More unusually among historical artists of the time, he also depicted the Franks, whose contribution to French history was then generally underrated in favour of the Gauls. His painting of the Alemannic rout at the hands of the Franks in the Battle of Tolbiac impressed Théophile Gautier at the 1848 Salon. His "Frankish Cavalry in Combat" was inspired by reading Chateaubriand. His paintings on Merovingian topics emphasise the barbaric cruelty of the rulers. Pepin the Short's overthrow of Childeric III with the agreement of Pope Zachary and the deposed king's imprisonment in the Monastery of St. Bertin at Saint-Omer is the subject of his painting "The Last of the Merovingians", for which he reportedly used one Jean Marie Dagobert as his model. At the 1883 Salon, the critic Charles Bigot hoped this would indeed be Luminais "last" Merovingian painting.