Part I, Chapter 5

Of the Kingdoms represented by the feet of the Image composed of iron and clay.

Dacia was a large country bounded on the south by the Danube, on the east by the Euxine Sea, on the north by the river Neister and the mountain Crapac, and on the west by the river Tibesis, or Teys, which runs southward into the Danube a little above Belgrade. It comprehended the countries now called Transylvania, Moldavia, and Wallachia, and the eastern part of the upper Hungary. Its ancient inhabitants were called Getæ by the Greeks, Daci by the Latins, and Goths by themselves. Alexander the great attacked them, and Trajan conquered them, and reduced their country into a province of the Roman Empire; and by that the propagation of the Gospel among them was much promoted. They were composed of several Gothic nations, called Ostrogoths, Visigoths, Vandals, Gepides, Lombards, Burgundians, Alans, etc., who all agreed in their manners and spoke the same language, as Procopius represents. While they lived under the Romans, the Goths or Ostrogoths were seated in the eastern parts of Dacia, the Vandals in the western part upon the river Teys, where the rivers Maresh and Keresh run into it. The Visigoths were between them. The Gepides, according to Jornandes, were upon the Vistula. The Burgundians, a Vandalic nation, were between the Vistula and the southern fountain of the Boristhenes, at some distance north of the mountain Crapac, where Ptolemy places them, by the names of Phrugundiones and Burgiones.¹ The Alans, another Gothic nation, were between the northern fountain of the Boristhenes and the mouth of the river Tanais, where Ptolemy places the mountain Alanus and the western side of the Palus Mæotis.

These nations continued under the dominion of the Romans until the second year of the Emperor Philip, and then, for want of their military pay, began to revolt; the Ostrogoths setting up a kingdom, which, under their kings Ostrogotha, Cniva, Araric, Geperic, and Hermanaric, increased until the year of Christ 376; and then, through an incursion of the Hunns from beyond the Tanais and the death of Hermanaric, broke into several smaller kingdoms. Hunnimund, the son of Hermanaric, became King over the Ostrogoths; Fridigern over the Visigoths; Winithar, or Vinithar, over a part of the Goths called Gruthungi by Ammian, Gothunni by Claudian, and Sarmatæ and Scythians by others; Athanaric reigned over another part of the Goths in Dacia, called Thervingi; Box over the Antes in Sarmatia; and the Gepides also had their King. The Vandals fled over the Danube from Geberic in the latter end of the reign of Constantine the great, and had settlements granted them in Pannonia by that Emperor, where they lived quietly forty years, namely until the year 377, when several Gothic nations, flying from the Hunns, came over the Danube and had settlements granted them in Mæsia and Thrace by the Greek Emperor Valens. But the next year they revolted, called in some Goths, Alans, and Hunns from beyond the Danube, routed the Roman army, killed the Emperor Valens, and spread themselves into Greece and Pannonia as far as the Alps. In the years 379 and 380 they were checked by the arms of the Emperors Gratian and Theodosius, and made a submissive peace; the Visigoths and Thervingi returned to their settlements in Mæsia and Thrace, the Hunns withdrew across the Danube, and the Alans and Gruthingi obtained settlements in Pannonia.

About the year 373 or 374, the Burgundians rose from their settlements upon the Vistula with an army of eighty thousand men to invade Gallia; and, being opposed, seated themselves upon the northern side of the Rhine opposite Mentz. In the year 358, a body of the Salian Franks, with their King, coming from the river Sala, were received into the Empire by the Emperor Julian, and settled in Gallia between Brabant and the Rhine; and their King Mellobaudes was made count of the household by the Emperor Gratian. Richomer, another noble Salian Frank, was made count of the household and master of both services by Theodosius, and in A.C. 384 was Consul with Clearchus. He was a great favorite of Theodosius, and accompanied him in his wars against Eugenius, but died in the expedition, and left a son called Theudomir, who afterward became King of the Salian Franks in Brabant. In the time of this war some Franks from beyond the Rhine invaded Gallia under the conduct of Genobald, Marcomir, and Suno, but were repulsed by Stilico; and Marcomir, being killed, was succeeded in Germany by his son Pharamond.

While these nations remained quiet within the Empire, subject to the Romans, many others continued so beyond the Danube until the death of the Emperor Theodosius, and then rose up in arms. For Paulus Diaconus, in his Miscellaneous History, book xiv, speaking of the times next after the death of this Emperor, tells us: "At that time there were Goths and other very great nations living beyond the Danube; of these the four most reasonable are the Goths, the Visigoths, the Gepids, and the Vandals, changing only their name and nothing else. These, under Arcadius and Honorius, crossed the Danube and were settled in the land of the Romans; and the Gepids, from whom afterward the Lombards and the Avars were divided, occupied the villages around Singidonum and Sirmium"; and Procopius, at the beginning of his History of the Vandals, writes to the same purpose. Until now the Western Empire continued entire, but now it broke into many kingdoms.

Theodosius died A.C. 395; and then the Visigoths, under the conduct of Alaric the successor of Fridigern, rose from their settlements in Thrace and wasted Macedon, Thessaly, Achaia, Peloponnesus, and Epirus with fire and sword for five years together; when, turning westward, they invaded Dalmatia, Illyricum, and Pannonia; and from there went into Italy A.C. 402; and the next year were so beaten at Pollentia and Verona by Stilico, commander of the forces of the Western Empire, that Claudian calls the remnant of Alaric's forces "the brief remains of so great a people," and Prudentius "a people destroyed." Thereupon Alaric made peace with the Emperor, being so far humbled that Orosius says he did "pray humbly and simply for the best peace and for any settlements whatever." This peace was ratified by mutual hostages; Ætius was sent as a hostage to Alaric; and Alaric continued a free Prince in the settlements now granted to him.

When Alaric took up arms, the nations beyond the Danube began to be in motion; and the next winter, between A.C. 395 and 396, a great body of Hunns, Alans, Ostrogoths, Gepides, and other northern nations came over the frozen Danube, being invited by Rufinus: when their brethren, who had obtained settlements within the Empire, took up arms also. Jerome calls this great multitude Hunns, Alans, Vandals, Goths, Sarmatians, Quades, and Marcomans; and says that they invaded all places between Constantinople and the Julian Alps, wasting Scythia, Thrace, Macedon, Dardania, Dacia, Thessaly, Achaia, Epirus, Dalmatia, and all Pannonia. The Suevians also invaded Rhætia; for when Alaric ravaged Pannonia, the Romans were defending Rhætia; which gave Alaric an opportunity of invading Italy, as Claudian thus mentions:

"Only through treachery did they find a moment they could pierce:the Getæ broke in, while Rhætia holds our forcesand the cohorts sweat in another battle."

And when Alaric went from those parts into Italy, some other barbarous nations invaded Noricum and Vindelicia, as the same Poet Claudian thus writes:

"…Now the nations had thrown off their treaties, and,fierce at the report of the defeat of Latium, heldthe Vindelician woods and the fields of Noricum."

This was in the years 402 and 403. And among these nations I reckon the Suevians, Quades, and Marcomans; for they were all in arms at this time. The Quades and Marcomans were Suevian nations; and they and the Suevians came originally from Bohemia, and the river Suevus or Sprake in Lusatia; and were now united under one common King called Ermeric, who soon after led them into Gallia. The Vandals and Alans might also about this time extend themselves into Noricum. Uldin also, with a great body of Hunns, passed the Danube about the time of Chrysostom's banishment, that is, A.C. 404, and wasted Thrace and Mæsia. Radagaisus, King of the Gruthunni and successor of Winithar, inviting over more barbarians from beyond the Danube, invaded Italy with an army of above two hundred thousand Goths; and within a year or two, A.C. 405 or 406, was overcome by Stilico, and perished with his army. In this war Stilico was assisted with a great body of Hunns and Ostrogoths, under the conduct of Uldin and Sarus, who were hired by the Emperor Honorius. In all this confusion it was necessary for the Lombards in Pannonia to arm themselves in their own defense, and assert their liberty, the Romans being no longer able to protect them.

And now Stilico, purposing to make himself Emperor, procured a military prefecture for Alaric, and sent him into the East in the service of Honorius the Western Emperor, committing some Roman troops to his conduct to strengthen his army of Goths, and promising to follow soon after with his own army. His pretense was to recover some regions of Illyricum, which the Eastern Emperor was accused to detain injuriously from the Western; but his secret design was to make himself Emperor, by the assistance of the Vandals and their allies: for he himself was a Vandal. For facilitating this design, he invited a great body of the barbarous nations to invade the Western Empire, while he and Alaric invaded the Eastern. And these nations, under their several Kings, the Vandals under Godegisilus, the Alans in two bodies, the one under Goar, the other under Resplendial, and the Suevians, Quades, and Marcomans under Ermeric, marched through Rhætia to the side of the Rhine, leaving their settlements in Pannonia to the Hunns and Ostrogoths, and joined the Burgundians under Gundicar, and harassed the Franks in their further march. On the last of December A.C. 406, they passed the Rhine at Ments, and spread themselves into Germania prima and the adjacent regions; and among other actions the Vandals took Triers. Then they advanced into Belgium, and began to waste that country. After which the Salian Franks in Brabant took up arms, and, under the conduct of Theudomir, the son of Ricimer, or Richomer, mentioned above, made so stout a resistance that they killed almost twenty thousand of the Vandals, with their King Godegesilus, in battle; the rest escaping only by a detachment of Resplendial's Alans, which came timely to their assistance.

Then the British soldiers, alarmed by the rumor of these things, revolted, and set up tyrants there; first Marcus, whom they killed at once; then Gratian, whom they killed within four months; and lastly Constantine, under whom they invaded Gallia A.C. 408, being favored by Goar and Gundicar. And Constantine having possessed a good part of Gallia, created his son Constans Cæsar, and sent him into Spain to order his affairs there, A.C. 409.

In the meantime Resplendial, seeing the aforesaid disaster of the Vandals, and that Goar was gone over to the Romans, led his army from the Rhine; and, together with the Suevians and the residue of the Vandals, went toward Spain; the Franks in the meantime prosecuting their victory so far as to retake Triers, which, after they had plundered, they left to the Romans. The Barbarians were at first stopped by the Pyrenean mountains, which made them spread themselves into Aquitain; but the next year they had the passage betrayed to them by some soldiers of Constans; and entering Spain 4 Kal. Octob. A.C. 409, they conquered every one what he could; and at length, A.C. 411, divided their conquests by lot; the Vandals obtained Boetica, and part of Gallæcia; the Suevians the rest of Gallæcia; and the Alans Lusitania and the Carthaginian Province: the Emperor, for the sake of peace, confirming them in those settlements by grant A.C. 413.

The Roman Franks mentioned above, having made Theudomir their King, began soon after their conquest of the Vandals to invade their neighbors also. The first they set upon were the Gauls of Brabant²; but meeting with notable resistance, they desired their alliance; and so those Gauls fell off from the Romans, and made an intimate league with the Franks to be one people, marrying with one another, and conforming to one another's manners, till they became one without distinction. Thus by the access of these Gauls, and of the foreign Franks also, who afterward came over the Rhine, the Salian kingdom soon grew very great and powerful.

Stilico's expedition against the Greek Emperor was stopped by the order of Honorius; and then Alaric came out of Epirus into Noricum, and requested a sum of money for his service. The Senate were inclined to deny him, but by Stilico's mediation granted it. But after some time Stilico being accused of a traitorous conspiracy with Alaric, and killed 10 Kal. Sept. A.C. 408; Alaric was by that disappointed of his money, and reputed an enemy to the Empire; he then broke at once into Italy with the army he brought out of Epirus, and sent to his brother Adolphus to follow him with whatever forces he had in Pannonia, which were not great, but yet not to be despised. Thereupon Honorius, fearing to be shut up in Rome, retired to Ravenna in October A.C. 408. And from that time Ravenna continued to be the seat of the Western Emperors. In those days the Hunns also invaded Pannonia; and, seizing the deserted settlements of the Vandals, Alans, and Goths, founded a new kingdom there. Alaric advancing to Rome besieged it, and 9 Kal. Sept. A.C. 410 took it; and afterward attempting to pass into Africa, was shipwrecked. After which Honorius made peace with him, and got up an army to send against the tyrant Constantine.

At the same time Gerontius, one of Constantine's captains, revolted from him, and set up Maximus Emperor in Spain. After which Constantine sent Edobec, another of his captains, to draw to his assistance the Barbarians under Goar and Gundicar in Gallia, and supplies of Franks and Alemans from beyond the Rhine; and committed the custody of Vienne in Gallia Narbonensis to his son Constans. Gerontius advancing, first killed Constans at Vienne, and then began to besiege Constantine at Arles. But Honorius at the same time sending Constantius with an army on the same errand, Gerontius fled, and Constantius continued the siege, strengthened by the arrival of the greater part of the soldiers of Gerontius. After a siege of four months, Edobec having procured succors, the Barbarian Kings at Ments, Goar and Gundicar, made Jovinus Emperor, and together with him set forward to relieve Arles. At their approach Constantius retired. They pursued, and he beat them by surprise; but not prosecuting his victory, the Barbarians soon recovered themselves; yet not so as to hinder the fall of the tyrants Constantine, Jovinus, and Maximus. Britain could not be recovered to the Empire, but remained ever after a distinct kingdom.

The next year, A.C. 412, the Visigoths, being beaten in Italy, had Aquitain granted them to retire into; and they invaded it with much violence, causing the Alans and Burgundians to retreat, who were then depopulating it. At the same time the Burgundians were brought to peace; and the Emperor granted them for inheritance a region upon the Rhine which they had invaded; and the same, I presume, he did with the Alans. But the Franks not long after retaking and burning Triers, Castinus, A.C. 415, was sent against them with an army, who routed them and killed Theudomir their King. This was the second taking of Triers by the Franks. It was therefore taken four times, once by the Vandals and thrice by the Franks. Theudomir was succeeded by Pharamond, the Prince or King of the Salian Franks in Germany. From there he brought new forces, reigned over the whole, and had settlements granted to his people within the Empire near the Rhine.

And now the Barbarians were all quieted, and settled in several kingdoms within the Empire, not only by conquest, but also by the grants of the Emperor Honorius. For Rutilius, in his Itinerary, written in Autumn, Anno Urbis 1169, that is, according to Varro's computation then in use, A.C. 416, thus laments the wasted fields:

"Those fields, indeed, too marred by long wars;"

And then adds,

"Now it is time, after the long fires, upon the torn fields,to build pastoral huts."

And a little after,

"May the Rhine plow your fields forever."

And Orosius, in the end of his history, which was finished A.C. 417, represents now a general pacification of the barbarous nations by the words "to restrain, to compress, and to subject the most savage nations"; terming them "subject to the empire," because they had obtained settlements in the Empire by league and compact; and "compressed," because they did no longer invade all regions at pleasure, but by the same compact remained quiet in the settlements then granted them. And these are the kingdoms, of which the feet of the Image were henceforward composed, and which are represented by iron and clay intermixed, which did not stick one to another, and were of different strength.

Notes to Chap. V.

1 Procopius, book 1 of the Vandal War.

2 The Gauls of the grove: from which the region was named Arboricbant, and by contraction Brabant.

Of the Kingdoms represented by the feet of the Image composed of iron and clay.

Dacia was a large country, bounded on the south by the Danube, on the east by the Euxine sea, on the north by the river Neister and the mountain Crapac, and on the west by the river Tibesis, or Teys, which runs south into the Danube a little above Belgrade. It included the countries now called Transylvania, Moldavia, and Wallachia, and the eastern part of the upper Hungary. Its ancient inhabitants were called Getæ by the Greeks, Daci by the Latins, and Goths by themselves. Alexander the great attacked them, and Trajan conquered them and turned their country into a Province of the Roman Empire; this greatly advanced the spread of the Gospel among them. They were made up of several Gothic nations, called Ostrogoths, Visigoths, Vandals, Gepides, Lombards, Burgundians, Alans, and others, who all had the same customs and spoke the same language, as Procopius describes. While they lived under the Romans, the Goths or Ostrogoths were seated in the eastern parts of Dacia, the Vandals in the western part on the river Teys, where the rivers Maresh and Keresh run into it. The Visigoths were between them. The Gepides, according to Jornandes, were on the Vistula. The Burgundians, a Vandalic nation, were between the Vistula and the southern source of the Boristhenes, some distance north of the mountain Crapac, where Ptolemy places them by the names of Phrugundiones and Burgiones.¹ The Alans, another Gothic nation, were between the northern source of the Boristhenes and the mouth of the river Tanais, where Ptolemy puts the mountain Alanus and the western side of the Palus Mæotis.

These nations stayed under the dominion of the Romans until the second year of the Emperor Philip, and then, for lack of their military pay, they began to revolt; the Ostrogoths set up a kingdom, which under their Kings Ostrogotha, Cniva, Araric, Geperic, and Hermanaric grew until the year of Christ 376; then, with an invasion of the Hunns from beyond the Tanais and the death of Hermanaric, it broke into several smaller kingdoms. Hunnimund, the son of Hermanaric, became King over the Ostrogoths; Fridigern over the Visigoths; Winithar, or Vinithar, over a part of the Goths called Gruthungi by Ammian, Gothunni by Claudian, and Sarmatæ and Scythians by others; Athanaric reigned over another part of the Goths in Dacia, called Thervingi; Box over the Antes in Sarmatia; and the Gepides also had their King. The Vandals fled over the Danube from Geberic at the end of the reign of Constantine the great, and were given seats in Pannonia by that Emperor, where they lived quietly forty years, that is, until the year 377, when several Gothic nations fleeing from the Hunns came over the Danube and were given seats in Mæsia and Thrace by the Greek Emperor Valens. But the next year they revolted, called in some Goths, Alans and Hunns from beyond the Danube, routed the Roman army, killed the Emperor Valens, and spread themselves into Greece and Pannonia as far as the Alps. In the years 379 and 380 they were checked by the arms of the Emperors Gratian and Theodosius and made a submissive peace; the Visigoths and Thervingi returned to their seats in Mæsia and Thrace, the Hunns withdrew over the Danube, and the Alans and Gruthingi were given seats in Pannonia.

About the year 373, or 374, the Burgundians left their seats on the Vistula with an army of eighty thousand men to invade Gallia; meeting resistance, they settled on the north side of the Rhine opposite Mentz. In the year 358, a body of the Salian Franks, with their King, came from the river Sala, were received into the Empire by the Emperor Julian, and settled in Gallia between Brabant and the Rhine; and their King Mellobaudes was made Comes domesticorum by the Emperor Gratian. Richomer, another noble Salian Frank, was made Comes domesticorum and Magister utriusque Militiæ by Theodosius, and, A.C. 384, was Consul with Clearchus. He was a great favorite of Theodosius and went with him in his wars against Eugenius, but died on that campaign, and left a son called Theudomir, who later became King of the Salian Franks in Brabant. During this war some Franks from beyond the Rhine invaded Gallia under the leadership of Genobald, Marcomir and Suno, but were driven back by Stilico; and after Marcomir was killed, his son Pharamond succeeded him in Germany.

While these nations stayed quiet inside the Empire, subject to the Romans, many others did the same beyond the Danube until the death of the Emperor Theodosius, and then rose up in arms. For Paulus Diaconus in his Historia Miscell. lib. xiv., speaking of the times just after the death of this Emperor, tells us: Eodem tempore erant Gothi & aliæ gentes maximæ trans Danubium habitantes: ex quibus rationabiliores quatuor sunt, Gothi scilicet, Huisogothi, Gepides & Vandali; & nomen tantum & nihil aliud mutantes. Isti sub Arcadia & Honorio Danubium transeuntes, locati sunt in terra Romanorum: & Gepides quidem, ex quibus postea divisi sunt Longobardi & Avares, villas, quæ sunt circa Singidonum & Sirmium, habitavere: and Procopius at the beginning of his Historia Vandalica writes to the same purpose. Until then the Western Empire stayed whole, but now it broke into many kingdoms.

Theodosius died A.C. 395; and then the Visigoths, led by Alaric the successor of Fridigern, rose from their seats in Thrace and wasted Macedon, Thessaly, Achaia, Peloponnesus, and Epirus with fire and sword for five years together; then turning west, they invaded Dalmatia, Illyricum and Pannonia; and from there they went into Italy A.C. 402; and the next year they were so beaten at Pollentia and Verona by Stilico, the commander of the forces of the Western Empire, that Claudian calls what was left of Alaric's forces tanta ex gente reliquias breves, and Prudentius, Gentem deletam. Alaric then made peace with the Emperor, so humbled that Orosius says he did pro pace optima & quibuscunque sedibus suppliciter & simpliciter orare. This peace was confirmed by mutual hostages; Ætius was sent as a hostage to Alaric; and Alaric stayed a free Prince in the seats now granted to him.

When Alaric took up arms, the nations beyond the Danube began to move; and the next winter, between A.C. 395 and 396, a great body of Hunns, Alans, Ostrogoths, Gepides, and other northern nations crossed the frozen Danube, having been invited by Rufinus; at the same time their brethren, who had gotten seats inside the Empire, took up arms as well. Jerome calls this great crowd the Hunns, Alans, Vandals, Goths, Sarmatians, Quades, and Marcomans, and says that they invaded all the places between Constantinople and the Julian Alps, wasting Scythia, Thrace, Macedon, Dardania, Dacia, Thessaly, Achaia, Epirus, Dalmatia, and all Pannonia. The Suevians also invaded Rhætia; for while Alaric ravaged Pannonia, the Romans were defending Rhætia, which gave Alaric a chance to invade Italy, as Claudian mentions:

Non nisi perfidiâ nacti penetrabile tempus, Irrupere Getæ, nostras dum Rhætia vires Occupat, atque alio desudant Marte cohortes.

And when Alaric went from those parts into Italy, some other barbarous nations invaded Noricum and Vindelicia, as the same Poet Claudian thus writes:

----Jam foedera gentes Exuerant, Latiique auditâ clade feroces Vendelicos saltus & Norica rura tenebant.

This was in the years 402 and 403. And among these nations I count the Suevians, Quades, and Marcomans; for they were all in arms at this time. The Quades and Marcomans were Suevian nations; and they and the Suevians came originally from Bohemia, and the river Suevus or Sprake in Lusatia; and they were now united under one common King called Ermeric, who soon after led them into Gallia. The Vandals and Alans might also about this time extend themselves into Noricum. Uldin also with a great body of Hunns passed the Danube about the time of Chrysostom's banishment, that is, A.C. 404, and wasted Thrace and Mæsia. Radagaisus, King of the Gruthunni and successor of Winithar, bringing over more barbarians from beyond the Danube, invaded Italy with an army of more than two hundred thousand Goths; and within a year or two, A.C. 405 or 406, was defeated by Stilico, and perished with his army. In this war Stilico was helped by a great body of Hunns and Ostrogoths, under the command of Uldin and Sarus, who were hired by the Emperor Honorius. In all this confusion it was necessary for the Lombards in Pannonia to arm themselves in their own defense and assert their liberty, the Romans being no longer able to protect them.

And now Stilico, planning to make himself Emperor, secured a military prefecture for Alaric and sent him into the East in the service of Honorius the Western Emperor, putting some Roman troops under his command to strengthen his army of Goths, and promising to follow soon after with his own army. His pretense was to recover some regions of Illyricum, which the Eastern Emperor was accused of wrongly keeping from the Western; but his secret design was to make himself Emperor with the help of the Vandals and their allies, because he himself was a Vandal. To make this design easier, he invited a great body of the barbarous nations to invade the Western Empire while he and Alaric invaded the Eastern. These nations marched under their own Kings: the Vandals under Godegisilus, the Alans in two bodies, one under Goar and the other under Resplendial, and the Suevians, Quades, and Marcomans under Ermeric. They marched through Rhætia to the Rhine, left their seats in Pannonia to the Hunns and Ostrogoths, joined the Burgundians under Gundicar, and harassed the Franks as they went on. On the last of December A.C. 406, they crossed the Rhine at Ments and spread themselves into Germania prima and the neighboring regions; among their other actions, the Vandals took Triers. Then they advanced into Belgium and began to waste that country. At that the Salian Franks in Brabant took up arms and, under the command of Theudomir, the son of Ricimer, or Richomer, mentioned above, made such a strong resistance that they killed almost twenty thousand of the Vandals, with their King Godegesilus, in battle; the rest escaped only because a body of Resplendial's Alans came to their help in time.

Then the British soldiers, alarmed by the rumor of these things, revolted and set up Tyrants there; first Marcus, whom they killed at once; then Gratian, whom they killed within four months; and lastly Constantine, under whom they invaded Gallia A.C. 408, with the favor of Goar and Gundicar. And Constantine, having taken a good part of Gallia, made his son Constans Cæsar and sent him into Spain to handle his affairs there, A.C. 409.

Meanwhile Resplendial, seeing the disaster of the Vandals described above and that Goar had gone over to the Romans, led his army from the Rhine; and together with the Suevians and the rest of the Vandals he went toward Spain, while the Franks in the meantime followed their victory far enough to retake Triers, which, after they had plundered it, they left to the Romans. The Barbarians were first stopped by the Pyrenean mountains, which made them spread into Aquitain; but the next year the passage was betrayed to them by some soldiers of Constans; and entering Spain 4 Kal. Octob. A.C. 409, each conquered what he could; and at last, A.C. 411, they divided their conquests by lot: the Vandals obtained Boetica and part of Gallæcia, the Suevians the rest of Gallæcia, and the Alans Lusitania and the Carthaginian Province; the Emperor, for the sake of peace, confirmed them in those seats by grant A.C. 413.

The Roman Franks mentioned above, having made Theudomir their King, began right after their conquest of the Vandals to invade their neighbors as well. The first they attacked were the Gauls of Brabant²; but meeting strong resistance, they asked for their alliance; and so those Gauls broke away from the Romans and made a close league with the Franks to be one people, marrying one another and adopting each other's manners, until they became one without distinction. In this way, with these Gauls added, and also the foreign Franks who came across the Rhine afterward, the Salian kingdom soon grew very great and powerful.

Stilico's expedition against the Greek Emperor was stopped by the order of Honorius; and then Alaric came out of Epirus into Noricum and asked for a sum of money for his service. The Senate leaned toward refusing him, but granted it through Stilico's mediation. But after some time Stilico was accused of a traitorous conspiracy with Alaric and killed 10 Kal. Sept. A.C. 408; Alaric by that failed to get his money and was treated as an enemy of the Empire; he then went straight into Italy with the army he had brought out of Epirus, and sent word to his brother Adolphus to follow him with whatever forces he had in Pannonia, which were not great, but not to be despised either. At this Honorius, afraid of being shut up in Rome, withdrew to Ravenna in October A.C. 408. From then on Ravenna remained the seat of the Western Emperors. In those days the Hunns also invaded Pannonia; and seizing the empty seats of the Vandals, Alans, and Goths, founded a new kingdom there. Alaric advanced on Rome, besieged it, and took it 9 Kal. Sept. A.C. 410; and afterward, while trying to cross to Africa, he was shipwrecked. After that Honorius made peace with him and raised an army to send against the Tyrant Constantine.

At the same time Gerontius, one of Constantine's captains, revolted from him and set up Maximus Emperor in Spain. At this Constantine sent Edobec, another of his captains, to bring to his help the Barbarians under Goar and Gundicar in Gallia and reinforcements of Franks and Alemans from beyond the Rhine; and he put his son Constans in charge of Vienne in Gallia Narbonensis. Gerontius advanced, first killing Constans at Vienne, and then began to besiege Constantine at Arles. But Honorius at the same time sent Constantius with an army on the same errand; Gerontius fled, and Constantius continued the siege, strengthened by the arrival of most of Gerontius's soldiers. After a siege of four months, Edobec having gotten reinforcements, the Barbarian Kings at Ments, Goar and Gundicar, made Jovinus Emperor and set out with him to relieve Arles. At their approach Constantius withdrew. They pursued him, and he beat them by surprise; but he did not follow up his victory, and the Barbarians soon recovered, though not enough to stop the fall of the tyrants Constantine, Jovinus and Maximus. Britain could not be won back to the Empire and remained ever after a separate kingdom.

The next year, A.C. 412, the Visigoths, beaten in Italy, were granted Aquitain to withdraw into; and they invaded it with much force, driving back the Alans and Burgundians, who were then laying it waste. At the same time the Burgundians were brought to peace, and the Emperor granted them, as their inheritance, a region on the Rhine which they had invaded; and I suppose he did the same for the Alans. But not long after the Franks took and burned Triers again, Castinus, A.C. 415, was sent against them with an army, which routed them and killed Theudomir their King. This was the second taking of Triers by the Franks. It was therefore taken four times, once by the Vandals and three times by the Franks. Theudomir was succeeded by Pharamond, the Prince or King of the Salian Franks in Germany. From there he brought new forces, ruled over them all, and was granted seats for his people inside the Empire near the Rhine.

By now all the Barbarians were quiet and settled in several kingdoms inside the Empire, not only by conquest but also by the grants of the Emperor Honorius. For Rutilius, in his Itinerary, written in Autumn, Anno Urbis 1169—that is, according to Varro's computation then in use, A.C. 416—laments the wasted fields in these words:

Illa quidem longis nimium deformia bellis;

And then adds,

Jam tempus laceris post longa incendia fundis Vel pastorales ædificare casas.

And a little after,

Æternum tibi Rhenus aret.

And Orosius, at the end of his history, which was finished A.C. 417, describes a general pacification of the barbarous nations with the words comprimere, coangustare, addicere gentes immanissimas; he calls them imperio addictas, because they had obtained seats in the Empire by league and compact, and coangustatas, because they no longer invaded all regions at will, but by the same compact stayed quiet in the seats then granted them. And these are the kingdoms of which the feet of the Image were henceforward composed, and which are represented by iron and clay mixed together, which did not stick to one another and were of different strength.

Notes to Chap. V.

1 Procop. l. 1. de Bello Vandalico.

2 Galli Arborici: from which the region was named Arboricbant, and by contraction Brabant.