Late Roman Empire, Valentinian-Theodosian Dynasty, Interregnum (392-425), Valentinian III: Flavius Aetius, Theodosius II’s (2nd) Sassanian War

⁶⁰Flavius Aetius (63; fl.405-454), [2/2]

In Gaul, in 425, Aetius drove the Visigoths away from Arles; and in 428 he fought the Salian Franks, defeated their king Chlodio and recovered some of the territory they had occupied along the Rhine. In 430 he drove the Visigoths away from Arles once more, defeated the Juthungi in Raetia, and overcame the Norici in Noricum. 

A revolt by the bagaudae (peasant insurgents) led by Tibatto in 435 and the subsequent invasion of Belgica Prima by the Burgundians in 436, encouraged the Visigoth king Theodoric-I to besiege the city of Narbo Martius (=Narbonne), the possession of which would provide the Visigoths with an outlet to the Mediterranean and easier access to Spain. 

In 437 Aetius campaigned successfully against the bagaudae in Armorica (=part of Gaul, between the Seine and Loire rivers, that includes the Brittany Peninsula); and his magister militum per Gallias, Litorius (435-439), with the aid of the Huns, drove off the Visigoths. In 438 Aetius won a great victory at the Battle of Mons Colubrarius in southern Gaul. By 439 the conflict between the Visigoths and Litorius had reached the Visigothic capital Tolosa (=Toulouse). In a battle outside the city walls the Visigoths defeated the force of Romans and Huns. Litorius was captured and imprisoned and he died soon after from the injuries he received in the battle.

The Suebic king Hermeric was succeeded by his son Rechila (r.438-448) who, taking advantage of the vacuum left by the departing Vandals and Alans, campaigned widely in southern Lusitania, Baetica and western Carthaginensis. In 438 he defeated the comes Hispaniarum, Andevotus, on the Singilis (=Genil) River, and captured the provincial capitals of Merida (439) and Seville (441). In 440 the Roman legate Censorius, returning from what was his third embassy to the Suevi, was captured by Rechila near Myrtilis (=Mertola) and kept prisoner until 448 when he was executed.

Aetius frequently installed friendly barbarian tribes as buffers against his enemies. In 440 he placed the Alani under Sambida around Valence (Drome) in the lower Rhone Valley; in 441 to keep the Bagaudae of Armorica in check he located the Alani under Goar near Orleans; and in 443 he resettled the Burgundians along the middle and upper Rhone Valley, where they established a new kingdom with capital cities eventually at Geneva, Lugdunum (=Lyons) and Vienne. 

Theodosius II’s (2nd) Sassanian War (440), [9/9]

On 15 February 438 Theodosius published the Codex Theodosianus, a compilation of the laws of the Roman Empire under the Christian emperors since 312. By agreement it went into force in both parts of the Empire on 1 January 439.

After the fall of Carthage, a Vandal navy in North Africa would pose a permanent threat to the Eastern Empire. In 440 Theodosius II sent an expedition, but when the imperial fleet carrying its military force sailed westwards for North Africa, the Sassanids attacked Theodosiopolis (=Erzurum) and Satala (=Sadak) in eastern Turkey.

The war was caused by Romans strengthening their defensive frontier with the Sassanids (a clear violation of the 422 treaty with Bahram V) and, having agreed to subsidise Sassanid defences in the northern Caucasus where the Huns had crossed into Roman and Sassanid territory in 395, Theodosius suddenly stopped the payments.

The expeditionary force bound for North Africa was withdrawn from Sicily and the Sassanid king Yazdegerd II (r.438-457), facing new threats along his borders with Central Asia, agreed a peace; but it was now clear that any move against the Vandals in North Africa in the West would encourage an invasion of the Empire by the Sassanids in the East.

Thus, in 442 a new treaty was made with the Vandals. In the terms agreed, Gaiseric was to keep the province of Africa Byzacena (=Tunisia; split off from Africa Proconsularis) and divide up Proconsularis among his followers, while returning the remaining regions of Roman North Africa to Rome. He was to continue to send a grain ‘tribute’ to Rome and to hand over as hostage to the Roman court his son Huneric (fl.442-484) who, in a break in Roman tradition, was betrothed to Eudocia (439-466/474?), the daughter of Valentinian III. After 442 the Vandals were not federates of Rome and Gaiseric was formally recognized as a client king of the Empire. In 446 the Britons sent a final pleading but disregarded letter, described by the monk Gildas (c.500-570) as the ‘Groans of the Britons’, to Aetius asking for help against the Saxons.