Year 475 (CDLXXV) was a common year starting on Wednesday of the Julian calendar. At the time, it was known as the Year of the Consulship of Zeno without colleague. The denomination 475 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.
Majorian was the western Roman emperor from 457 to 461. A prominent general of the Roman army, Majorian deposed Emperor Avitus in 457 and succeeded him. Majorian was the last emperor to make a concerted effort to restore the Western Roman Empire with its own forces. Possessing little more than Italy, Dalmatia, and some territory in northern Gaul, Majorian campaigned rigorously for three years against the Empire's enemies. His successors until the fall of the Empire, in 476/480, were actually instruments of their barbarian generals, or emperors chosen and controlled by the Eastern Roman court.
Eparchius Avitus was Roman emperor of the West 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.
Gaius Sollius Modestus Apollinaris Sidonius, better known as Sidonius Apollinaris, was a poet, diplomat, and bishop. Sidonius is "the single most important surviving author from fifth-century Gaul" according to Eric Goldberg. He was one of four Gallo-Roman aristocrats of the fifth- to sixth-century whose letters survive in quantity; the others are Ruricius, bishop of Limoges, Alcimus Ecdicius Avitus, bishop of Vienne and Magnus Felix Ennodius of Arles, bishop of Ticinum. All of them were linked in the tightly bound aristocratic Gallo-Roman network that provided the bishops of Catholic Gaul. His feast day is 21 August.
Riothamus was a Romano-British military leader, who was active circa AD 470. He fought against the Goths in alliance with the declining Western Roman Empire. He is called "King of the Britons" by the 6th-century historian Jordanes, but the extent of his realm is unclear. Some Arthurian scholars identify Riothamus as one of the possible sources of the legendary King Arthur.
Saint Mamertus was the bishop of Vienne in Gaul, venerated as a saint. His primary contribution to ecclesiastical practice was the introduction of litanies prior to Ascension Day as an intercession against earthquakes and other disasters, leading to "Rogation Days." His feast day is the first of the Ice Saints.
Saint Apollinaris of Valence (453–520), born in Vienne, France, was bishop of Valence, France, at the time of the irruption of the barbarians. Valence, which was the central see of the recently founded Kingdom of the Burgundians, had been scandalized by the dissolute Bishop Maximus, and the see in consequence had been vacant for fifty years.
Tonantius Ferreolus, was a vir clarissimus, or Gallo-Roman senator.
Ansbertus was a Frankish Austrasian noble, as well as a Gallo-Roman Senator. He is thought to be the son of Ferreolus, Senator of Narbonne and his wife, Dode. This would make him the great-grandson of Tonantius Ferreolus, Praetorian Prefect of Gaul and his wife Papianilla.
The Praetorian Prefecture of Gaul was one of four large prefectures into which the Late Roman Empire was divided.
Ecdicius Avitus was an Arverni aristocrat, senator, and magister militum praesentalis from 474 until 475.
Tonantius Ferreolus was the praetorian prefect of Gaul from 451.
Papianilla was an aristocrat of Roman Gaul.
Thaumastus was a friend and uncle of Sidonius Apollinaris. His brother, the elder Apollinaris was born around 405 and was the praetorian prefect of Gaul under Valentinian III between 425 and 455. Thaumastus and his brother were both sons of another Apollinaris, praetorian prefect of Gaul before 409 and were friends with his successor Decimus Rusticus. Thaumastus was associated with Tonantius Ferreolus in the impeachment of Arvandus. He was the father of Eulalia, born in 425, married before 450 to Flavius Probus, Roman Senator.
Agroecius or Agroetius was an ancient Gaul who was bishop of Sens. He was also a grammarian, and the author of an extant work in Latin, De Orthographia et Differentia Sermonis, intended as a supplement to a work on the same subject by Flavius Caper. It was composed around 450, and dedicated to the bishop Eucherius of Lyon, who apparently had earlier given Agroecius a copy of Caper's work. He is supposed to have lived in the middle of the 5th century. His work is reprinted in Putschius' Grammaticae Latinae Auctores Antiqui, pp. 2266–2275.
Theodoric I was the King of the Visigoths from 418 to 451. Theodoric is famous for his part in defeating Attila at the Battle of the Catalaunian Plains in 451, where he was killed.
Papianilla may refer to:
Agricola was an Arvernian noble and son of the Western Roman Emperor Avitus.
Apollinaris was a count of Auvergne who led a auvergnat army for the Visigoths in the Battle of Vouillé, and was bishop of Clermont for four months before his death.
The Battle of Vicus Helena was a clash between Salian Franks led by Chlodio and Roman soldiers commanded by general Flavius Aetius; the latter were victorious. It is attested in a limited number of late Roman and early Medieval sources, and reportedly occurred in or around the year 448 in the unidentified place of Vicus Helena somewhere in the Civitas Atrebatium, modern Artois.