For reasons which we know not, Charles and Carloman had never been friendly—perhaps the younger son as born after his father’s coronation may have claimed some precedence over the elder, who was the son merely of a Mayor of the Palace. We know at any rate that throughout the three years of their joint reign they were always on the edge of a quarrel. Nothing but the influence and advice of their worthy mother Bertha kept them from an open rupture. Luckily for the realm both were good sons, and listened to the maternal pleadings: still more luckily for the Franks the life of the younger king was destined to be a short one. If Carloman had been granted many days on earth, we may be sure that the history of the last quarter of the ninth century would have repeated the old fratricidal wars of the Merovings. The historians who wrote the life of the great Charles are never tired of insisting on the many provocations which his brother gave him. If Carloman had chanced to find an apologist we might perhaps have learnt that Charles also gave subjects for offence. The commencement of the joint reign of the two kings was followed by the prompt revolt of the newly subdued Aquitaine. Duke Waifer, the leader of the Southerners in their long war with Pippin, being dead, his old father Hunold emerged from his monastery to put himself at the head of the insurrection. [Sidenote: Charles subdues Aquitaine 769.] The country as far north as Angoulême—which was kept down by a Frankish garrison—at once fell away to him, for the Gascons trusted that the two jealous brothers would be too much occupied with their grievances against each other to spare time for the reconquest of the south. Charles immediately marched against the rebels, and invited Carloman to accompany him: the younger king appeared for a moment, but only to hold an angry colloquy with his senior and then to return to Burgundy. He did not, however, take the opportunity to attack Charles, and the latter was able to pursue, unaided but also unhindered, his campaign against the Aquitanians. It was completely successful: he forced his way in arms as far as Bordeaux, built a great fortified camp at Fronsac, which was destined to remain as the central stronghold of the Garonne for many generations, and so thoroughly beat Hunold that the old man fled for refuge to Lupus, duke of the Gascons. But Lupus fearing the wrath of Charles submitted to the conqueror, surrendered the fugitive, and asked and obtained peace. Charles went home in triumph, replaced Hunold in a cloister, and was henceforth undisputably king in Aquitaine. He divided the country into countships on the usual Frankish system, and placed these provinces in the hands not of natives, but of men from north of the Loire whose fidelity he could trust. For the future Aquitaine gave no trouble.