Editing Bavaria (section)

===Middle Ages===
Around the year 500 AD, some elements of that victorious Marcomanni people helped form the [[Bavarii]] confederation, which incorporated [[Bohemia]] and Bavaria.<ref>{{Cite web |last=Kessler |first=P. L. |title=Kingdoms of the Germanic Tribes - Marcomanni (Suevi) |url=https://www.historyfiles.co.uk/KingListsEurope/BarbarianMarcomanni.htm |access-date=2024-07-29 |website=The History Files |language=en}}</ref> In the 530s, the [[Merovingian dynasty]] incorporated the kingdom of [[Thuringia]] after their defeat by the [[Franks]]. The [[Baiuvarii]] were Frankicised a century later.<ref>{{cite book |editor1=Heiko Steuer | editor2= Janine Fries-Knoblach | editor3= John Hines| title=The Baiuvarii and Thuringi: An Ethnographic Perspective |publisher= Boydell Press | year=2014 |isbn=9781843839156|page = 2  }}</ref> The [[Lex Thuringorum]] documents an upper class nobility of ''adalingi''.<ref>{{cite book |editor1=Heiko Steuer | editor2= Janine Fries-Knoblach | editor3= John Hines| title=The Baiuvarii and Thuringi: An Ethnographic Perspective |publisher= Boydell Press | year=2014 |isbn=9781843839156|page= 7}}</ref> From about 554 to 788, the house of [[Agilolfing]] ruled the [[Duchy of Bavaria]], ending with [[Tassilo III]] who was deposed by [[Charlemagne]].<ref>{{cite book |author1=Warren Brown |title=Unjust Seizure |date=2001 |isbn=9780801437908 |page=63 |publisher=Cornell University Press |edition=1st }}</ref>

[[Tassilo I of Bavaria]] tried unsuccessfully to hold the eastern frontier against the expansion of [[Slavic peoples]] and the [[Pannonian Avars]] around 600. [[Garibald II of Bavaria|Garibald II]] seems to have achieved a balance of power between 610 and 616.<ref>{{cite web |title=History of Bavaria |url=http://www.guide-to-bavaria.com/en/Bavaria-History.html |website=Guide to Bavaria |access-date=31 August 2015 |archive-date=6 September 2015 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150906235754/http://www.guide-to-bavaria.com/en/Bavaria-History.html |url-status=live }}</ref>

At Hugbert's death in 735, the [[duchy]] passed to [[Odilo of Bavaria]] from the neighboring [[Alemannia]]. Odilo issued a [[Lex Baiuvariorum]] for Bavaria, completed the process of church organization in partnership with [[Saint Boniface]] in 739, and tried to intervene in Frankish succession disputes by fighting for the claims of the [[Carolingian dynasty]]. He was defeated near [[Augsburg]] in 743 but continued to rule until his death in 748.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Frassetto |first1=Michael |title=The Early Medieval World: From the Fall of Rome to the Time of Charlemagne [2 Volumes] |date=2013 |publisher=ABC-CLIO |isbn=978-1598849967 |page=145 }}</ref><ref>{{cite book |last1=Collins |first1=Roger |title=Early Medieval Europe, 300–1000 |date=2010 |publisher=Palgrave Macmillan |isbn=978-1137014283 |page=273 }}</ref>

[[Saint Boniface]] completed the people's conversion to Christianity in the early 8th century. [[Tassilo III of Bavaria]] succeeded to rule Bavaria. He initially ruled under Frankish oversight but began to function independently from 763 onward. He was particularly noted for founding new monasteries and for expanding eastwards, oppressing [[Slavs]] in the [[eastern Alps]] and along the [[Danube]] and colonizing these lands. After 781, however, Charlemagne began to exert pressure and Tassilo III was deposed in 788. Dissenters attempted a coup against [[Charlemagne]] at [[Regensburg]] in 792, led by [[Pepin the Hunchback]].

[[File:Karte Herzogtum Bayern im 10. Jahrhundert.png|thumb|A map of Bavaria in the 10th century]]

With the revolt of [[Henry II, Duke of Bavaria]] in 976, Bavaria lost large territories in the south and southeast.

One of the most important dukes of Bavaria was [[Henry the Lion]] of the [[house of Welf]], founder of [[Munich]], and ''de facto'' the second most powerful man in the empire as the ruler of two duchies. When in 1180, Henry the Lion was deposed as Duke of [[Saxony]] and Bavaria by his cousin, [[Frederick I, Holy Roman Emperor]] (a.k.a. "Barbarossa" for his red beard), Bavaria was awarded as [[fief]] to the [[Wittelsbach]] family, counts palatinate of Schyren ("Scheyern" in modern German). They ruled for 738 years, from 1180 to 1918. In 1180, however, [[Styria]] was also separated from Bavaria. The [[Electorate of the Palatinate]] by Rhine (''Kurpfalz'' in German) was also acquired by the [[House of Wittelsbach]] in 1214, which they would subsequently hold for six centuries.<ref>{{cite book |last1=Harrington |first1=Joel F. |title=Reordering Marriage and Society in Reformation Germany |date=1995 |publisher=Cambridge University Press |isbn=978-0521464833 |page=17 }}</ref>

The first of several divisions of the duchy of Bavaria occurred in 1255. With the extinction of the [[House of Hohenstaufen|Hohenstaufen]] in 1268, [[Swabia]]n territories were acquired by the Wittelsbach dukes. [[Louis IV, Holy Roman Emperor|Emperor Louis the Bavarian]] acquired [[Margraviate of Brandenburg|Brandenburg]], [[County of Tyrol|Tyrol]], [[County of Holland|Holland]] and [[County of Hainaut|Hainaut]] for his House but released the [[Upper Palatinate]] for the Palatinate branch of the Wittelsbach in 1329. That time also [[Salzburg (state)|Salzburg]] finally became independent from the [[Duchy of Bavaria]].

In the 14th and 15th centuries, upper and lower Bavaria were repeatedly subdivided. Four Duchies existed after the division of 1392: [[Bavaria-Straubing]], [[Bavaria-Landshut]], [[Bavaria-Ingolstadt]] and [[Bavaria-Munich]]. In 1506 with the [[Landshut War of Succession]], the other parts of Bavaria were reunited, and Munich became the sole capital. The country became a center of the Jesuit-inspired [[Counter-Reformation]].