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Encyclopedia Britannica - Main :: FRA-GAE |
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FRANCONIA (Ger. Franken) , the name of one of the stem-duchies of medieval Germany. It stretched along the valley of the Main from the Rhine to Bohemia, and was bounded on the north by Saxony and Thuringia, and on the south by Swabia and Bavaria. It also included a district around Mainz, Spires and Worms, on the left bank of the Rhine. The word Franconia, first used in a Latin charter of 1053, was applied like the words France, Francia and Franken, to a portion of the land occupied by the Franks.About the close of the 5th century this territory was conquered by Clovis, king of the Salian Franks, was afterwards incorporated with the kingdom of Austrasia, and at a later period came under the rule of Charlemagne. After the treaty of Verdun in 843 it became the centre of the East Frankish or German kingdom, and in theory remained so for a long period, and was for a time the most important of the duchies which arose on the ruins of the Carolingian empire. The land was divided into counties, or gauen, which were ruled by counts, prominent among whom were members of the families of Conradine and Babenberg, by whose feuds it was frequently devastated. Conrad
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Francia rhenensis, Ger. Rheinfranken) and Eastern Franconia (Francia orientalis, Ger. Ostfranken). The most influential family in Rhenish Franconia was that of the Salians, the head of which early in the loth century was Conrad the Red, duke of Lorraine, and son-in-law of Otto the Great. This Conrad, his son Otto and his grandson Conrad are sometimes called dukes of Franconia; and in 1024 his great-grandson Conrad, also duke of Franconia, was elected German king as Conrad II. and founded the line of Franconian or Salian emperors. Rhenish Franconia gradually became a land of free towns and lesser nobles, and under the earlier Franconianemperors sections passed to the count palatine of the Rhine, the archbishop of Mainz, the bishops of Worms and Spires and' other clerical and lay nobles; and the name Franconia, or Francia orientalis as it was then called, was confined to the eastern portion of the duchy. Clerical authority was becoming predominant in this region. A series of charters dating from 822 to 1025 had granted considerable powers to the bishops of Wurzburg, who, by the time of the emperor Henry II., possessed judicial authority over the whole of eastern Franconia. The duchy was nominally retained by the emperors in their own hands until 1115, when the emperor Henry V., wishing to curb the episcopal influence in this neighbourhood, appointed his nephew Conrad of Hohenstaufen as duke of Franconia. Conrad's son Frederick took the title of duke of Rothenburg instead of duke of Franconia, but in 1196, on the death of Conrad of Hohenstaufen, son of the emperor Frederick I., the title fell into disuse. Meanwhile the bishop of Wurzburg had regained his former power in the duchy, and this was confirmed in 1168 by the emperor Frederick I.The title remained in abeyance until the early years of the 15th century, when it was assumed by John II., bishop of Wurzburg, and retained by his successors until the bishopric was secularized in 1802. The greater part of the lands were united with Bavaria, and the name Franconia again fell into abeyance. It was revived in 1837, when Louis I., king of Bavaria, gave to three northern portions of his kingdom the names of Upper, Middle and Lower Franconia. In 1633 Bernhard, duke of Saxe- Weimar
See J. G. ab Eckhart, Commentarii de rebus Franciae orientalis et episcopalus Wirceburgensis (Wurzburg, 1729); F. Stein, Geschichte Frankens ( Schweinfurt
FRANCS-ARCHERS. The institution of the francs-archers was the first attempt at the formation of regular infantry in France. They were created by the ordinance of Montils-les-Tours on the 28th of August 1448, which prescribed that in each parish an archer should be chosen from among the most apt in the use of arms; this archer to be exempt from the faille and certain obligations, to practise shooting
See Daniel, Histoire de la milice francaise (1721) ; and E. Boutaric, Institutions militaires de la France avant lesarmees permanentes (1863). FRANCS-TIREURS (" Free-Shooters "), irregular troops, almost exclusively infantry, employed by the French in the war of 187o-1871. They were originally rifle clubs or unofficial military societies formed in the east of France at the time of the Luxemburg crisis of 1867. The members were chiefly concerned with the practice of rifle- shooting
captured francs-tireurs as irresponsible non-combatants found with arms in their hands and usually exacted the death penalty. In July 187o, at the outbreak of the war, the societies were brought under the control of the minister of war and organized for field service, but it was not until the 4th of Novemberby which time the levee en masse was in forcethat they were placed under the orders of the generals in the field. After that they were sometimes organized in large bodies and incorporated in the mass of the armies, but more usually they continued to work in small bands, blowing up culverts on the invaders' lines of communication, cutting off small reconnoitring parties, surprising small posts, &c. It is now acknowledged, even by the Germans, that though the francs-tireurs did relatively little active mischief, they paralysed large detachments of the enemy, contested every step of his advance (as in the Loire campaign), and prevented him from gaining information, and that their soldierly qualities inproved with experience. Their most celebrated feats were the blowing up of the Moselle railway bridge at Fontenoy on the 22nd of January 1871 (see Les Chasseurs des Vosges by Lieut.-Colonel St Etienne, Toul, 1906), and the heroic defence of Chateaudun by Lipowski's Paris corps and the francs-tireurs of Cannes and Nantes (October 18, 1870). It cannot be denied that the original
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