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(d. 681), Frankish "mayor of the palace," was a Neustrian, and wished to impose the authority of Neustria over Burgundy and Austrasia. In 656, at the moment of his accession to power, Sigebert III., the king of Austrasia, had just died, and the Austrasian mayor of the palace, Grimoald, was attempting to usurp the authority. The great nobles, however, appealed to the king of Neustria, Clovis II., and unity was re-established. But in spite of a very firm policy Ebroin was unable to maintain this unity, and while Clotaire III., son of Clovis II., reigned in Neustria and Burgundy, he was obliged in 660 to give the Austrasians a special king, Childeric II., brother of Clotaire III., and a special mayor of the palace, Wulfoald. He endeavoured to maintain at any rate the union of Neustria and Burgundy, but the great Burgundian nobles wished to remain independent, and rose under St Leger (Leodegar), bishop of Autun, defeated Ebroin, and interned him in the monastery of Luxeuil (670). A proclamation was then issued to the effect that each kingdom should keep its own laws and customs, that there should be no further interchange of functionaries between the kingdoms, and that no one should again set up a tyranny like that of Ebroin. Soon, however, Leger was defeated by Wulfoald and the Austrasians, and was himself confined at Luxeuil in 673. In the same year, taking advantage of the general anarchy, Ebroin and Leger left the cloister and soon found themselves once more face to face. Each looked for support to a different Merovingian king, Ebroin even proclaiming a false Merovingian as sovereign. In this struggle Leger was vanquished; he was besieged in Autun, was forced to surrender and had his eyes put out, and, on the 12th of October 678, he was put to death after undergoing prolonged tortures. The church honours him as a saint. After his death Ebroin became sole and absolute ruler of the Franks, imposing his authority over Burgundy and subduing the Austrasians, whom he defeated in 678 at Bois-du-Fay, near Laon. His triumph, however, was short-lived; he was assassinated in 681, the victim of a combined attack of his numerous enemies. He was a man of great energy, but all his actions seem to have been dictated by no higher motives than ambition and lust of power.

See Liber historiae Francorum, edited by B Krusch, in Mon. Germ. hist. script. rer. Merov. vol. ii.; Vita sancti Leodegarii, by Ursinus, a monk of St Maixent (Migne, Patr. Latina, vol. xcvi.); "Vita metrica" in Poetae Latini aevi Carolini, vol. iii. (Mon. Germ. hist.); J. B. Pitra, Histoire de Saint Leger (Paris, 1846); and J. Friedrich, "Zur Gesch. des Hausmeiers Ebroin," in the Proceedings of the Academy of Munich (1887, pp. 42-61). (C. PF.) Eburacum, or Eboracum (probably a later variant), the Roman name of York in England. Established about A.D.

75 - So as fortress of the Ninth legion and garrisoned (after the annihilation of that legion about A.D. 118) by the Sixth legion, it developed outside its walls a town of civil life, which later obtained Roman municipal rank and in the 4th century was the seat of a Christian bishop. The fortress and town were separated by the Ouse. On the left bank, where the minster stands, was the fortress, of which the walls can still be partly traced, and one corner (the so-called Multangular Tower) survives. The municipality occupied the right bank near the present railway station. The place was important for its garrison and as an administrative centre, and the town itself was prosperous, though probably never very large. The name is preserved in the abbreviated form Ebor in the official name of the archbishop of York, but the philological connexion between Eboracum and the modern name York is doubtful and has probably been complicated by Danish influence. (F. J. H.)