Whatever the long-term effects of the Battle of Tours, in the short run, it seems to have been just another in the long string of Charles’ successful campaigns. Indeed, after removing the Bishop of Orleans and others in the region that had failed to heed Charles’ summons and supply their quota of troops, Charles returned his attention north to the Frisians, whom he again defeated in AD 733.

After Eudo’s death in AD 734, however, Charles extended his power over Aquitaine over the following two years through a clever mix of diplomacy and the threat of force (in the form of large army which he marched through the region to persuade the local magnates to submit). That Charles had succeeded where Eudo had failed may well have helped convince the local magnates their lands and lives were better protected by Charles than by Eudo’s untested sons (whom Charles allowed to jointly serve as dux, under his aegis).

After driving the Islamic invaders from Narbone in AD 737, however, Charles was again forced to turn his attention north, as the pagan Saxons again rose against him. Charles spent the next three years ravaging their lands and fully extending his authority over them.

When Charles passed on October 24, AD 741 he was able to divide his non-hereditary authority over the Regnum Francorum and its tributary states among his three sons, Karloman, Pippin the Short, and their young half-brother Gripho (who was the child of Charles’ second wife, Sunnichildis). In a move befitting their father’s ruthlessness, however, Karloman and Pippin deposed and imprisoned Gripho, had their stepmother placed in a convent, and (with the apparent consent of the magnates in the region that had been granted to Gripho) divided Gripho’s portion between them – all before the campaigning season for AD 742 had even begun!