The
Saxon Wars were the campaigns and insurrections of the more than thirty years from 772, when
Charlemagne first entered
Saxony with the intent to conquer, to 804, when the last rebellion of disaffected
tribesmen was crushed. In all, eighteen battles were fought in what is now northwestern
Germany. They resulted in the incorporation of Saxony into the
Frankish realm and their forcible conversion from
Germanic paganism to
Catholicism.