Rewriting Merovingian history in the tenth century: Aimoin of Fleury's Gesta Francorum
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2017 John Wiley & Sons Ltd. Aimoin of Fleurys Gesta Francorum has mostly been ignored apart from its importance as a source for the Grandes Chroniques de France. Aimoins editorial techniques in reworking his Merovingian-era sources deserve more attention, however. Through a process of selective editing, strategic silence, and rhetorical invention he compiled a history that would appeal to its probable target audience, King Robert II of West Francia. The most noteworthy changes wrought by Aimoin are the assignment of a divinely appointed imperial and evangelizing mission to the Franks and the transformation of Clovis into an exemplary Christian king.