Edeco

Edeco was one of the leading men around Attila. Priscus introduces him as a Scythian “who had done very great deeds in war”.^[1] The interpreter Bigilas called him a man most famous in war and of Hunnic race. Bigilas also placed him far above Attila’s Roman secretary Orestes in rank.^[2]^[3] He belonged to the circle of leading men whom Priscus calls logades.^[4]^[5]

The plot of 449

In 448 or 449 Edeco came to Constantinople as Attila’s envoy, together with Orestes. He handed the emperor a letter in which Attila demanded the fugitives, a strip of land south of the Danube and a market at Naissus.^[1]^[6] After the audience Bigilas took him to the eunuch Chrysaphius, the most powerful man at the court of Theodosius II. Edeco admired the palace. Chrysaphius told him that he too could have a house with a golden roof if he left Scythia and came over to the Romans. Edeco answered that it was wrong for the servant of another master to do so great a deed without his master’s will.^[1] He told the eunuch that he and other leading men took turns guarding Attila in arms on fixed days.^[7]

At a second dinner, without Orestes, Chrysaphius proposed that Edeco kill Attila on his return to Scythia and come back to live in great wealth among the Romans. Edeco agreed and asked for fifty pounds of gold to divide among the men under his command. Bigilas was to bring it later.^[7] When the Roman embassy reached Attila’s camp, Edeco revealed the plot to Attila, with the sum of gold that was to be sent. Priscus could not say whether he had made the agreement with the eunuch only in pretence, or whether he feared that Orestes would report his secret talks with the emperor and the eunuch.^[8] When Bigilas came back with the gold, he was seized. Attila learned from him that he had been told the truth.^[9] Chrysaphius may have corrupted Edeco. If so, Edeco confessed to Attila almost at once.^[10]

At Attila’s banquet the Moorish jester Zercon came in. Edeco had persuaded him to return to Attila’s court with a promise to help him recover his wife.^[11]

Later life and name

Edeco has been identified with Edica, the father of Odoacer, the first barbarian king of Italy. In that case, after Attila’s death he and his son Hunoulphus joined the coalition that the Ostrogoths routed on the river Bolia. He may have fallen there.^[12] Others find no more reason to identify the Hun Edeco with Odoacer’s father than with Edica, a chief of the Sciri.^[13] Odoacer himself became king of Italy in 476. In one account he had served under Attila as a general and came from the Turk-ilingi.^[14]

Edeco was a Hun by birth. His name is the Greek form of Edika, a short Germanic form of a name beginning with Ed-.^[13]

References

^ a b c Priscus; Müller 1851, fr. 7, p. 76
^ Priscus; Müller 1851, fr. 8, p. 78
^ Maenchen-Helfen 1973, p. 195
^ Maenchen-Helfen 1973, p. 192
^ Thompson 1948, p. 163
^ Thompson 1948, p. 98
^ a b Priscus; Müller 1851, fr. 7, p. 77
^ Priscus; Müller 1851, fr. 8, p. 80
^ Priscus; Müller 1851, fr. 8, p. 95
^ Thompson 1948, p. 164
^ Priscus; Müller 1851, fr. 8, p. 92
^ Thompson 1948, p. 155–156
^ a b Maenchen-Helfen 1973, p. 388
^ Yavuz 2025, p. 104

Sources

Priscus

Literature

Karl Müller (ed.), Fragmenta Historicorum Graecorum, Bd. IV (darin: Menandri Protectoris fragmenta, griechisch mit lateinischer Übersetzung) (1851)
J. B. Bury, History of the Later Roman Empire from the Death of Theodosius I to the Death of Justinian, vol. I (1923)
Otto J. Maenchen-Helfen, The World of the Huns: Studies in Their History and Culture (1973)
E. A. Thompson, A History of Attila and the Huns (1948)
Emre-E. Yavuz, The Gokturk Empire: 2nd Edition (2025)