Dagobert II - (c. 650 – December 23, 679) (king of Austrasia 676 – 679). He was the last of the Merovingian dynasty to rule independently in Austrasia. As a boy Dagobert was given to the care of Desiderius, Bishop of Poitiers, where there was a cathedral school. Then he was sent on to a monastery in Ireland, sometimes identified as Slane, to be further trained as a page at an Anglo-Saxon court in England. An old tradition relates that he married Mechthilde, an Anglo-Saxon princess, during his exile. In 676 Dagobert was restored to a portion of his rightful lands, a territory along the Rhine. He died after being pierced through the eye in hunting incident. The name of Dagobert II achieved prominence in 20th century popular culture, when it became associated with speculation, which tried to link Dagobert II and his supposed descendants with a secret Merovingian line of legitimate royal succession, unjustly displaced by the Carolingian and Capetian monarchies but continuing into modern times. It is currently one of the central legends associated with the conspiracy-laden French village of Rennes-le-Château and existence of a thousand-year-old secret society, the Priory of Sion.

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Joyce's note: 'Dagobert educated / at Slane (cf / Brian O'Linn)'

Flood: Ireland: Its Saints and Scholars 83: Dagobert II., King of the Austrasian Franks, was educated at Slane.

Note: The reference to Brian O'Lynn is an extrapolation by Joyce, connecting the French song about 'le roi Dagobert qui met sa culotte à l'envers', with the Irish song about the intrepid Brian O'Lynn who liked to wear his breeches 'With the fleshy side out and the woolly side in'.

MS 47478-123, MT of insert: Dagobert went through his preparatory in Slane when he learned how to inside outbreeches from Brian Aulin, the chif culoteer. | JJA 52:022 | 1934 | II.2§3.2 | FW 274.29

Dagobert: 7th century king of Franks, educated at Slane (in comic song wears his trousers back to front; French song: Le bon roi Dagobert qui met sa culotte a l'envers: 'Votre Majesté est mal culottée').