[2] See my “Ravenna” (Dent, 1913), pp. 1-10.
II
THE HUNS AND ATTILA
The people called the Huns, “scarcely mentioned in other records,” are fully described by that Ammianus Marcellinus[3] whom I have already quoted. He lived at the end of the fourth century, was a Roman historian born of Greek parents at Antioch, and after fighting in Gaul, in Germany and the East, settled in Rome and devoted himself to history. He describes the Huns as “living beyond the Sea of Azov on the borders of the Frozen Ocean.” And adds that they were a people “savage beyond all parallel.” He then gives us the following careful description of them:—
“In their earliest infancy deep incisions are made in the cheeks of their boys[4] so that when the time comes for the beard to grow the sprouting hairs may be kept back by the furrowed scars, and therefore they grow to old age as beardless as eunuchs. At the same time all have strong and well-built limbs and strong necks; they are indeed of great size, but so short-legged that you might fancy them to be two-legged beasts, or the figures which are hewn out in a rude manner with an axe on the posts at the end of bridges.[5]
“They do, however, just bear the likeness of men (horribly ugly though they be), but they are so little advanced in civilisation that they make no use of fire, nor of seasoned food, but live on roots which they find in the fields, or on the half raw flesh of any animal which they merely warm a little by placing it between their own thighs and the backs of their horses.
“They do not live under roofed houses but look upon them as tombs and will only enter them of necessity. Nor is there to be found among them so much as a cabin thatched with reed; but they wander about over the mountains and through the woods training themselves to bear from their infancy the extremes of frost and hunger and thirst.
“They wear linen clothes or else the skins of field mice sewn together, and this both at home and abroad. When once such a tunic is put on, it is never changed till from long decay it falls to pieces. Their heads are covered with round caps and their hairy legs with goat skins and their shoes which are ignorant of any last are so clumsy as to hinder them in walking.
“For this cause they are not well suited for infantry; but, on the other hand, they are almost one with their horses, which are poorly shaped but hardy; often they sit them like women. In truth they can remain on horseback night and day; on horseback they buy and sell, they eat and drink, and bowed on the narrow neck of their steeds they even sleep and dream. On horseback too they discuss and deliberate. They are not, however, under the authority of a king, but are content with the loose government of their chiefs.
“When attacked they sometimes engage in regular battle formed in a solid body and uttering all kinds of terrific yells. More often, however, they fight irregularly, suddenly dispersing, then reuniting and after inflicting huge loss upon their enemy will scatter over the plains hither and thither, avoiding a fortified place or an entrenchment. It must be confessed that they are very formidable warriors....
“None of them ploughs or even touches a plough-handle; for they have no settled abode, but are alike homeless and lawless, continually wandering with their waggons which indeed are their homes. They seem to be ever in flight.... Nor if he is asked can any one tell you where he was born; for he was conceived in one place, born in another far away, and bred in another still more remote.