BURGUNDY, or BounGoo sr, anciently a powerful kingdom in Gaul, was first established by the Burgun dians, a German nation, in the beginning of the fifth century. This people formerly occupied the countries of the present Thuringia and Lusace, on either side of the Elbe, and were supposed to have been descended from the Roman soldiers who had been left to garrison the conquests of Drusus ; though Pliny decidedly as sert~, that they were a tribe of the Vandals. Vindili, quorum pars Burgundione.,," //isl .Airt. iv. 28.) Before their emigration from the short s of the Baltic, they were engaged in almost constant hostilities with die. Alemanni, coneeroing their respective boundaries , and it was in con junction with that nation they made their first ap pearance on the Rhine, in the of the emperor Tacitus. After repeated irruptions into the empire, they at last obtained a grant from the usurper Jovinus, to settle in that part of Gaul which borders on the Rhine, under their king Gundicar, in 413 ; and this grant was afterwards confirmed by the emperor I lonorins, upon condition that they should assist the Romans, and serve in his armies as subjects of the empire. Their irrup tions, however, were continued ; and, leaguing them selves with the other barbarians front the north, they en tered Belgic Gaul, committing unparalleled ravages wherever they came. But their army was at last com pletely defeated by iEtius the Roman general, when they were compelled to sue for peace. Aldus afterwards re moved them into Sakai:lilt, now Savoy, an extensive tract between the Rhone and tie Alps ; and here they gradually dilated their boundalies until 490, when the territory of Cundobald, the Burgundian king, compre hended modern Burgundy, almost the Wilde of Switzer land and Dauphine, with a part of Provence and Savoy, and had Vienna for its capital. This monarch had sa crificed to his fears of a rival, two of his brothers, one of whom was the father of Clotilda, queen of the Franks; but had permitted the youngest to live, and to possess the dependent principality of Geneva. The prosperity of toe Burgundians, however, was but of short duration.
Clovis, king of the Franks, had spread his conquests over the finest provinces of Gaul, and was stopped only by the power and the valour of Gundobald. But the defection of Godegesil, the brother of the Burgundian king. decided the fate of his country; and Gondobald was compelled to yield to the arms of Clovis, and eon desc. tided to pay a yearly tribute to his conqueror. Upon the ( eath of Gundobaid in 509, his son, Sigisniund, as cc (led the t..rone. inc first act of his reign was to ac kno•ledge his subjection to the emperor of Constantino ple ; and the second, that is worth recording, was the inhuman murder of his innocent son, to satisfy ti.e pride and resentment of a step-mother. This he after w a•ds attempted to expiate, by austere devotion, and liberal do nations to the monastery of St Maurice in Vallais, which obtained for him the honours of a saint and a martyr. But a more dreadful expiation awaited hint from the sons of Clovis, who, with a powerful army of Franks, came to revenge upon the son of Gundobald the murder of their grandfiether. After an unsuccessful battle in 523, Sigismund fled to the desert, and attempted to conceal himself, under the habit of a monk ; but, being discover ed and betrayed by his own subjects, he was condemned, with his wife and two children, to be buried alive in a deep well at Orleans. The Burgundians submitted for a sl oit while to treir invaders. when, revolting under Gondemar, the brother of Sigismund, they recovered their independence after a severe struggle, but maintain ed It only for eight years. Toe sons of Clovis again en tered Burgundy ; and, in 534, completed the conquest of the kingdom, when Gondemar was obliged to save him self by flight ; and his subjects were reduced to pay an annual tribute, and to serve in the armies of their con querors. But, though now under the dominion of the Franks, tlyy c.outinued to enjoy their national laws, til the reign of Louis-le-DI home he, in the beginnio”,. (.1 the 'Mali century, It Lou incorporated v.ith tt,e other subjects of the French monarelly.