The life of St Lambert of Maastricht
His later years brought him again into conflict with power, amid the rivalries between Frankish clans contesting the see of Maastricht and Liège as the Merovingian dynasty gave way to the Carolingians. Church tradition holds that Lambert publicly denounced Pepin's union with Alpaida, taken as a mistress or perhaps a second wife, as a betrayal of Christian marriage, and that men connected to Alpaida's family killed the bishop at a chapel in Liège in these years, probably around 705. Historians who have examined the sources note that this specific charge against Alpaida's circle appears only in later accounts and is not fully settled, though Lambert's violent death amid this political strife is not in doubt. He is remembered as a bishop who paid with his life in defense of conscience, and the city of Liège grew up around the site of his martyrdom.
