 It may have been just chance, but historian James Campbell has suggested that Chlothar summoned clergy from Britain to attend in an attempt to assert overlordship over Kent.The historian N. J. Higham offers another explanation for their attendance, arguing that Æthelberht sent the pair to the council because of shifts in Frankish policy towards the Kentish kingdom, which threatened Kentish independence, and that the two clergymen were sent to negotiate a compromise with Chlothar.A pagan backlash against Christianity followed Æthelberht's death in 616, forcing Justus and Mellitus to flee to Gaul.