Clovis I

Clovis I

Clovis (Latin: Chlodovechus; reconstructed Frankish: *Hlōdowig; c. 466 – 27 November 511) was the first king of the Franks to unite all of the Franks under one ruler, changing the form of leadership from a group of petty kings to rule by a single king and ensuring that the kingship was passed down to his heirs. He is considered to have been the founder of the Merovingian dynasty, which ruled the Frankish kingdom for the next two centuries. Clovis is important in the historiography of France as "the first king of what would become France." Clovis succeeded his father, Childeric I, as a king of the Salian Franks in 481, and eventually came to rule an area extending from what is now the southern Netherlands to northern France, corresponding in Roman terms to Gallia Belgica (northern Gaul). Read more on Wikipedia

Since 2007, the English Wikipedia page of Clovis I has received more than 3,298,637 page views. His biography is available in 85 different languages on Wikipedia (up from 82 in 2019). Clovis I is the 131st most popular politician (down from 114th in 2019), the 3rd most popular biography from Belgium and the 3rd most popular Belgian Politician.

Clovis I is most famous for being the first known Native American culture to use the atlatl, a spear-throwing device.