Stem duchies (from the German Stammesherzogtum, literally "tribal duchy") were associated with the Frankish Kingdom, especially the East, in the Early Middle Ages. In contrast to later duchies, these entities were not defined by strict administrative boundaries but by the area of settlement of major Germanic tribes. Their dukes were neither royal administrators nor territorial lords.

Historians distinguish between two sets of stem duchies, the older stem duchies (6th-8th century) and the younger stem duchies (9th-12th century).

Older stem duchies

The older stem duchies were regions inhabited by Germanic tribes that were associated with the Frankish Kingdom. The duchies were more or less independent entities ruled by native rulers, which had acquired the Roman title of dux. All of them found their end during the rule of the early Carolingians. These older stem duchies were:

• Alamannia (or Swabia)

The Alamanns came under Frankish supremacy around 539 and were ruled by various dukes until 746, when the Frankish mayor Carloman terminated the duchy in the Blood court at Cannstatt.

• Bavaria

The Bavarians came under Frankish supremacy around 550 and were ruled by the Agilolfings until 788, when Charlemagne deposed the last Duke.

• Saxony

The Saxons were loosely associated with the Merovingian Kingdom but practically remained independent until they were subdued by Charlemagne in the Saxon Wars (772–804).

Some tribes, such as the Frisians, never formed a stem duchy with cultural allegiance to any single duke.

Younger stem duchies

After the demise of the stem duchies, the Carolingians administered these regions through counts and prefects or sometimes distributed the rule to a member of the dynasty, e.g. Louis the German in Bavaria. After the division of the Kingdom in the Treaties of Verdun (843), Meerssen (870) and Ribemont (880), Bavaria, Alemannia and Saxony together with Eastern parts of the Frankish territory formed the Eastern Frankish Kingdom. The kingdom was divided among the sons of Louis the German largely along the lines of the tribes. After 899, under the rule of Louis the Child, royal power quickly disintegrated, which allowed local magnates to revive the duchies as autonomous entities, ruling their tribes under the supreme authority of the King. After end of the eastern branch of the Carolingians (911), the dukes competed for the crown with first the Franconian Conradines (911) and eventually the Saxon Liudolfings (919) winning out. Though their and their successors' strong government often reduced the dukes to royal lieutenants again, the stem duchies largely remained intact until the reign of the Hohenstaufen dynasty.

The Eastern Frankish Kingdom with the stem duchies:
Saxony (yellow), Franconia (blue), Bavaria (green), Swabia (orange)
and Lotharingia (pink).

The younger stem duchies were:

• Saxony (880-1180)

The Liudolfing family, which had long been employed in the administration of Saxony, rose to the position of Dukes and even attained the Kingship after 919. In the 11th century, the Duchy was ruled by the Billungs and after 1137 the Welfs dominated the duchy. The fall of Duke Henry the Lion in 1180 resulted in the dismantling of the stem duchy, into three smaller parts (Westphalia, Brunswick and the Duchy of Saxony on the river Elbe).

• Franconia (906-939)

The Conradine family, close to the royal court, obtained ducal hegemony in Franconia but never managed to unify the region. After attaining the Kingship in 911, they had to yield the crown to the Saxon Luidolfings. After a failed rebellion, the Conradines were deposed and the Duchy made into a land of the crown. The region fragmented into a conglomerate of noble territories and ecclesisiastical principalities.

• Bavaria (907-1180)

The Luitpolding family, responsible for the defense of Carinthia, rose to the position of Dukes. They were succeeded by a branch of the Luidolfings dynasty and eventually the Welfs, whose struggle with the Hohenstaufen Kings resulted in Bavaria being stripped of Austria (1156) and Styria and Tyrol (1180). The reduced territorial duchy was given to the Wittelsbach family.

• Swabia (909-1268)

The Thurgau-based Hunfridings first rose to the position of Dukes but soon lost the rule in their struggle with the Luidolfing Kings. After various families, the Duchy passed to the Hohenstaufen family in 1079. Their rise to the Kingship made Swabia a base of the crown but their fall in the 13th century left Swabia in complete disintegration, with remains falling to the Wittelsbach, Württemberg and Habsburg families.

• Lotharingia (903-959)

Though without a tribal identity (as a central component of the Frankish kingdom), Lotharingia was organized as a Duchy in 903 and kept a changing position between the Eastern and the Western Kingdom until 939, when it was firmly incorporated into the Eastern Kingdom. In 959 the Duchy was divided into Lower Lotharingia (which in turn fragmented further) and Upper Lotharingia (which developed into the territory called the Duchy of Lorraine)

Stem duchies in France

German historians have commonly restricted the term stem duchy to the Eastern kingdom with its variety of Germanic tribes in contrast to the romanized and more unified Western kingdom, whose duchies were considered regional units of administration withhout ethnic cohesion. J. Flach^[1] and W. Kienast^[2] however argued that the duchies of France (Bretagne, Normandy, Gascogne, Aquitaine, and Burgundy) also had an ethnic basis before the French kings began creating dukes in the fourteenth century. The nature and role of Germanic stem duchies are now often characterized by contrasting them with the oldest duchies of Francia.^[2]

Notes

Sources and external link

• The Stem Duchies & Marches
• Westermann, Großer Atlas zur Weltgeschichte (in German)

References

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