JORDANES

THE ORIGIN AND DEEDS OF THE GOTHS

551 AD

translated by Charles C. Mierow

Princeton University Press, 1915

The Divided Goths: Visigoths

The Visigoths, who were their other allies and inhabitants of the western country,
were terrified as their kinsmen had been, and knew not how to plan for safety
against the race of the Huns. After long deliberation by common consent they finally
sent ambassadors into Romania to the Emperor Valens, brother of Valentinian, the
elder Emperor, to say that if he would give them part of Thrace or Moesia to keep,
they would submit themselves to his laws and commands. That he might have greater
confidence in them, they promised to become Christians, if he would give them
teachers who spoke their language.

When Valens learned this, he gladly and promptly granted what he had himself
intended to ask. He received the Getae into the region of Moesia and placed them
there as a wall of defense for his kingdom against other tribes. And since at
that time the Emperor Valens, who was infected with the Arian perfidy, had closed
all the churches of our party, he sent as preachers to them those who favored
his sect. They came and straightway filled a rude and ignorant people with the
poison of their heresy. Thus the Emperor Valens made the Visigoths Arians rather
than Christians.

Moreover, from the love they bore them, they preached the gospel both to the
Ostrogoths and to their kinsmen the Gepidae, teaching them to reverence this heresy,
and they invited all people of their speech everywhere to attach themselves to
this sect. They themselves as we have said, crossed the Danube and settled Dacia
Ripensis, Moesia and Thrace by permission of the Emperor.

Soon famine and want came upon them, as often happens to a people not
yet well settled in a country. Their princes and the leaders who ruled them in
place of kings, that is Fritigern, Alatheus and Safrac, began to lament the plight
of their army and begged Lupicinus and Maximus, the Roman commanders, to open
a market. But to what will not the “cursed lust for gold” compel men to assent?
The generals, swayed by avarice, sold them at a high price not only the flesh
of sheep and oxen, but even the carcasses of dogs and unclean animals, so that
a slave would be bartered for a loaf of bread or ten pounds of meat.

When their goods and chattels failed, the greedy trader demanded their sons
in return for the necessities of life. And the parents consented even to this,
in order to provide for the safety of their children, arguing that it was better
to lose liberty than life; and indeed it is better that one be sold, if he will
be mercifully fed, than that he should be kept free only to die.

Now it came to pass in that troubIous time that Lupicinus, the Roman general,
invited Fritigern, a chieftain of the Goths, to a feast and, as the event revealed,
devised a plot against him.

But Fritigern, thinking no evil, came to the feast with a few followers. While
he was dining in the praetorium he heard the dying cries of his ill-fated men,
for, by order of the general, the soldiers were slaying his companions who were
shut up in another part of the house. The loud cries of the dying fell upon ears
already suspicious, and Fritigern at once perceived the treacherous trick. He
drew his sword and with great courage dashed quickly from the banqueting-hall,
rescued his men from their threatening doom and incited them to slay the Romans.

Thus these valiant men gained the chance they had longed for–to be free to
die in battle rather than to perish of hunger–and immediately took arms to kill
the generals Lupicinus and Maximus. Thus that day put an end to the famine of
the Goths and the safety of the Romans, for the Goths no longer as strangers and
pilgrims, but as citizens and lords, began to rule the inhabitants and to hold
in their own right all the northern country as far as the Danube.

When the Emperor Valens heard of this at Antioch, he made ready an army at
once and set out for the country of Thrace. Here a grievous battle took place
and the Goths prevailed. The Emperor himself was wounded and fled to a farm near
Hadrianople. The Goths, not knowing that an emperor lay hidden in so poor a hut,
set fire to it (as is customary in dealing with a cruel foe), and thus he was
cremated in royal splendor. Plainly it was a direct judgment of God that he should
be burned with fire by the very men whom he had perfidiously led astray when they
sought the true faith, turning them aside from the flame of love into the fire
of hell. From this time the Visigoths, in consequence of their glorious victory,
possessed Thrace and Dacia Ripensis as if it were their native land.

Now in the place of Valens, his uncle, the Emperor Gratian established Theodosius
the Spaniard in the Eastern Empire. Military discipline was soon restored to a
high level, and the Goth, perceiving that the cowardice and sloth of former princes
was ended, became afraid. For the Emperor was famed alike for his acuteness and
discretion. By stern commands and by generosity and kindness he encouraged a demoralized
army to deeds of daring.

But when the soldiers, who had obtained a better leader by the change, gained
new confidence, they sought to attack the Goths and drive them from the borders
of Thrace. But as the Emperor Theodosius fell so sick at this time that his life
was almost despaired of, the Goths were again inspired with courage. Dividing
the Gothic army, Fritigern set out to plunder Thessaly, Epirus and Achaia, while
Alatheus and Safrac with the rest of the troops made for Pannonia.

Now the Emperor Gratian had at this time retreated from Rome to Gaul because
of the invasions of the Vandals. When he learned that the Goths were acting with
greater boldness because Theodosius was in despair of his life, he quickly gathered
an army and came against them. Yet he put no trust in arms, but sought to conquer
them by kindness and gifts. So he entered on a truce with them and made peace,
giving them provisions.

When the Emperor Theodosius afterwards recovered and learned that the Emperor
Gratian had made a compact between the Goths and the Romans, as he had himself
desired, he took it very graciously and gave his assent. He gave gifts to King
Athanaric, who had succeeded Fritigern, made an alliance with him and in the most
gracious manner invited him to visit him in Constantinople.

Athanaric very gladly consented and as he entered the royal city exclaimed
in wonder “Lo, now I see what I have often heard of with unbelieving ears,” meaning
the great and famous city. Turning his eyes hither and thither, he marvelled as
he beheld the situation of the city, the coming and going of the ships, the splendid
walls, and the people of divers nations gathered like a flood of waters streaming
from different regions into one basin. So too, when he saw the army in array,
he said “Truly the Emperor is a god on earth, and whoso raises a hand against
him is guilty of his own blood.”

In the midst of his admiration and the enjoyment of even greater honors at
the hand of the emperor, he departed this life after the space of a few months.
The emperor had such affection for him that he honored Athanaric even more when
he was dead than during his life-time, for he not only gave him a worthy burial,
but himself walked before the bier at the funeral.

Now when Athanaric was dead, his whole army continued in the service of the
Emperor Theodosius and submitted to the Roman rule, forming as it were one body
with the imperial soldiery. The former service of the Allies under the Emperor
Constantine was now renewed and they were again called Allies. And since the Emperor
knew that they were faithful to him and his friends, he took from their number
more than twenty thousand warriors to serve against the tyrant Eugenius who had
slain Gratian and seized Gaul. After winning the victory over this usurper, he
wreaked his vengeance upon him.

But after Theodosius, the lover of peace and of the Gothic race, had passed
from human cares, his sons began to ruin both empires by their luxurious living
and to deprive their Allies, that is to say the Goths, of the customary gifts.
The contempt of the Goths for the Romans soon increased, and for fear their valor
would be destroyed by long peace, they appointed Alaric king over them. He was
of a famous stock, and his nobility was second only to that of the Amali, for
he came from the family of the Balthi, who because of their daring valor had long
ago received among their race the name Baltha, that is, The Bold.

Now when this Alaric was made king, he took counsel with his men and persuaded
them to seek a kingdom by their own exertions rather than serve others in idleness.
In the consulship of Stilicho and Aurelian he raised an army and entered Italy,
which seemed to be bare of defenders, and came through Pannonia and Sirmium along
the right side. Without meeting any resistance, he reached the bridge of the river
Candidianus at the third milestone from the royal city of Ravenna.

This city lies amid the streams of the Po between swamps and the sea, and is
accessible only on one side. Its ancient inhabitants, as our ancestors relate,
were called Ainetoi, that is, “Laudable”. Situated in a corner of the Roman Empire
above the Ionian Sea, it is hemmed in like an island by a flood of rushing waters.

On the east it has the sea, and one who sails straight to it from the region
of Corcyra and those parts of Hellas sweeps with his oars along the right hand
coast, first touching Epirus, then Dalmatia, Liburnia and Histria and at last
the Venetian Isles. But on the west it has swamps through which a sort of door
has been left by a very narrow entrance. To the north is an arm of the Po, called
the Fossa Asconis.

On the south likewise is the Po itself, which they call the King of the rivers
of Italy; and it has also the name Eridanus. This river was turned aside by the
Emperor Augustus into a very broad canal which flows through the midst of the
city with a seventh part of its stream, affording a pleasant harbor at its mouth.
Men believed in ancient times, as Dio relates, that it would hold a fleet of two
hundred and fifty vessels in its safe anchorage.

Fabius says that this, which was once a harbor, now displays itself like a
spacious garden full of trees; but from them hang not sails but apples. The city
itself boasts of three names and is happily placed in its threefold location.
I mean to say the first is called Ravenna and the most distant part Classis; while
midway between the city and the sea is Caesarea, full of luxury. The sand of the
beach is fine and suited for riding.

But as I was saying, when the army of the Visigoths had come into the neighborhood
of this city, they sent an embassy to the Emperor Honorius, who dwelt within.
They said that if he would permit the Goths to settle peaceably in Italy, they
would so live with the Roman people that men might believe them both to be of
one race; but if not, whoever prevailed in war should drive out the other, and
the victor should henceforth rule unmolested. But the Emperor Honorius feared
to make either promise. So he took counsel with his Senate and considered how
he might drive them from the Italian borders.

He finally decided that Alaric and his race, if they were able to do so, should
be allowed to seize for their own home the provinces farthest away, namely, Gaul
and Spain. For at this time he had almost lost them, and moreover they had been
devastated by the invasion of Gaiseric, king of the Vandals. The grant was confirmed
by an imperial rescript, and the Goths, consenting to the arrangement, set out
for the country given them.

When they had gone away without doing any harm in Italy, Stilicho, the Patrician
and father-in-law of the Emperor Honorius,–for the Emperor had married both his
daughters, Maria and Thermantia, in succession, but God called both from this
world in their virgin purity–this Stilicho, I say, treacherously hurried to Pollentia,
a city in the Cottian Alps. There he fell upon the unsuspecting Goths in battle,
to the ruin of all Italy and his own disgrace.

When the Goths suddenly beheld him, at first they were terrified. Soon regaining
their courage and arousing each other by brave shouting, as is their custom, they
turned to flight the entire army of Stilicho and almost exterminated it. Then
forsaking the journey they had undertaken, the Goths with hearts full of rage
returned again to Liguria whence they had set out. When they had plundered and
spoiled it, they also laid waste AemiIia, and then hastened toward the city of
Rome along the Flaminian Way, which runs between Picenum and Tuscia, taking as
booty whatever they found on either hand.

When they finally entered Rome, by Alaric’s express command they merely sacked
it and did not set the city on fire, as wild peoples usually do, nor did they
permit serious damage to be done to the holy places. Thence they departed to bring
like ruin upon Campania and Lucania, and then came to Bruttii. Here they remained
a long time and planned to go to Sicily and thence to the countries of Africa.

Now the land of the Bruttii is at the extreme southern bound of Italy, and
a corner of it marks the beginning of the Apennine mountains. It stretches out
like a tongue into the Adriatic Sea and separates it from the Tyrrhenian waters.
It chanced to receive its name in ancient times from a Queen Bruttia.

To this place came Alaric, king of the Visigoths, with the wealth of all Italy
which he had taken as spoil, and from there, as we have said, he intended to cross
over by way of Sicily to the quiet land of Africa. But since man is not free to
do anything he wishes without the will of God, that dread strait sunk several
of his ships and threw all into confusion. Alaric was cast down by his reverse
and, while deliberating what he should do, was suddenly overtaken by an untimely
death and departed from human cares.

His people mourned for him with the utmost affection. Then turning from its
course the river Busentus near the city of Consentia–for this stream flows with
its wholesome waters from the foot of a mountain near that city–they led a band
of captives into the midst of its bed to dig out a place for his grave. In the
depths of this pit they buried Alaric, together with many treasures, and then
turned the waters back into their channel. And that none might ever know the place,
they put to death all the diggers. They bestowed the kingdom of the Visigoths
on Athavulf his kinsman, a man of imposing beauty and great spirit; for though
not tall of stature, he was distinguished for beauty of face and form.

When Athavulf became king, he returned again to Rome, and whatever had escaped
the first sack his Goths stripped bare like locusts, not merely despoiling Italy
of its private wealth, but even of its public resources. The Emperor Honorius
was powerless to resist even when his sister Placidia, the daughter of the Emperor
Theodosius by his second wife, was led away captive from the city. But Athavulf
was attracted by her nobility, beauty and chaste purity, and so he took her to
wife in lawful marriage at Forum Julii, a city of Aemilia. When the barbarians
learned of this alliance, they were the more effectually terrified, since the
Empire and the Goths now seemed to be made one. Then Athavulf set out for Gaul,
leaving Honorius Augustus stripped of his wealth, to be sure, yet pleased at heart
because he was now a sort of kinsman of his.

Upon his arrival the neighboring tribes who had long made cruel raids into
Gaul,–Franks and Burgundians alike,–were terrified and began to keep within
their own borders. Now the Vandals and the Alani, as we have said before, had
been dwelling in both Pannonias by permission of the Roman Emperors. Yet fearing
they would not be safe even here if the Goths should return, they crossed over
into Gaul.

But no long time after they had taken possession of Gaul they fled thence and
shut themselves up in Spain, for they still remembered from the tales of their
forefathers what ruin Geberich, king of the Goths, had long ago brought on their
race, and how by his valor he had driven them from their native land. And thus
it happened that Gaul lay open to Athavulf when he came.

Now when the Goth had established his kingdom in Gaul, he began to grieve for
the plight of the Spaniards and planned to save them from the attacks of the Vandals.
So Athavulf left at Barcelona his treasures and the men who were unfit for war,
and entered the interior of Spain with a few faithful followers. Here he fought
frequently with the Vandals and, in the third year after he had subdued Gaul and
Spain, fell pierced through the groin by the sword of Euervulf, a man whose short
stature he had been wont to mock. After his death Segeric was appointed king,
but he too was slain by the treachery of his own men and lost both his kingdom
and his life even more quickly than Athavulf.

Then Valia, the fourth from Alaric, was made king, and he was an exceeding
stern and prudent man.The Emperor Honorius sent an army against him under Constantius,
who was famed for his achievements in war and distinguished in many battles, for
he feared that Valia would break the treaty long ago made with Athavulf and that,
after driving out the neighboring tribes, he would again plot evil against the
Empire. Moreover Honorius was eager to free his sister Placidia from the disgrace
of servitude, and made an agreement with Constantius that if by peace or war or
any means soever he could bring her back to the kingdom, he should have her in
marriage.

Pleased with this promise, Constantius set out for Spain with an armed force
and in almost royal splendor. Valia, king of the Goths, met him at a pass in the
Pyrenees with as great a force. Hereupon embassies were sent by both sides and
it was decided to make peace on the following terms, namely that Valia should
give up Placidia, the Emperor’s sister, and should not refuse to aid the Roman
Empire when occasion demanded.

Now at that time a certain Constantine usurped imperial power in Gaul and appointed
as Caesar his son Constans, who was formerly a monk. But when he had held for
a short time the Empire he had seized, he was himself slain at Arelate and his
son at Vienne. Jovinus and Sebastian succeeded them with equal presumption and
thought they might seize the imperial power; but they perished by a like fate.

Now in the twelfth year of Valia’s reign the Huns were driven out of Pannonia
by the Romans and Goths, almost fifty years after they had taken possession of
it. Then Valia found that the Vandals had come forth with bold audacity from the
interior of Galicia, whither Athavulf had long ago driven them, and were devastating
and plundering everywhere in his own territories, namely in the land of Spain.
So he made no delay but moved his army against them at once, at about the time
when Hierius and Ardabures had become consuls.

But Gaiseric, king of the Vandals, had already been invited into Africa by
Boniface, who had fallen into a dispute with the Emperor Valentinian and was able
to obtain revenge only by injuring the empire. So he invited them urgently and
brought them across the narrow strait known as the Strait of Gades, scarcely seven
miles wide, which divides Africa from Spain and unites the mouth of the Tyrrhenian
Sea with the waters of Ocean.

Gaiseric, still famous in the City for the disaster of the Romans, was a man
of moderate height and lame in consequence of a fall from his horse. He was a
man of deep thought and few words, holding luxury in disdain, furious in his anger,
greedy for gain, shrewd in winning over the barbarians and skilled in sowing the
seeds of dissension to arouse enmity.

Such was he who, as we have said, came at the solicitous invitation of Boniface
to the country of Africa. There he reigned for a long time, receiving authority,
as they say, from God Himself. Before his death he summoned the band of his sons
and ordained that there should be no strife among them because of desire for the
kingdom, but that each should reign in his own rank and order as he survived the
others; that is, the next younger should succeed his elder brother, and he in
turn should be followed by his junior. By giving heed to this command they ruled
their kingdom in happiness for the space of many years and were not disgraced
by civil war, as is usual among other nations; one after the other receiving the
kingdom and ruling the people in peace.

Now this is their order of succession: first, Gaiseric who was father and lord,
next, Huneric, the third Gunthamund, the fourth Thrasamund, and the fifth Ilderich.
He was driven from the throne and slain by Gelimer, who destroyed his race by
disregarding his ancestor’s advice and setting up a tyranny.

But what he had done did not remain unpunished, for soon the vengeance of the
Emperor Justinian was manifested against him. With his whole family and that wealth
over which he gloated like a robber, he was taken to Constantinople by that most
renowned warrior Belisarius, Master of the Soldiery of the East, Ex-Consul Ordinary
and Patrician. Here he afforded a great spectacle to the people in the Circus.
His repentance, when he beheld himself cast down from his royal state, came too
late. He died as a mere subject and in retirement, though he had formerly been
unwilling to submit to private life.

Thus after a century Africa, which in the division of the earth’s surface is
regarded as the third part of the world, was delivered from the yoke of the Vandals
and brought back to the liberty of the Roman Empire. The country which the hand
of the heathen had long ago cut off from the body of the Roman Empire, by reason
of the cowardice of emperors and the treachery of generals, was now restored by
a wise prince and a faithful leader and to-day is happily flourishing. And though,
even after this, it had to deplore the misery of civil war and the treachery of
the Moors, yet the triumph of the Emperor Justinian, vouchsafed him by God, brought
to a peaceful conclusion what he had begun. But why need we speak of what the
subject does not require? Let us return to our theme.

Now Valia, king of the Goths, and his army fought so fiercely against the Vandals
that he would have pursued them even into Africa, had not such a misfortune recalled
him as befell Alaric when he was setting out for Africa. So when he had won great
fame in Spain, he returned after a bloodless victory to Tolosa, turning over to
the Roman Empire, as he had promised, a number of provinces which he had rid of
his foes. A long time after this he was seized by sickness and departed this life.

Just at that time Beremud, the son of Thorismud, whom we have mentioned above
in the genealogy of the family of the Amali, departed with his son Veteric from
the Ostrogoths, who still submitted to the oppression of the Huns in the land
of Scythia, and came to the kingdom of the Visigoths. Well aware of his valor
and noble birth, he believed that the kingdom would be the more readily bestowed
upon him by his kinsmen, inasmuch as he was known to be the heir of many kings.
And who would hesitate to choose one of the Amali, if there were an empty throne?
But he was not himself eager to make known who he was, and so upon the death of
Valia the Visigoths made Theodorid his successor.

Beremud came to him and, with the strength of mind for which he was noted,
concealed his noble birth by prudent silence, for he knew that those of royal
lineage are always distrusted by kings. So he suffered himself to remain unknown,
that he might not bring the established order into confusion. King Theodorid received
him and his son with special honor and made him partner in his counsels and a
companion at his board; not for his noble birth, which he knew not, but for his
brave spirit and strong mind, which Beremud could not conceal.

And what more? Valia (to repeat what we have said) had but little success against
the Gauls, but when he died the more fortunate and prosperous Theodorid succeeded
to the throne. He was a man of the greatest moderation and notable for vigor of
mind and body. In the consulship of Theodosius and Festus the Romans broke the
truce and took up arms against him in Gaul, with the Huns as their auxiliaries.
For a band of the Gallic Allies, led by Count Gaina, had aroused the Romans by
throwing Constantinople into a panic. Now at that time the Patrician Aius was
in command of the army. He was of the bravest Moesian stock, born of his father
Gaudentius in the city of Durostorum. He was a man fitted to endure the toils
of war, born expressly to serve the Roman state; and by inflicting crushing defeats
he had compelled the proud Suavi and barbarous Franks to submit to Roman sway.

So then, with the Huns as allies under their leader Litorius, the Roman army
moved in array against the Goths. When the battle lines of both sides had been
standing for a long time opposite each other, both being brave and neither side
the weaker, they struck a truce and returned to their ancient alliance. And after
the treaty had been confirmed by both and an honest peace was established, they
both withdrew