Europe. The opening of the volume sets the stage for a deep exploration of Clovis's life and legacy, detailing the difficulty of reconstructing his history due to the scarcity and fragmentary nature of the surviving sources. Kurth discusses the lack of direct historical documentation from Clovis's reign, highlighting how previous accounts have been marred by legend and myth. The author expresses his motivation to provide a comprehensive narrative about Clovis, emphasizing his influence in shaping the early medieval society of the Franks and his pivotal role in the Christianization of the region. Kurth introduces the complex historical context, which will form the foundation for the subsequent exploration of Clovis’s conquests, reign, and the foundational events that positioned him as a key figure in European history. (This is an automatically generated summary.)