Mayor Of The Palace (Lat. major domus regice, or magister palatii), an officer of state in France under the Merovingian kings, who originally exercised the functions of royal steward, having the management of the king's estates and the direction of his household. By degrees these functionaries usurped almost the entire power of the state, the kings remaining such only in name, whence they were called rois faineants or lazy kings. This assumption of absolute power dates from the middle of the 7th century, when the administration of Australia, Neustria, and Burgundy was engrossed by their mayors, Grimoald, Archam-baud, and Ebroin. Pepin of Heristal, mayor of Austrasia, from 688 to his death in 714 ruled France with absolute sway, and was succeeded by his natural son Charles Martel, whose son Pepin the Short, father of the emperor Charlemagne, took the title of king, and founded the Carlovingian dynasty of French mon-archs. The office then lost much of its importance, or was altogether abolished.