As the Lombards did not feel themselves a match for the Gepids, they had sent ambassadors to Justinian to beg for help which was granted, not in consideration of former agreements which the emperor seldom observed, but because the Byzantine principle was to stand by the weaker side that the stronger might be the more completely destroyed. The Gepids who demanded support or, at least, neutrality, on the grounds of a former treaty promising them Roman help in case of war, were refused, and a Roman army consisting of some ten thousand horsemen and fifteen hundred Herulian warriors advanced against them. Before they met, the imperial troops destroyed a division of three thousand Herulians, who were allies of the Gepids, and compelled them to conclude a separate peace with the Lombards. As a security for the newly formed friendly relations Audoin summoned the king of the Gepids, Thorisind, to surrender Hildichis; meanwhile the latter had escaped and for a long time wandered as an adventurer through various lands.
The first war of the Lombards and Gepids was soon followed by another (549), which also found a speedy ending without any decision being arrived at.
According to Procopius a panic seems to have seized both armies before the battle and put them to disorderly flight. The kings, therefore, again met and concluded a two years’ armistice; at the close of that time hostilities began again. This time also Justinian placed himself on the side of the Lombards—he broke the treaty formed shortly before with the Gepids and sent troops to the field, a division of which was under the command of Amalafrid; only the latter and his soldiers reached the Lombards; the other troops remained in Ulpiana at the imperial command, evidently for the purpose of quelling disturbances there. Nevertheless the Lombards succeeded in invading the Gepidean territory and in completely beating their adversaries; the seat of war was probably Sirmium. Procopius places this battle in the seventeenth year of the war, probably July, 551. It is very probably the same which Paulus[p] describes and during which Alboin, Audoin’s son, unhorsed the son of the Gepidean king, Torismond, in single combat. The terrible defeat compelled the Gepids to seek peace, which was granted them through the mediation of Justinian.
As conditions the Lombards and the emperor demanded the surrender of Hildichis; for after his flight from the Gepids in 548,—after he had first wandered about Italy with Byzantine troops, had then lived amongst a Slav people, and as leader of a troop had served in the imperial palace guard in Constantinople,—he had lately returned to them that he might again assert his claims to the Lombard throne. But as the Gepids were determined not to violate the laws of hospitality and for the same reason the Lombards would not surrender Ostrogothus who had sought refuge with them, after Thorisind had expelled him from his rightful throne, and whose surrender was now demanded in return, Hildichis was not given up; soon after the two princes, not without the connivance of the king, were assassinated (552), that there might be no more occasion for the rupture of the peace just concluded.
Before the outbreak of the war, Audoin at the request of Justinian sent twenty-five hundred picked Lombard warriors as well as three thousand troops to Italy to the army of Narses; with them they went through the famous campaign against Totila, but, owing to their licentiousness after the decisive battle at Taginæ (autumn, 552), they were richly rewarded and sent home under an escort.
The peace concluded with the Gepids lasted as long as Audoin and Thorisind lived; but when they both died and Alboin was ruler of the Lombards (555), while Cunimund had become king of the Gepids, the enmity restrained with difficulty burst out again with redoubled violence.
ALBOIN ANNIHILATES THE GEPID POWER
[555-567 A.D.]
According to the tradition, the Origin relates that after the battle in which he had become so famous, Alboin went directly into the hostile country to King Thorisind, to fetch the arms according to ancient custom; on this visit he for the first time saw the lovely Rosamund, the youngest daughter of the late king Cunimund, with whom he fell passionately in love (551).