The Visigoths had now obtained a permanent home by the shores of the Atlantic. This final settlement of the Visigoths, who had moved about for twenty years in the three peninsulas of the Mediterranean, was a momentous stage in that process of compromise between the Roman Empire and the Germans which had been going on for many years and was ultimately to change the whole face of western Europe. Constantius was doing in Gaul what Theodosius the Great had done in the Balkans. There were now two orderly Teutonic kingdoms on Gallic soil under Roman lordship, the Burgundian on the Rhine, the Visigothic on the Atlantic. Continue reading “Western Europe gradually passes from the power of the Roman into that of the Teuton”
Wallia and the Visigothic settlement in Gaul
After a short intervening reign Wallia was elected king; and Wallia is an important person in the history of the Visigoths, for it was he who succeeded in marking out the limits of their new kingdom in Gaul. Continue reading “Wallia and the Visigothic settlement in Gaul”
The sack of Rome by Alaric’s Goths
The fall of Stilicho was the signal for the Roman troops to massacre with brutal perfidy the families of the barbarian auxiliaries who were serving in Italy. The foreign soldiers, 30,000 of them, straightway marched to Noricum, joined the standard of Alaric, and urged him to descend on Italy. Continue reading “The sack of Rome by Alaric’s Goths”
How the Eastern Romans escaped the Gothic danger (4th-5th cen. A.D.)
Valens was succeeded on the throne by Theodosius, a wise and virtuous prince, who set himself to repair, by caution and courage combined, the disaster that had shaken the Roman power in the Danube lands. Continue reading “How the Eastern Romans escaped the Gothic danger (4th-5th cen. A.D.)”
Raising an army in Post-Roman Europe – The seventh century Visigothic Spain
From the early seventh century the sources available to us are more numerous and more evenly distributed across the west. By this period, the ‘ethnic’ armies descended from the late Roman field armies had evolved into armies raised from classes of landowners. This evolution continued through the seventh century. Continue reading “Raising an army in Post-Roman Europe – The seventh century Visigothic Spain”
The historical importance of the westward movement of the Huns into Europe
A new enemy was on the horizon, an enemy of Teuton and Roman alike. The nomad hordes known to history as the Huns appeared in the reign of Emperor Valens west of the Caspian Sea, and swept over southern Russia. Continue reading “The historical importance of the westward movement of the Huns into Europe”