[235] Sens was about a hundred miles southeast of Paris. Charles abandoned the region about Sens to the Northmen to plunder during the winter of 886-887. His very lame excuse for doing this was that the people of the district did not properly recognize his authority and were deserving of such punishment. [236] The twelve month siege of Paris thus brought to an end had many noteworthy results. Chief among these was the increased prestige of Odo as a national leader and of Paris as a national stronghold. Prior to this time Paris had not been a place of importance, even though Clovis had made it his capital. In the period of Charlemagne it was distinctly a minor city and it gained little in prominence under Louis the Pious and Charles the Bald. The great Carolingian capitals were Laon and Compiegne. The siege of 885-886, however, made it apparent that Paris occupied a strategic position, commanding the valley of the Seine, and that the inland city was one of the true bulwarks of the kingdom. Thereafter the place grew rapidly in population and prestige, and when Odo became king (in 888) it was made his capital. As time went on it grew to be the heart of the French kingdom and came to guide the destinies of France as no other city of modern times has guided a nation. [237] He was deposed in 887, largely because of his utter failure to take any active measures to defend the Franks against their Danish enemies. From Paris he went to Germany where he died, January 13, 888, at a small town on the Danube. [238] After the famous siege of Paris in 885-886 the Northmen, or Normans as they may now be called, continued to ravage France just as they had done before that event. In 910 one of their greatest chieftains, Rollo, appeared before Paris and prepared to take the city. In this project he was unsuccessful, but his warriors caused so much devastation in the surrounding country that Charles the Simple, who was now king, decided to try negotiations. A meeting was held at Saint-Clair-sur-Epte where, in the presence of the Norman warriors and the Frankish magnates, Charles and Rollo entered into the first treaty looking toward a permanent settlement of Northmen on Frankish territory. Rollo promised to desist from his attacks upon Frankland and to become a Christian. Charles agreed to give over to the Normans a region which they in fact already held, with Rouen as its center, and extending from the Epte River on the east to the sea on the west. The arrangement was dictated by good sense and proved a fortunate one for all parties concerned. [239] Robert was Odo's brother. "Duke of the Franks" was a title, at first purely military, but fast developing to the point where it was to culminate in its bearer becoming the first Capetian king [see p. 177]. [240] See p. 138, note 4. [241] If the offender had a lord, this lord would be expected to produce his accused vassal at court. [242] That is, the old blood-feud of the Germans.