Gothic war in Spain | |||||||
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Part of Fall of the Western Roman Empire | |||||||
![]() Map of the Spanish provinces | |||||||
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Belligerents | |||||||
Western Roman Empire Visigoths | Alans Silingi | ||||||
Commanders and leaders | |||||||
Constantius III Wallia | Attaces Respendial Fredebal | ||||||
Strength | |||||||
± 10.000 | unknown |
The Gothic War in Spain was a military operation of the Visigoths commissioned by the West Roman Empire. This operation consisted of multiple campaigns that took place between 416 and 418 and were directed against the Vandals and the Alans to restore Roman power in the Spanish provinces of Betica, Lusitania and Cartaginense. [1] As far as is known, the Roman field army was not involved in the battles, only foederati units fought on the side of the Romans. [1] According to Thompson the Hasdingi in Gallaecia played a dubious role in this war.
The history of this war is briefly handed down, the main source is Hydatius (400-469), bishop of Chaves. Without his Chronicles, no history of Spain would have been known in the 5th century. [2] Another contemporary is Orosius (375-420). Furthermore, Sidonius Apollinaris (430-486), the nameless Gallic Chronicle of 452, and Isidore of Seville (560-636) are useful sources. Also prominent historians such as E.A. Thompson and B.P. Bachrach have written the necessary about the period.
The broad outlines of the events are known. After three years of warfare, the Visigoths knocked down Romes' enemies in Spain and almost destroyed them. Fredebal, the king of the Silingen was captured and Attaces, the Alan king in Lusitania, was killed. Gunderic, the Vandal Hasdingi king in Gallaecia, was lucky, because they were not attacked by the Visigoths. Unfortunately, the reason for this has not been reported and the answer to it has been provided by later historians. According to Thompson, Gunderic was accepted by the emperor as an ally and it was his troops who dealted a heavy blow to the Alans in Carthaginensis. At that moment Constantius thought it was enough and intervened, he forced the Visigoths to stop their campaign and they had to leave Spain.
On December 31, 405/406, a coalition of barbaric peoples (Alanen,(Vandals: Hasdingi and Silingi) and Suebi) broke through the Roman border defense on the Rhine and invaded Gallia, which event is known as the Rhine Crossing. In their wake, a trail of destruction arose. Shortly thereafter, the rebellious British army under the leadership of Constantine III crossed the Channel. With a mixture of fighting and diplomacy, the British usurper stabilized the situation and established his control over Gaul and Hispania (modern Spain and Portugal). In addition, he had little to fear of the imperial field army that had been largely withdrawn because of the War of Radagaisus.
Constantine managed to reach an agreement with the Alans and Vandals, which allowed him to establish his authority, while the Alans and Vandals in turn could secure their own interests. He also managed to persuade a part of the Alans led by King Goar to fight by his side. [3] From those barbarians, Constantine created a regiment called the Honorians. which he gave as task to guard the mountain passes in the Pyrenees. [4] In 409 Constantine's general Gerontius revolted against him in Spain and the Alans regiments were withdrawn from the Pyrenees, allowing the Alans and Vandals to enter the Iberian peninsula without problems. [5]
In October 409, the Vandal, Alanian and Suevian tribes arrived in Spain, where they plunder. The Romans could do little to do with this. Most of Constantine's army units were in the province of Tarragona where they were deployed in the war against the rebellious general Gerontius.
The Spanish-Romans, like their fellow citizens in Gaul, seem to have made no effort to fight with the invaders; they rather joined the fortified cities, villages and castra in the hope that the Alans and the Vandals would move on. The intruders who were nomads in their neighborhood do not seem to have made any attempts to take the fortified places. The inhabitants, although they could only venture into the countryside with some risk, found the fields depted of food. In some areas famine arose, contemporaries report that it was not uncommon for a mother to eat her own children. [6]
In 411, Gerontius, taking his entire armed forces, left Spain to fight Constantine. The newcomers filled this power vacuum and decided to take possession of the land and divide it among themselves. [7] The Alans were the most important group and owned the provinces Lusitania and Tarraconenses, the Vandal Silingi received Baetica, while the Vandal Hasdingi and the Suebi divided the smallest province Gallecia among themselves.
With the Spanish-Roman landowners, they concluded an arrangement for the distribution of the land based on hospitality, i.e. the Alans and other invaders became the guests of the Roman landowners and received a significant part of the income from their estates. In exchange for this income, guests 'protected' their hosts from robbers and looters. They also founded their own settlements. These arrangements seem to have brought peace to Spain temporarily. [8]
Honorius' imperial army was at a distance in ItaIia, where it was bound after the war against Radagaisus to contain the Visigoths. After the fall of Rome in 410, they were in the south and were now on their way north. In addition, the army was to protect the Italian prefecture from the usurpators Constantine III, Jovinus and Heraclianus. Only after Constantius III, the commander-in-chief of Honorius' army, neutralized these threats and made peace with the Visigoths in 415, did the Romans gather the troops they could miss to be deployed the invaders. [9] However, capacity for this remained limited, as the ongoing wars had halved the Roman army since 395. [10]
The Western Roman Empire had been at war with the Visigoths since 410, albeit there were periods of cooperation. It simply had too few men to defeat the Visigoths, but on the contrary, the Visigothic soldiers were also indispensable in the defense of the empire against its enemies.
In 414, Athaulf, King of the Visigoths, married Galla Placidia, the daughter of Emperor Theodosius (379-395). After the conclusion of this marriage, relations with the Romans were again disrupted by Honorius' general Constantius (who would later become Emperor Constantius III), and who had proceeded to block the Mediterranean ports of Gaul. In response to this, Athaulf proclaimed Priscus Attalus as emperor in Bordeaux in 414. But Constantius' sea blockade was successful and in 415 Athaulf exchanged South-France for Northern-Spain. Attalus fled, fell into the hands of Constantius and was exiled to the island of Lipari.
Ataulf crossed the Pyrenees and installed his court in Barcino (present-day Barcelona) in the Tarraconence. Nevertheless, the arrival to Spain was peaceful, Athaulf met with no opposition. Not confirmed by source material, it seems that Athaulf and Constantius came to an agreement. The peaceful entry into Barcelona, as well as the arrest of Attalus, seem to reflect this, apparently based on the Visigoths' desire for peaceful coexistence with the Romans and that of the Roman Empire to use the power of the Goths to fight the other tribes that had migrated to the interior of Spain years earlier.
After dividing Spain among themselves, the Alans and Vandals of the Romans hoped to receive the status of foederati and addressed a request to Emperor Honorius. In exchange for peace, they offered to fight for the empire as allies, and to show their good will they were willing to give hostages. However, on the advice of his chief adviser, the commander-in-chief of the army Constantius, the emperor rejected this request, with the exception of the Hasdingi. [11] Honorius chose to subjugate the barbarians in Spain, by applying divide and rule, he wanted to weaken them. To realize this plan, the Visigoths, with whom he had recently concluded a new peace treaty, were his main trump card.
In Spain, the Alans were divided into two main groups: a group led by Respendial was located in Cartaginensis and a group under the leadership of Attaces in Lusitania. [1] The Vandals were also divided into two groups; in Silingi and Hasdingi, albeit with this difference that they had been known for much longer (from the 2nd century) as separate tribal associations. The Silings were located in the southern province of Baetica and the Hasdingi in northern Gallaecia. [12]
In Honorius' attack plan to restore Roman authority in the Spanish provinces, the Hasdingi were given a special task to fulfill. He did not charge the reconquest of the province of Cartaginensis on the Visigoths but ordered the Hasdingi to do so. [1] Even before the Visigoths took action, the Hasdingi under the leadership of king Gunderic went up against the Alans of Respendial and defeated them in a battle that presumably took place near the cities of Toletum and Consabura. The conquered had to place themselves under Gunderics' authority and leave Cartaginensis. [1]
In the middle of the year 416, the Visigothic army left Barcino (Barcelona) and began its campaign against the Silingi. They harboured a special resentment against this people, because the Silingi had benefited from the food shortage among the Visigoths in previous years and had sold their wheat at exorbitant prices. [13] It is unknown how big the army of the Visigoths was, but it will probably have been around 10,000. Except for Wallia, no names of the Roman command have been handed down, this could indicate that Wallia itself held the supreme command. The campaign led them along the coast towards the province of Baetica, which the Silingi had appropriated. The sources do not mention how the journey took, it is suspected that the Visigoths were transported by sea in ships of the Imperial Navy. [14]
In the south of Baetica the Visigoths went ashore and soon attacked the Silingi. After a series of short battles that usually ended indecided Wallia managed to capture their king Fredebal by means of a list. [15] A decisive battle between the two armies took place near 'western Calpe' (Carteia) where the Visigoths inflicted a destructive defeat to the Silingi. [16] All 417 the victors on the Silings who fled north with their families fled north, where they sought refuge from the Hasdingi. [17]
The next target of the Visigoths were the Alans of Attaces. The Visigoths advanced north and entered their territory. At Mérida the capital of Lusitania, they were met by the Alan army with King Attacus at the head. In the battle that took place near the city, the Alan army was defeated and their king was killed in the battle. [18] Just like the other group of Alans and the Silingi had done, the survivors chose to flee to the territory of Hasdingi to join them, and without appointing a new leader. [16]
The Goths only stopped fighting when they were ordered to do so by Constantius. His reasons for this have led to a lot of speculation. Most of these speculations have tried to explain Constantius' action by referring to the state of affairs in Gaul. In addition, many historians are dominated by the belief that the imperial authorities apparently had no objection to the presence of the barbarians as long as the Roman administrative structure was maintained, and the latter had now been met. The Goths had stripped Baetica and Lusitania of their Vandal and Alan inhabitants.
Now that the goal of the war was reached, after the defeat of the Alans in 418, Constantius ordered the Goths to stop the campaign and go to Gaul where they were given a settlement area in the province Aquitania. This meant that no war was waged against the barbarians who stayed in Gallaecia. The empire continued its alliance agreement with the Hasdingi, while the Suebi were finally also left alone. [1]
When the "enemies" were subdued, Guntharic dominated all the remaining Vandals and Alans in Spain.
With this outcome of the war, the Roman Emperor Honorius had managed to recover his provinces disembed in 407 and restore the imperial government in them. For the year 420 there is evidence of the existence of a governor for Hispania and it again had its own field army. [19] Nevertheless, the peace was short-lived, the Vandal king Gunderic already considered his military strength strong enough within two years after the war to expand his territory at the expense of the Suebi. In 421 his army left mountainous Gallaecia and moved south, where they captured Baetica and defeated the Roman field army.
The Hasdingi were one of the Vandal peoples of the Roman era. The Vandals were Germanic peoples, who are believed to have spoken an East Germanic language, and were first reported during the first centuries of the Roman empire in the area which is now Poland, eastern Germany, the Czech Republic, and Slovakia.
The 400s decade ran from January 1, 400, to December 31, 409.
Year 409 (CDIX) was a common year starting on Friday of the Julian calendar. In the Roman Empire, it was known as the Year of the Consulship of Honorius and Theodosius. The denomination 409 for this year has been used since the early medieval period, when the Anno Domini calendar era became the prevalent method in Europe for naming years.
Gunderic, King of Hasding Vandals (407-418), then King of Vandals and Alans (418–428), led the Hasding Vandals, a Germanic tribe originally residing near the Oder River, to take part in the barbarian invasions of the Western Roman Empire in the fifth century.
The Vandals were a Germanic people who first inhabited what is now southern Poland. They established Vandal kingdoms on the Iberian Peninsula, Mediterranean islands, and North Africa in the fifth century.
Wallia, Walha or Vallia, was king of the Visigoths from 415 to 418, earning a reputation as a great warrior and prudent ruler. He was elected to the throne after Athaulf and Sigeric were both assassinated in 415. One of Wallia's most notable achievements was negotiating a foedus with the Roman emperor Honorius in 416. This agreement allowed the Visigoths to settle in Aquitania, a region in modern-day France, in exchange for military service to Rome. This settlement marked a significant step towards the eventual establishment of a Visigothic kingdom in the Iberian Peninsula. He was succeeded by Theodoric I.
Athaulf was king of the Visigoths from 411 to 415. During his reign, he transformed the Visigothic state from a tribal kingdom to a major political power of late antiquity.
Constans II was the son of Western Roman emperor Constantine III, and served as his co-emperor from 409 to 411. Constans was a monk prior to his father being acclaimed emperor by the army in Britain in early 407, an act of rebellion against the ruling emperor Honorius. He was summoned to Gaul, appointed to the position of caesar (heir) and swiftly married so that a dynasty could be founded. In Hispania, Honorius's relatives rose in 408 and expelled Constantine's administration. An army under the generals Constans and Gerontius was sent to deal with this and Constantine's authority was re-established. Honorius acknowledged Constantine as co-emperor in early 409 and Constantine immediately raised Constans to the position of augustus (emperor), theoretically equal in rank to Honorius as well as to Constantine. Later in 409 Gerontius rebelled, proclaimed his client Maximus emperor and incited barbarian groups in Gaul to rise up. Constans was sent to quash the revolt, but was defeated and withdrew to Arles. In 410, Constans was sent to Hispania again. Gerontius had strengthened his army with barbarians and defeated Constans; the latter withdrew north and was defeated again and killed at Vienne early in 411. Gerontius then besieged Constantine in Arles and killed him.
The Silings or Silingi were a Germanic tribe, part of the larger Vandal group. The Silingi at one point lived in Silesia, and the names Silesia and Silingi may be related.
This is a historical timeline of the Iberian Peninsula during the period of the post-Imperial kingdoms.
Hermeric was the king of the Suevi from at least 419 and possibly as early as 406 until his abdication in 438.
The Kingdom of the Suebi, also called the Kingdom of Galicia or Suebi Kingdom of Galicia, was a Germanic post-Roman kingdom that was one of the first to separate from the Roman Empire. Based in the former Roman provinces of Gallaecia and northern Lusitania, the de facto kingdom was established by the Suebi about 409, and during the 6th century it became a formally declared kingdom identifying with Gallaecia. It maintained its independence until 585, when it was annexed by the Visigoths, and was turned into the sixth province of the Visigothic Kingdom in Hispania.
Goar was a leader of the Alans in 5th-century Gaul. Around the time that the Vandals and other Alans under Respendial crossed the Rhine in 405 or 406, Goar's band of Alans quickly joined the Romans, and subsequently played a role in the internal politics of Gaul.
Addac or Attaces was king of the western Alans in Hispania. In 409, the Alans settled in the provinces of Lusitania and Carthaginiensis: Alani Lusitaniam et Carthaginiensem provincias, et Wandali cognomine Silingi Baeticam sortiuntur. Some doubt whether the Alans held all or just parts of Carthaginiensis.
The Visigothic Kingdom, Visigothic Spain or Kingdom of the Goths occupied what is now southwestern France and the Iberian Peninsula from the 5th to the 8th centuries. One of the Germanic successor states to the Western Roman Empire, it was originally created by the settlement of the Visigoths under King Wallia in the province of Gallia Aquitania in southwest Gaul by the Roman government and then extended by conquest over all of Hispania. The Kingdom maintained independence from the Eastern Roman or Byzantine Empire, whose attempts to re-establish Roman authority in Hispania were only partially successful and short-lived.
The Battle of the Nervasos Mountains occurred in the year 419 and was fought between a coalition of Suebi, led by King Hermeric together with allied Roman Imperial forces stationed in the Province of Hispania, against the combined forces of the Vandals and Alans who were led by their King Gunderic. This battle occurred in the context of a contemporary Germanic invasion of the Iberian Peninsula. The battle took place in what is today the Province of León, Spain, and resulted in a Roman/Suebian Victory.
Asterius was a Roman general who obtained the title of comes Hispaniarum in which capacity he participated in an important military expedition against the Vandals who had established themselves in the north of Gallaecia. He was also able to defeat the usurper, Maximus of Hispania who had taken refuge with the barbarian tribes there. Due to his military prowess and his considerable amount of battlefield victories, he was given the title of Patrician in 422.
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 Bagaudae Revolt (409-417) was a violent conflict in the early 5th century, involving part of the population in northwestern Gaul. The uprising was an indirect result of the Rhine crossing in 405–406, through which various Germanic peoples invaded the Western Roman Empire, as well as the revolt of the army in Britannia and the resulting civil war. In the following period, the Gallic population largely had to rely on itself and formed self-defense groups, which were called Bagaudae. In mid-409, groups of Bagaudae in the Loire Valley and Brittany rebelled against the Roman regime. The course of this uprising has been briefly reported. Most of the information comes from the work of the Byzantine historian Zosimus (460-515), the Roman poet Rutilus Namatianus and the priest Salvianus from Marseille.
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.