive worlds of interaction.
