The land of
Provence has a history quite separate from that of any of the larger nations of Europe. Its independent existence has its origins in the frontier nature of the dukedom in
Merovingian Gaul. In this position, influenced and affected by several different cultures on different sides, the Provençals maintained a unity which was reinforced when it was created a separate kingdom in the
Carolingian decline of the later ninth century. Provence was eventually joined to the
other Burgundian kingdom, but it remained ruled by its own powerful, and largely independent, counts.