Dictionary of Battles / From the Earliest Date to the Present Time

by Thomas Benfield Harbottle

Hadrianople (Second Gothic Invasion of the East).

Fought August 9, 378, between the Romans, under the Emperor Valens, and the Goths, under Fritigern. The Roman cavalry fled from the field, and the legionaries were surrounded and ridden down by the overwhelming masses of the Gothic horse. Two thirds of the legionaries, and 39 great officers and tribunes perished. Valens was carried off the field wounded, but the hut in which he was lying was fired, and he perished in the flames.