Reginbert was followed by all the Neustrian Lombards, and was able to defeat the regent Ansprand at Novara. He died immediately after his victory, but his son Aribert followed up the success by winning a second battle in front of Pavia, and taking prisoner the boy Liutbert. [Sidenote: Civil wars of the Lombards.] The victor seized the capital, and was hailed as king by his followers, under the name of Aribert II. The regent Ansprand, who had escaped from Pavia, tried to keep up the civil war in the name of his ward: but the new king put an end to this attempt by ordering the boy Liutbert to be strangled in his bath. Ansprand then fled over the Alps and took refuge with the duke of Bavaria. Aribert II. reigned over the Lombards for ten troubled years (701-11), fully occupied by the tasks of putting down rebellious dukes, driving back raids of the Carinthian Slavs from Venetia, and endeavouring to assert his power over Spoleto and Benevento. The time was opportune for attacking the imperial possessions in Italy, but Aribert refrained from making the attempt. He was friendly to the papacy, and made over to pope John VI. a great gift of estates in the Cottian Alps: nor did he assist his vassal Faroald, duke of Spoleto, when the latter in 703 made an attempt on the Exarchate. Aribert preferred to live in peace both with the Pope and the Emperor. Aribert II. had gained his kingdom by the sword, and by the sword he was destined to lose it. In 711 the exile Ansprand, once the regent for the boy Liutbert, invaded Italy at the head of a Bavarian army, lent to him by duke Teutbert. Many of the Lombards still loved the house of Berthari and hated Aribert as a murderer and usurper. The army of Ansprand was ere long increased by many thousands of the ‘Austrian’ Lombards, and he was soon able to face the king in the open field near Pavia. The battle was indecisive, but when it was over Aribert retired within the walls of the city. His retreat discouraged his army, which began to fall away from him: thereupon Aribert determined to take with him the royal treasure, and flee to Gaul to buy aid of the Franks. While endeavouring to cross the Ticino by night with all his hoard, he was accidentally drowned, and left the throne vacant for his rival Ansprand (712). The ex-regent was now proclaimed king, but only survived his triumph a few months: on his deathbed he prevailed on the Lombards to elect as his colleague his son Liutprand, who therefore became sole ruler when his father died a few days later. [Sidenote: Liutprand, king of the Lombards, 712-43.] Liutprand was the most able and energetic king who ever ruled the Lombard realm, and his long reign of thirty-one years (712-43) saw the completion of the long-delayed process of the eviction of the East-Romans from Central Italy, and the rise of the Lombards to the highest pitch of success which they ever knew—a rise which was to be closely followed by the extinction of their kingdom.