Gothic war of 457-458 | |||||||
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Part of Fall of the Western Roman Empire | |||||||
![]() Map of Southern France | |||||||
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Belligerents | |||||||
Visigoths, | West Roman Empire | ||||||
Commanders and leaders | |||||||
Theoderic II, Frederik | Majorianus, Aegidius, Nepotianus | ||||||
Strength | |||||||
10,000 - 15,000 | 20,000 | ||||||
Casualties and losses | |||||||
unknown | unknown |
The Gothic War of 457-458 was a military conflict between the Visigoths of Theoderic II against the Western Roman Empire of Emperor Majorian. The war began in 457 with a revolt of the Goths in Aquitania that pushed aside Roman authority, followed by an aggressive conquest in the adjacent Septimania aimed at area expansion. The war ended with a Roman victory over the Goths in the Battle of Arles in 458. [1]
The most important contemporary sources in which this war is reported are the Gallo-Roman writer Sidonius Apollinaris (431-489) and the bishop of Chaves Hydatius (400-469). Furthermore, the Historia Francorum (history of the Franks) of Gregory of Tours (535-594) is an early source.
In the run-up to this war, there was a crisis situation within the Western Roman Empire. Emperor Avitus was deposed in October 456 by the rebelling generals Ricimer and Majorian and then assassinated. In the Gallic provinces, the Gallo-Roman aristocracy rebelled against this deposition and appealed to the Burgundian and Visigothic allies. [2] The Visigothic King Theodoric II (453 - 466) was staying in Spain at that time where he campaigned against the Suebi along with the Bourgondian king Gundioc. When they reached the news of the deposition of the emperor and the revolt in Gaul, Theoderic left command to his generals Sunerik and Cyrila and returned to Toulouse, while Gundioc and his entire army returned to the mountains of Saudia. [3]
The recently appointed emperor in the east Leo I, who was now also emperor of the west until he had appointed a successor, inherited a difficult relationship with the west from his predecessors. He was initially unwilling to cooperate with the rebellious generals, but lacked sufficient influence to impose his will on the West. In the end, the extremely unstable situation in the west asked for a solution that made him dwell on the two generals who served in Italy. [4]
Leo appointed Ricimer as patricius e magister militum commander-in-chief with the title of Patrician and Majorian as magister militum, making Majorianus the subordinate of Ricimer. [5] In doing so, he insulted Majorianus who, with the support of the Senate, forced Leo to appoint him to Caesar on April 1, 457. When Leo hesitated to acknowledge him, Majorian proclaimed himself emperor of the west on December 28, 457, with the support of the Senate and the army.
The Gallic aristocracy considered Majorian elevation to emperor by the Senate as usurpation and put forward their own candidate Marcellinus as successor to Avitus. [6] To strengthen themselves against Roman power in Italy, they sought support from the Burgundians and Visigoths. A delegation representing several cities in addition to the senatorial nobility turned to Gundioc and sent an envoy to the emperor in the east. In exchange for more territory, the Burgundian king supported the Gallo-Romans and sent militias to the cities. The Visigothic king Theodoric also lined up behind the insurgents. [7]
The interregnum lasted months after the death of Avitus. Most of the Gallic cities and aristocracy were turned away from Italy, and Generals Ricimer and Majorian were unsure what to do now. Taking advantage of the situation, Theoderic saw opportunities to found his own state on Roman soil. In the course of 457 he put aside the treaty with the Romans and rebelled, with which the war began. In Aquitaine he drew all power towards him and ordered his brother Frederik to conquer the adjacent region Septimania. The answer to this from the formal authority in Italy was long overdue. An invasion of northern Italy by the Alemanni and the southern Vandals caused Ricimer and Majorian to focus their attention on other matters than the Visigoths in Gaul. Yet they had a windfall with the imperial army in Gaul which was partly under the command of Aegidius, a general who declared himself loyal to Majorian. With this they still had a card in their hands that would soon be deployed.
The advance of the Goths in the south continued reprehensively now that they encountered no opposition. Frederick conquered Septimania and Theodoric II seized Narbonne which gave the Goths access to the Mediterranean. This port city fell into his hands without gun violence thanks to the betrayal of the Roman general Agrippinus, unlike Aegidius, had turned away from Majorian. According to Mathisens, he belonged to the Gallic insurgents who had turned to the Burgundians. Nevertheless, after the conquest of Septimania, the Visigoths clashed with the Gallic field army led by Aegidus. Majorianus had appointed him magister militum per Gallias, replacing Agrippinus, [8] and given the order to put things in order in Gaul. At Arles, the Visigoths clashed with the Romans, with Aegidius being cut short. After his defeat, he withdrew from the south.
Recimer and Majorian could not send reinforcements now that they themselves were confronted with external incursions in Italy. From Raetia, the Alemanni penetrated Italian territory as far as Lake Maggiore. There they were intercepted and defeated by the troops of comes Burco, sent by Majorian to stop them. [9] A group of Vandals landed in Campania in the summer of 457, at the mouth of the Garigliano River, and began to destroy and plunder the region. Majorian personally led the Roman army to a victory over the invaders at Sinuessa killing many of them. [10]
Only after consolidating his position in Italy could Majorian concentrate on restoring power in Gaul. Before that, he first had to strengthen the Roman army. Unlike under Aetius, at this stage the Roman army no longer had the manpower and logistics to maintain itself as before. Majorianus recruited barbarians en masse to bring the army to strength. Some of these were Huns under a certain Tuldila, who came from a group that settled on the Danube during the collapse of Attila's empire. [11] Others were Rugi, Gepids, Heruli and Goths from Noricum and Pannonia, and it is likely that Majorianus agreed to formally recognize the territory and income they controlled in exchange for their military services. He may also have withdrawn some of the remaining Pannonian Limitanei [12] Be that as it may, from the military commander of Dalmatia Marcellinus he received support consisting of supplying troops and fleet units.
With his new federated troops, Majorian had assembled a force of as many as 10,000 men. He appointed Nepotianus as his second general in rank behind Ricimer and then marched across the Alps towards Gaul. Here Aegidius's army joined him, who had meanwhile strengthened with Frankish auxiliary troops, and their army now amounted to 20,000 men, with which the Roman army was considerably stronger than the armed forces that Theodoric could oppose. [13]
With the bulk of his army, supplemented by loyal foederati [14] and accompanied by his generals Aegidius and Nepotianus, Majorian marched in 458 against the Gallic insurgents who had united with the Burgundians of Gundioc. They entered the Rhone Valley and defeated the Burgundians even before they could have retreated into Lugdunum. Then it was the turn of the rebellious Gallic cities in the south, which surrendered one by one to Majorian.
After this, the Romans marched against the Visigoths of Theoderic who stayed with his army near Arles, at the mouth of the river Rhodanus (Rhône). [15] The resulting battle was an overwhelming defeat for the Goths. The Roman army was supreme in battle and won the battle. The defeated Visigoths fled after the defeat and King Theodoric II narrowly escaped death.
The Visigothic army fled to Toulouse where they were enclosed by the Roman army. After a brief siege, the king surrendered and peace talks began. In the peace that Majorian forced the Visigoths, they had to give up their settlements in Spain and Gaul and return within the limits of their settlement area in Aquitaine according to the original foederati treaty with the Romans from 418. [16]
The Burgundians were an early Germanic tribe or group of tribes. They appeared in the middle Rhine region, near the Roman Empire, and were later moved into the empire, in eastern Gaul. They were possibly mentioned much earlier in the time of the Roman Empire as living in part of the region of Germania that is now part of Poland.
The 450s decade ran from January 1, 450, to December 31, 459.
The 460s decade ran from January 1, 460, to December 31, 469.
Ricimer was a Romanized Germanic general who effectively ruled the remaining territory of the Western Roman Empire from 456 after defeating Avitus, until his death in 472, with a brief interlude in which he contested power with Anthemius. Deriving his power from his position as magister militum of the Western Empire, Ricimer exercised political control through a series of puppet emperors. Ricimer's death led to unrest across Italy and the establishment of a Germanic kingdom on the Italian Peninsula.
Majorian was the Western Roman emperor from 457 to 461. A prominent commander in the Western military, Majorian deposed Avitus in 457 with the aid of his ally Ricimer. Possessing little more than Italy, Dalmatia, as well as some territory in Hispania and northern Gaul, Majorian campaigned rigorously for three years against the Empire's enemies. In 461, he was murdered at Dertona in a conspiracy, and his successors until the Fall of the Empire in 476 were puppets either of barbarian generals or the Eastern Roman court.
Procopius Anthemius was the Western Roman emperor from 467 to 472. Born in the Eastern Roman Empire, Anthemius quickly worked his way up the ranks. He married into the Theodosian dynasty through Marcia Euphemia, daughter of Eastern emperor Marcian. He soon received a significant number of promotions to various posts, and was presumed to be Marcian's planned successor. However, Marcian's sudden death in 457, together with that of Western emperor Avitus, left the imperial succession in the hands of Aspar, who instead appointed Leo, a low-ranking officer, to the Eastern throne, probably out of fear that Anthemius would be too independent. Eventually, this same Leo designated Anthemius as Western emperor in 467, following a two-year interregnum that started in November 465.
Eparchius Avitus was Roman emperor of the Western Empire from July 455 to October 456. He was a senator of Gallic extraction and a high-ranking officer both in the civil and military administration, as well as Bishop of Piacenza.
Aegidius was the ruler of the short-lived Kingdom of Soissons from 461 to 464/465. Before his ascension he was an ardent supporter of the Western Roman emperor Majorian, who appointed him magister militum per Gallias in 458. After the general Ricimer assassinated Majorian and replaced him with Emperor Libius Severus, Aegidius rebelled and began governing his Gallic territory as an independent kingdom. He may have pledged his allegiance to the Eastern Roman emperor Leo I.
Theodoric II, Teodorico in Spanish and Portuguese, was the eighth King of the Visigoths, from 453 to 466.
The Kingdom or Domain of Soissons is the historiographical name for the ethnically Roman, de facto independent remnant of the Western Roman Empire's Diocese of Gaul, which existed during Late Antiquity as an initially nominal enclave and later rump state of the Empire until its conquest by the Franks in AD 486. Its capital was at Noviodunum, today the town of Soissons in France.
Marcellinus was a Roman general and patrician who ruled over the region of Dalmatia in the Western Roman Empire and held sway with the army there from 454 until his death. Governing Dalmatia both independently from, and under, six Emperors during the twilight of the Western Empire, Marcellinus proved to be an able administrator and military personality with sources making reference that he ruled justly and well and kept Dalmatia independent of the emperor and of barbarian rulers.
Libius Severus, sometimes enumerated as Severus III, was Western Roman emperor from 461 to his death in 465. A native of Lucania, Severus was the fourth of the so-called "Shadow Emperors" who followed the deposition of the Valentinianic dynasty in 455. He ruled for just under four years, attaining the throne after his predecessor, Majorian, was overthrown by his magister militum, Ricimer. Severus was the first of a series of emperors who were highly dependent on the general, and it is often presumed that Ricimer held most of the de facto power during Severus' reign
Agrippinus was a general of the Western Roman Empire, Magister militum per Gallias under emperors Valentinian III, Petronius Maximus, Avitus and Libius Severus.
Nepotianus was a general of the Western Roman Empire.
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The Battle of Orléans took place in the year 463 pitting the forces of the Kingdom of Soissons, under the command of the magister militum Aegidius, against those of the Visigoths who were commanded by the Visigoth King Theodoric II and his brother Federico.
Gothic revolt of Theodoric I was an uprising of the Gothic Fouderati in Aquitaine during the regime of Emperor Valentinian III (425-455). That rebellion was led by Theodoric I, King of the Visigoths and took place in the South of France. The uprising took place between 425 and 426, in the period shortly after the death of usurpator John and was terminated by a military operation under the command of Aëtius.
The Gothic War (436-439) was a military conflict between the Gothic foederati and the Western Roman Empire under Emperor Valentinian III. It occurred primarily in the Gallic provinces from 436 to 439. The key figures involved were the Gothic leader Theodoric I and the Roman army's commander-in-chief, Aetius. Contemporary sources characterize this conflict as a war. Additionally, there were uprisings of the Burgundians and the Bagaudae during the same period.
The Gothic War in Spain of 456 was a military operation of the Visigoths commissioned by the West Roman emperor Avitus. This operation consisted of an extensive campaign aimed at reclaiming the Spanish provinces of Lusitania and Betica that were in the hands of the Suebi and threatened Roman power in the provinces of Cartaginensis and Tarraconensis. The main players in this war were Theoderic II who led the army of the Visigoths and Rechiar the king of the Suebi. The Visigothic army was supported by Franks and Burgundian auxiliary troops.
The Roman Civil War of 456 was a military conflict in the 2nd half of 456 in which the generals Majorianus and Ricimer revolted against the West Roman Emperor Avitus. The war ended with a victory by the insurgents. Avitus was deposed as emperor and died shortly thereafter in mysterious circumstances.