3. The Cession of Tours to Childebert…

Emperor Wen summons Emperor Jing to Daxing to visit him in 587.

Emperor Jing leads a train of some 200 officials, but as he is departing Jiangling, the people of Jiangling, believing that he will be detained and not be able to return, weep bitterly.

Emperor Wen, claiming that he fears for Jiangling's safety in Emperor Jing's absence, sends his general Cui Hongdu, the Duke of Wuxiang, to Jiangling.

When Cui arrives in the nearby Ruo Province (roughly modern Yichang, Hubei), Emperor Jing's uncle Xiao Yan and brother Xiao Huan, suspicious that Cui is instead planning to attack, send the official Shen Jungong (uncle of Chen Shubao's Empress Shen Wuhua) to Chen Huiji, offering to surrender.

Chen Huiji quickly arrives at Jiangling, and Xiao Yan and Xiao Huan lead the people of Jiangling in leaving the city and fleeing into Chen territory.

When Emperor Wen hears of this, he issues an edict abolishing Liang.

He sends his official Gao Jiong to Jiangling to pacify the people who remain and to post guards to tend to the tombs of Emperor Ming and Emperor Ming's father Emperor Xuan.

The former Emperor Jing is created the Duke of Ju.

The Battle of Shigisan, a battle fought in 587 between Soga no Umako and Mononobe no Moriya at the riverside of the Ekagawa river in Kawachi Province, Japan near Mount Shigi, practically exterminates the Mononobe clan, the most powerful opponent of Buddhism.

The Soga clan, which has intermarried with the royal Yamato, had fought the Mononobe and Nakatomi clans over influence in selecting a new successor for the Japanese throne, after emperor Yōmei died.

The Soga favor importing Buddhism from the Asian mainland, described there as the religion of the most civilized.

The Mononobe and Nakatomi hold that Buddhism would be an affront to the gods.

The Soga win the civil war and Sushun, age sixty-six, becomes the thirty-second emperor of Japan.

Both Ishbara and Apa Khagan die in 587, and Ishbara's brother Bagha Qaghan tries to unite the khaganate, but cannot control the western portion, where the ambitious Tardu is acting independently.

Maurice builds more fortifications along the Danube frontier, separating the Empire from the realm of the Avars and Slavs.

Nothing is known of the early life of the imperial general Comentiolus, except that he hailed from Thrace.

He first appeared in 583, as an officer (scribon) in the Excubitores, the imperial bodyguard, when he accompanied an imperial embassy to Bayan I, the khagan of the Avars.

According to the historian Theophylact Simocatta, he enraged the khagan with an outspoken statement, and was briefly imprisoned.

It is likely that the close trust he shares with Maurice dates from the latter's time as commander of the Excubitores, before his ascension to the throne.

Throughout his career, Comentiolus will be loyal to Maurice, and the Emperor will watch over his protégé's career.

The next year, after a truce with the Avars had been arranged, he had been appointed in charge of a brigade (taxiarchia) operating against the Slavic tribes that raided Thrace and had penetrated as far as the Long Walls of Anastasius, Constantinople's outer defensive system.

Comentiolus had defeated them at the river Erginia, near the Long Walls.

As a reward for this success, he had been appointed magister militum praesentalis in 585.

On this occasion, or perhaps a bit later (possibly in 589), Comentiolus had been raised to the supreme title of patricius.

In the summer of 585, he had again defeated a large force of Slavs, and in 586 he had been placed in charge of the war against the Avars, after they broke the treaty.

In 587, Comentiolus assembles a ten thousand-strong army at Anchialus and prepares an ambush for the Avar khagan in the Haemus mountains, but it fails.

Slavic incursions into Laconia beginning in about 587 initiate what will prove to be two centuries of barbarism in southern Greece.

Liuvigild's son Reccared I converts to Catholic Christianity on succeeding his father as king of the Visigoths in 587, leading to some unrest in the kingdom, notably a revolt by the Arian bishop of Mérida, which is put down; he also beats back another Frankish offensive in the north.

Many Visigothic nobles follow his example, but in Septimania (Southern Gaul) are Arian uprisings also.

Reccared I then oversees the Third Council of Toledo in 589, where he announces his faith in the Nicene creed and denounces the Arian.

Adopting the name Flavius, the family name of the Constantinian dynasty, he styles himself as the successor to the Roman emperors.

He bans Jews from slave ownership, intermarriage and holding positions of authority.

He also declares that children of mixed marriages be raised Christian.

Reccared also fights the imperial forces in Hispania Baetica after they begin a new offensive.

The Isola Comacina, a small wooded island of Italy’s Lake Como, is in the late sixth century (around 587) a remaining Roman stronghold under Francio, a subordinate of Narses and his successors; though the surrounding areas are entirely controlled by the Lombards.

The island is besieged for a good deal of time by the Lombards under Authari, who releases Francio to flee back to the capital at Ravenna.

The Lombards find the island to contain "many riches" deposited for safekeeping by local Roman loyalists.

Claudius is sent to put down the revolt in Mérida after a count named Witteric had exposed the plot of Sunna, the city's Arian bishop, to place the Visigoth Segga on the throne and probably to also kill the Catholic Méridan bishop Masona in 587.

Segga is captured, his hands cut off (the penalty for usurpers), and banished to Galicia.

The less important conspirators are deprived of their property and offices and sent into exile, but one of the chief rebels, Vagrila, takes refuge in the basilica of Saint Eulalia.

Claudius is told, upon request, to give Vagrila, his family, and his possessions over to the church of Mérida, which he does.

Masona, however, releases Vagrila and his family and returned his property to him.

The Treaty of Andelot (November 28, 587 CE): Guntram Adopts Childebert II as His Heir

On November 28, 587 CE, King Guntram of Burgundy and Queen Brunhilda of Austrasia, acting on behalf of her son King Childebert II, sign the Treaty of Andelot-Blancheville. This treaty formalizes Guntram’s recognition of Childebert II as his heir and establishes an alliance against rebellious Frankish nobles (leudes).

1. Guntram’s Adoption of Childebert II as Heir

• Guntram, childless and aging, had no direct heirs to succeed him in Burgundy.
• By signing the treaty, Guntram adopts Childebert II, the son of Sigebert I and Brunhilda, as his rightful successor.
• This agreement ensures that, upon Guntram’s death, Burgundy will pass to Childebert, securing the unity of Austrasia and Burgundy.

2. Political Alliance Against the Revolted Leudes

• Guntram and Childebert agree to ally against rebellious Frankish nobles, known as leudes, who threaten royal authority.
• This is particularly important for Brunhilda, who had been struggling to maintain control in Austrasia since the assassination of Sigebert I in 575.
• The treaty solidifies the bond between Austrasia and Burgundy, providing both kingdoms with a united front against internal revolts and external threats.

Emperor Wen of the Sui Dynasty prepares a campaign against the Chen Dynasty.

He amasses five hundred and eighteen thousand troops along the northern bank of the Yangtze River, stretching from Sichuan to the Pacific Ocean.