Spain

by Frederick A. Ober

A KINGDOM OF THE GOTHS.

Except for an invasion of the Franks, about a.d. 256, the peace of Spain was unbroken for nearly four hundred years. But in the time of the Roman Emperor Honorius, the empire having been greatly weakened by repeated attacks of the northern barbarians, as well as by the sloth and effeminacy of its own citizens, her distant provinces soon began to experience dissensions and invasions. The death of Stilicho, the trusted adviser of Honorius and commander of his forces, removed the only obstacle to Alaric’s advance upon Rome, and the city yielded to his persistent attacks. And the same year that Rome first felt the rude barbarian’s terrible hand upon her, was also that, if we may believe the chronicles, in which a host of Suevi, Alani, and Vandals poured over the Pyrenees and swept across defenceless Spain.

Roman civilization and influence were felt mainly on the coast and in southern Spain; in the north and west lived the semi-barbarous tribes we have already noted, who were now but loosely held together by the disintegrating bonds of Rome. Hispania’s conquerors could do nothing to help her, for was not Rome herself at the mercy of the Goths, and compelled to pay an enormous ransom, after enduring humiliating siege and capitulation? It came about, however, that the successor of Alaric, Ataulpha, or Atawulf, made captive lovely Placidia, sister of Honorius, whom he married and carried away into Aquitania. Honorius made the best of the matter and granted to Atawulf all southern Gaul and Roman Spain, on condition that he would expel the Suevi and Alani, and hold the province tributary to his empire. He accomplished his task, so far as southern Gaul was concerned, and then went over the mountains and established his court at Barcelona, which had been successively a Phœnician, Carthaginian, and Roman city, and was now held by the Visigoths.

Though Atawulf seems to have been a faithful ally of Rome, and in her name held his new kingdom of Hispania-Gothia, as he called it, yet Honorius sent an army against him under Constantius, who, according to report, was in love with Hacidia before she was carried off and married by the Goth. Atawulf was basely assassinated by a creature of his court, and Constantius made truce with his successor, on condition that he should be given possession of Placidia. It was a cheap purchase of peace, the Goths concluded, and so the Roman general retired with the widow of Atawulf as his only captive, and married in Rome her who became the mother of the future emperor Valentinian.

Sigric, successor to Atawulf, had murdered the five children of the latter and compelled his wife to walk barefoot through the streets of Barcelona, one historian tells us; yet he lived but a month to enjoy his ill-gotten throne, and was followed by the real founder of the Visigothic kingdom in Spain, the warrior Walia, whose reign lasted four years, when he died, and was succeeded by Theodoric.

Walia had reconquered the greater part of Spain for Rome, and was allowed to recover the territory of southern Gaul, where he established his kingdom of Toulouse, and whither his successor also went to hold court. Theodoric continued the conquests of his predecessor, but committed the unpardonable sin, in the eyes of Rome, of keeping his acquisition for himself and the Visigothic kingdom. In the year 428 the Vandals and Suevi, under the renowned Genseric, defeated an allied army of Goths and Romans, for a long time ravaged all southern Spain, and then went over into Africa. Some say that the present name of Andalusia, applied to the south of Spain, which in Roman times was called Boetica, was derived from the Vandal occupation—Vandalusia, or the land of the Vandals.

The greatest event of Theodoric’s reign occurred in the year of his death, a.d. 451, when the Visigoths, assisted by the allied armies of Rome and the Franks, defeated Attila the Hun, that famed “Scourge of God,” who had thus far led his horde of “beasts on two legs” out of the east and the north, to the ravage of the south.

Theodoric was killed on the field of battle, and the crown fell to a son, Theodoric II, after him to another son, Euric, or Evaric, who defied the waning power of Rome, and finally threw it off and brought the peninsula under the sole supremacy of the Visigoths.

Under Alaric II, who became king upon the death of Euric, the Visigoths lost nearly all their possessions north of the Pyrenees, and became more particularly a Spanish people. Their capital was established at Toledo, that ancient and interesting city on the Tagus, and, as compared with the other invaders, they were cultured and polished. At the same time they were more virile than the Romans, hence had been able to expel the latter and subdue the former. They were not, however, sufficiently civilized to hold sacred human life, and especially they secured a reputation as regicides, so many kings of theirs were murdered. During the three hundred years of their dominion in Spain they had thirty-three kings ruling over them, many of whom fell by the assassin’s knife.

By sword and good right arm, the Visigothic kings generally won their thrones, but the time came when they were dominated by the Church. To show how this came about, we must look back to the time when, a menace to Rome and a terror to all southern Europe, the barbarous Goths descended from their northern fastnesses. They were pagans then, enemies of the true faith, until between the years 340 and 380 they were converted to Christianity by one Ulfilas, who invented an alphabet for them and translated much of the New Testament into Gothic. This was about the middle of the fourth century; but even when Alaric was thundering at the gates of Rome, it is said that the Goths held more seriously the tenets of their faith and were of purer morals than those from whom they had received their new religion.