Beyond Brunhild: reassessing women in the Fredegar Chronicle

Scholarly consideration of women in the seventh-century Fredegar chronicle has long been dominated by the author’s hostility towards Brunhild, queen of Austrasia. Statistical analysis of Latin world chronicles before ad 900, however, shows that Fredegar’s representation of women was unusually high within this tradition. Close examination of the chronicle reveals diverse portrayals of queenship, with women acting as autonomous political actors rather than being defined by their reproductive capacity or their piety, as was common in early medieval chronicles. This article argues that Fredegar saw women as integral actors in his vision of universal history.