[Sidenote: Disasters of the Huns.]
On his death, the German tribes refused longer to serve under the divided rule of his sons, and after a severe contest with the more barbarous Huns, the empire of Attila disappeared as one of the great powers of the world, and Italy was delivered forever from this plague of locusts. The battle of Netad, in which they suffered a disastrous defeat, was perhaps as decisive as the battle of Chalons. They returned to Asia, or else were gradually worn out in unavailing struggles with the Goths.
[Sidenote: The Avars.]
The Avars, a tribe of the great Turanian race, and kindred to the Huns, a few years after their retreat, crossed the Danube, established themselves between that river and the Save, invaded the Greek empire, and ravaged the provinces almost to the walls of Constantinople. It would seem from Sheppard that the Avars had migrated from the very centre of Asia, two thousand miles from the Caspian Sea, fleeing from the Turks who had reduced them to their sway. [Footnote: Sheppard, Lect. iv.] In their migration to the West, they overturned every thing in their way, and spread great alarm at Constantinople. Justinian, then an old man, A.D. 567, purchased their peace by an annual tribute and the grant of lands. In 582, the Avar empire was firmly established on the Danube, and in the valleys of the Balkan. But it was more hostile to the Slavic tribes, than to the Byzantine Greeks, who then occupied the centre and southeast of Europe, and who were reduced to miserable slavery. With the Franks, the Avars also came in conflict, and, after various fortunes, were subdued by Charlemagne. Their subsequent history cannot here be pursued, until they were swept away from the roll of the European nations. Moreover, it was not until after the fall of Rome, that they were formidable.
[Sidenote: Final disasters of the empire.]
[Sidenote: Imbecile emperors.]
The real drama of the fall of Rome closes with the second sack of the city by the Vandals, since the imperial power was nearly prostrated in the West, and shut up within the walls of Ravenna. But Italy was the scene of great disasters for twenty years after, until the last of the emperors—Augustulus Romulus; what a name with which to close the series of Roman emperors!—was dethroned by Odoacer, chief of the Heruli, a Scythian tribe, and Rome was again stormed and sacked, A.D. 476. During these twenty years, the East and the West were finally severed, and Italy was ruled by barbaric chieftains, and their domination permanently secured. Valentinian, the last emperor of the race of Theodosius, was assassinated in the year 455 (at the instigation of the Senator Maximus, of the celebrated Anician family, whose wife he had violated), a man who had inherited all the weaknesses of his imperial house, without its virtues, and under whose detestable reign the people were so oppressed with taxes and bound down by inquisitions that they preferred the barbarians to the empire. The successive reigns of Maximus, Avitus, Majorian, Severus, Anthemius, Olybrius, Glycerius, Nepos, and Augustulus, nine emperors in twenty—one years, suggests nothing but disorder and revolution. The murderer of Valentinian reigned but three months, during which Rome was sacked by the Vandals. Avitus was raised to his vacant throne by the support of the Visigoths of Gaul, then ruled by Theodoric, a majestic barbarian, and the most enlightened and civilized of all the leaders of the Gothic hosts who had yet appeared. He fought and vanquished the Suevi, who had established themselves in Spain, in the name of the emperor whom he had placed upon the throne, but he really ruled on both sides of the Alps, and Avitus was merely his puppet, and distinguished only for his infamous pleasures, although, as a general, he had once saved the empire from the Huns.
[Sidenote: Last days of Rome.]
He was in turn deposed by Count Ricimer, a Sueve, and generalissimo of the Roman armies, and Majorian, whom Ricimer thought to make a tool, was placed in his stead. But he was an able and good man, and attempted to revive the traditions of the empire, and met the fate of all reformers in a hopeless age, doubtless under the influence of Ricimer, who substituted Severus, a Lucanian, who perished by poison after a reign of four years, so soon as he became distasteful to the military subordinate, who was all-powerful at Rome, and who ruled Italy for six years without an emperor with despotic authority. During these six years Italy was perpetually ravaged by the Vandals, who landed and pillaged the coast, and then retired with their booty. Ricimer, without ships, invoked the aid of the court of Constantinople, who imposed a Greek upon the throne of Italy. Though a man of great ability, Anthemius, the new emperor, was unpopular with the Italians and the barbarians, and he, again, was deposed by Ricimer, and Olybrius, a senator of the Anician house, reigned in his stead, A.D. 472. It was then that Rome for the third time was sacked by one of her own generals. Olybrius reigned but a few months, and Glycerius, captain of his guard, was selected as his successor—an appointment disagreeable to the Greek Emperor Leo, who opposed to him Julius Nepos—a distinguished general, who succeeded in ejecting Glycerius. The Visigoths, offended, made war upon Roman Gaul. Julius sent against them Orestes, a Pannonian, called the Patrician, who turned a traitor, and, on the assassination of Julius, entered Ravenna in triumph. His son, christened Romulus, the soldiers elevated upon a shield and saluted Augustus; but as he was too small to wear the purple robe, they called him Augustulus—a bitter mockery, recalling the battle of Actium, and the foundation of Rome. He was the last of the Caesars. It was easier to make an emperor than keep him in his place. The bands of Orestes clamored for lands equal to a third of Italy. Orestes hesitated, and refused the demand. The soldiers were united under Odoacer—chief of the Heruli, a general in the service of the Patrician—one of the boldest and most unscrupulous of those mercenaries who lent their arms in the service of the government of Ravenna. The. standard of revolt was raised, and the barbarian army marched against their former master. Leaving his son in Ravenna, Orestes, himself an able general trained in the service of Attila, went forth to meet his enemy on the Lombard plains. Unable to make a stand, he shut himself up in Pavia, which was taken and sacked, and Orestes put to death. The barbarians then marched to Ravenna, which they took, with the boy who wore the purple, who was not slain as his father was, but pensioned with six thousand crowns, and sent to a Campanian villa, which once belonged to Sulla and Lucullus. The throne of the Caesars was hopelessly subverted, and Odoacer was king of Italy, and portioned out its lands to his greedy followers, A.D. 476. He was not unworthy of his high position, but his kingdom was in a sad state of desolation, and after a reign of fourteen years he was in turn supplanted by the superior genius of Theodoric, king of the Ostrogoths, under whom a new era dawned upon Italy and the West, A.D. 490.
[Sidenote: Dismemberment of the empire.]