!!!Baiern

Bavarians, also Baiouarii, Baiovarii, Baiuwarii or Baivarii, (German: 
Baiern, Bajuwaren), Germanic people that arose from various tribes 
during the 5%%sup th/%  and 6%%sup th/%  centuries A.D. and settled in 
the area between the River Danube and the Alps: During the 4%%sup th/% 
 and 5%%sup th/%  centuries Germanic peoples who were Roman 
mercenaries were made to settle on the River Danube. Large groups of 
Marcomanni and German settlers from the Elbe Valley moved in from 
Bohemia. Parts of Eastern Germanic tribes who either passed through 
the area or disintegrated (Heruli and others) mixed with the peoples 
already settled there. The B. lived mainly in hamlets or small 
villages, and after the disintegration of Roman rule in the late 
5%%sup th/%  century they expanded further south into Alpine valleys 
and all along the River Danube. They mixed with Romans and the 
remaining Langobardi and settled in what are now the provinces of 
Upper Austria, Salzburg and Tirol as far as Saeben and the Pustertal 
Valley (Val Pusteria). Around 550 A.D. these various people were for 
the first time recorded as a single tribe. At this time the Bavarians 
were under Frankish dominion. Their land was composed of provinces 
with six families forming a noble upper class mentioned in the lex 
Baiuvariorum. Of these, the Burgundian House of Agilolfing became the 
leading dynasty from the middle of the 6%%sup th/%  century until 788. 
Conversion to Christianity started around 600 mainly due to the 
missionary work of Emmeram, Rupert and Corbinian and continued under 
Frankish dominion.

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The Bavarians were the main agents of colonisation in eastern Austria 
and Karantania before and during Carolingian times. Within the 
federate duchy of Bavaria, a march (border province) was instituted 
and settled after the year 955. From the 10%%sup th/%  century on 
there developed territories independent from the Bavarian duchy: the 
duchy of Carinthia in 976, Austria (Ostarichi) in 1156, Styria in 
1180, followed by the Archdiocese Salzburg and the county of Tirol.

!Literature
K. Reindel, Die Bajuwaren, 1981; H. Wolfram, Die Geburt 
Mitteleuropas, 1987; Die Bajuwaren, exhibition catalogue, Mattsee and 
Rosenheim 1988.


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