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HISTORYHISTORY — PAST AND PERSPECTIVE Overwhelmed by Immigrants No turning back: Migrating Goths cross a river en route to safety within Roman borders. Once The fall of the Western the fateful decision had been made to open the floo dgates of uncontrolled immigration from the Roman Empire was East, the Roman Empire was living on borrowed time. precipitated by of human history, a conflict that ran its itary and guaranteeing the supremacy of course quickly in the hot, parched coun- the Goths in the eastern portions of the immigrants — who had tryside, and left tens of thousands of men empire ever after. Within a generation, the fled to Roman protection most of them the flower of the Eastern Goths, emboldened and battle-hardened, Roman imperial military, including the would arrive at the gates of the Eternal from the Huns — when Roman emperor himself dead on the City itself, and become the first foreign the newcomers refused to field, while the comparatively small army power in eight centuries to sack Rome. of Goths and Alans rode triumphantly And all of it began because of an im- follow Roman laws. over the terrain, giving no quarter to the migration crisis. wounded and dying, slaying officer and by Charles Scaliger foot soldier alike. By late day, the field Charitable Notions belonged to the carrion fowl and blow- By the middle of the fourth century A.D., he late afternoon of August 9, 378 flies, already commencing their grim work German tribes were settled all along the A.D. was brutally hot in the fields among the heaps of corpses. northern frontiers of the Roman Empire, T around Adrianople in southeastern On that occasion, known to history as from the Rhine to the Danube. Over Europe. Today a prosperous Turkish city the Battle of Adrianople, which is usually the centuries, the Germans had proven (Edirne) near the Greek and Bulgarian considered to be the beginning of the end Romes most resolute rivals. The Cim- borders, Adrianople on that day almost of the Roman Empire, tens of thousands of brian War during the la te second century 1,700 years ago was the site of one of the Romans and their allies were hewn down, B.C. was enormously costly for Rome, al- greatest and most decisive battles in all crippling the once-invincible Roman mil- though they eventually repulsed the Ger- 34 THE NEW AMERICAN • OCTObER 19, 2015 manic and Celtic hosts that threatened to Unfortunately for the Romans, events Undying enmity: Romans and Goths shown in overrun Italy. Julius Caesar himself, after thousands of miles beyond the limits of battle on a stone Roman sarcophagus from the subduing Gaul, contented himself with their dominion many years before had third century A.D. crossing the Rhine into German territories set in motion forces that would upset the and launching a few military attacks, be- more-or-less peaceful status quo in the resistance. Rumors of their cruelty and fore retreating back into Gaul. In 9 A.D., east. From somewhere out of the fastness- military strength went before them, and the first great military disaster to befall im- es of the far eastern steppes probably in before long, after overrunning the territory perial Rome took place at Teutoburg For- what is now northwestern China or west- of the Alans to the east, the Huns crossed est, where a German chieftain with Roman central Asia a people had issued forth the Don to the north of the Sea of Azov on military training named Arminius led a who came to be known to the Romans as the northeastern arm of the Black Sea, and rout of Roman forces that resulted in the the Huns. These were possibly related to entered the territory of the Goths. annihilation of three legions under Varus. the Hsiung-Nu, a confederation of eastern A group of Goths known as Thuringians, In the centuries that followed, Rome never nomads who, as late as the first century after being overwhelmed by the Huns in ceased to press on the Germans in West- A.D., controlled a vast swath of territory several military engagements, took advan- ern and Central Europe, sometimes push- to the north of China and the Himalayas, tage of a lull in the Huns advance to flee ing forward the frontiers of the empire, extending perhaps as far west as the Trans- west to the border of the Danube River, sometimes withdrawing. The Germans oxiana region of central Asia. Whether the beyond which lay the Roman province of showed little inclination to adopt Roman Huns and Hsiung-Nu were synonymous is Thrace. Their leader, Alavivus, petitioned ways, preferring the virtues of rustic sim- still hotly debated by scholars, but in one the Eastern Roman emperor, Valens, for plicity combined with a knack for ferocity of those periodic accidents of which the permission to cross the river and settle in in combat that kept the disciplined Roman history of the Central Asian steppe peoples Thrace, promising to be faithful subjects. legions from imposing their will. is replete, something happened to stir up For the moment, they were safe from the To the east, in what is now the Ukraine the Huns and prompt them to begin mi- Huns depredations, since the invaders and western Russia, lived another German grating west. were too busy looting the Goths former people, the Goths. We do not know the As with the Scythians before them and settlements eastward to bother pursuing exact limits of their dominion, nor wheth- the Mongols after, the Huns were a people the Gothic host, but there was little doubt er, in remoter antiquity, they had come hardened by the demands of nomadic life they would eventually reach the Danube from further east, perhaps from the steppes in the empty Asian wilderness. They lived themselves and fall upon the tens of thou- and deserts of central Asia. But by the mid- on horseback and had no permanent settle- sands of Goths encamped there. fourth century A.D., they were settled on ments, using their wagons as mobile com- Valens, who was worried at rumors the fringes of the Eastern Roman Empire, munities. They enjoyed battle and plunder, of the approaching Huns, allowed the enjoying a more or less settled existence. and as with other equestrian nomads in the Thuringian Goths to cross the broad Unlike other barbarian tribes settled on the era before firearms, enjoyed a distinct ad- Danube and settle on Roman territory in Roman frontier, many if not most of them vantage over the armies of mostly infantry hopes of enlisting them in defense of the had converted to Christianity, although of that tried to stand against them. Accord- empire. This act of emergency amnesty the Arian, not the Catholic, strain. ingly, their westward advance met little was disruptive enough, but as soon as www.TheNewAmerican.com 35 HISTORYHISTORY — PAST AND PERSPECTIVE the Thuringians had crossed the river, they began ranging far and wide over Thracian territory, foraging for food and sometimes plundering local settlements. Moreover, word of Roman amnesty soon spread, and a second Gothic host, the Gruthungians, soon appeared on the far shore of the Danube demanding the same right to immigrate. This time Va- lens, already aware that he had made a mistake in allowing the Thuringian host into Roman territory, turned down their petition. But the Gruthungians, not to be denied, constructed a floating bridge in secret and crossed the Danube anyway. Broken Borders and Battles These events took place in 376 A.D., and marked the first time that the Roman Em- On the move: Ever a restless, mobile people, Gothic tribes took their cattle and families with them pire had effectively lost control of her bor- in their wanderings, part of the epic pe riod known in German history as the Volkerwanderung , the ders; from that time on, the eastern fron- Wandering Peoples. tier was ineffectually guarded, allowing a stream of violent, undesirable invaders to desire for war; and among many been formally partitioned for almost 100 enter the empire unimpeded from the east. preparations which seemed to beto- years, the Eastern and Western emperors In the meantime, the Gothic host in ken danger, the standards of war were still had a strong alliance. Valens peti- Thrace was making more and more of a raised according to custom, and the tioned Gratian to come to his aid in sup- nuisance of itself. For one thing, Roman trumpets poured forth sounds of evil pressing the Goths, and departed Antioch authorities proved unable or unwilling to omen; while the predatory bands col- for Constantinople, the Eastern capital. feed them properly, and rumors that they lected in troops, plundering and burn- As soon as he reached Constantinople in were being provisioned with dog meat ing villages, and throwing everything May, he authorized one of his top gener- kindled resentment among the Goths. that came in their way into alarm by als, Sebastianus, to re-order and gather The first major conflict occurred at the their fearful devastations. existing Roman forces in Thrace. In the city of Marcianopolis, where the Roman course of this buildup, Sebastianus man- general Lupicinus, trying to reestablish For the next two years, the war between aged to defeat several small detachments order, invited the two Gothic leaders, the Goths and Romans raged unabated, of Goths, giving Valens confidence that Alavivus and Fritigern, to a banquet to with thousands slain and no clear vic- Roman victory was at hand. In early parlay. However, the locals, resentful of tor. By early 378, however, the Eastern August, Sebastianus force met up with the Goths encamped near their city, soon emperor, Valens, dissatisfied with the Valens army at the city of Adrianople, started a conflict that led to the killing of failure of his commanders to bring the and fortified themselves in readiness for a number of Roman soldiers and pillaging unruly Gothic immigrants under control, battle.
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