The mind of Baddo: Assassination in Merovingian politics
One of the more repellent aspects of the Merovingian age is the apparent ease with which its society resorted to assassination. Ambition, dissimulation, and cupidity all too often found an outlet in political murder. But such behavior may be more than simply the upwelling of pure barbarism. Assassination in Merovingian politics may be the logical, if unhappy, byproduct of an altered world-view. 
 
The people of the Merovingian age were prone to take deeds as an accurate sign of inward intention, which brought the ultimate revelation of right and wrong forward to the present. And if the holiness of an action were readily apparent, even disgusting actions such as assassination may be seen, with proper exegesis of the Books of Judges, to produce right results. An examination of the implied conceptual circumstances surrounding assassination, the ‘mind’ of society to the deed, reveals a mixed attitude to these violent acts. 
 
The permissibility of assassination in qualified cases coupled with'the immediate establishment of it as holy or unholy, encouraged attempts on the lives of public figures. Once the full taboo had been broken, assassination became a dangerously routine solution to political grievances, and society's response to it became chillingly casual.
The saint as patron in the work of Gregory of Tours
Abstract Gregory of Tours and his world have long been out of fashion; but despite modern neglect of his works, Gregory gives us access to an understanding of many important aspects of late antiquity, among which is the role of the saint as patron. Saints appear as patrons throughout Gregory's works; the focus of this study is his account of the miraculous deeds of St. Martin. The role of the saint as patron is best understood against the background of the recent work of Peter Brown on holy men in late antiquity; several other scholars have also emphasized the importance of patrons in the Roman world. Appeals to the saints in Gregory's world are to be understood as one manifestation of the Roman ritual of appeal to a patron. More important than their afflictions are the social circumstances of those who appeal to St. Martin and analyzing some others in detail, we can demonstrate that the most important elements in those appeals are the social weakness of the appellants, their need for a saintly patron, and Martin's role as a model saintly patron in Gregory's world
Chemical constituents and chemotaxonomic study of Glycyrrhiza pallidiflora maxim
Abstract Phytochemical study of Glycyrrhiza pallidiflora Maxim. gave seventeen compounds, including two sterols (3 and 4), four triterpenes (1, 2, 5, 6), ten flavones (7, 9–17), and one pterocarpan (8). The chemotaxonomic significance of G. pallidiflora was discussed, which indicated the close relationship between G. pallidiflora with other species of Glycyrrhiza. Moreover, pallidiflorin can be served as a fingerprint for G. pallidiflora, macedonic acid and echinatin can be recognized as biomarkers for Glycyrrhiza, while formononetin, afrormosin and calycosin may be typical second metabolites for Papilionoideae.