Gaiseric

Gaiseric was king of the Vandals. He led them from Spain into Africa and ruled there for a long time.^[1] Jordanes describes him as a man of moderate height, lame from a fall from his horse. He was deep in thought and sparing of words, despised luxury, was furious in anger and greedy for gain. He was shrewd in winning over the barbarians and skilled in sowing the seeds of dissension.^[2] His affairs touched the Huns twice. The Hun invasion of 441 drew away the eastern fleet sent against him. In 451 Attila marched on the Visigoths, Gaiseric’s enemies, in his invasion of Gaul.^[3]^[4]

Africa and the Hun war of 441

Boniface, count of Africa for the western empire, had fallen out with the emperor Valentinian. He could take revenge only by injuring the empire. Gaiseric came to Africa at his invitation.^[5]^[6] In 439 he took Carthage by treachery.^[7]^[8] A great fleet, said to number 1,100 ships under five Germanic generals, sailed from Constantinople, the capital of the eastern empire, to win Carthage back.^[9] Gaiseric landed in Sicily, took Lilybaeum and plundered the island. Late in 440 or early in 441 he sailed back to Carthage.^[7]

A great Hun attack broke into the Balkan provinces in the first of Attila’s Balkan wars. Theodosius II and his ministers recalled the fleet from Sicily. The fleet had achieved nothing against the Vandals, owing to Gaiseric’s subtle diplomacy.^[10] Theodosius opened negotiations with Gaiseric. In 442 he made peace with the Vandals.^[11] Priscus counts the Vandals, who harassed the coasts, among the enemies that made the eastern Romans obey Attila in everything.^[12]

The war of 451

When Attila decided to turn west, Priscus writes, he meant to deal with the Italians, the Goths and the Franks. His purpose against the Goths was, in Priscus’s words, “to earn the gratitude of Gaiseric”.^[13] Jordanes tells the story behind it. Gaiseric’s son Huneric had married a daughter of Theodorid, king of the Visigoths. On a mere suspicion that she meant to poison him, Huneric cut off her nose and ears and sent her back to her father in Gaul. Gaiseric feared the father’s revenge. He learned that Attila’s mind was bent on the devastation of the world, and he incited him with many gifts to make war on the Visigoths.^[14] Attila’s letters to Valentinian and to Theodorid served the wars “long ago instigated by the bribe of Gaiseric”.^[15]

The views differ. The first holds that Gaiseric was urging Attila to a campaign against the Visigoths shortly before the spring of 450. It adds that the plan had been in Attila’s mind before.^[16] It also denies that the Huns would risk their position in Europe merely to please a foreigner.^[17] The second calls the picture of Vandal agents carrying bags of gold from North Africa to Hungary grotesque.^[4] The third finds the bribe unlikely, given the dynamics between Vandals and Visigoths. It notes that Jordanes contradicts himself.^[18] The fourth accepts the gifts and the craft. It counts them as only one of Attila’s motives.^[19]

The first view also holds that Attila wasted the alliance. Gaiseric was very anxious that Attila should attack the Visigoths. Vandal descents on Italy in 452 could have accompanied Attila’s attacks by land.^[20] No effort to stir him is recorded.^[20]

Rome, 455

In 455 the emperor Valentinian was killed through the treachery of Maximus. Maximus seized the throne.^[21]^[22] Jordanes writes that Gaiseric heard of it. He came from Africa to Italy with a war fleet, entered Rome and laid it waste.^[21] The Vandals were said to have been summoned from Africa by Valentinian’s widow Eudoxia. Maximus had forced her to marry him.^[23]

Gaiseric carried off the widow and the daughters of Valentinian. The eastern emperor Marcian twice sent envoys to demand that he spare Italy and set the women free. Gaiseric refused. He sent the second envoy away and ravaged Sicily and Italy again.^[24] He released the women only after he had betrothed Valentinian’s elder daughter, Eudocia, to his son Huneric.^[25] Later he would not lay down his arms unless the property of Valentinian and of Aetius was handed over to him. He had already obtained part of Valentinian’s property from the eastern Romans in the name of Eudocia. He used the claim every year as a pretext for renewing the war.^[26]

Jordanes says that before his death Gaiseric ordained that his sons should succeed one another by seniority. This was so that there should be no strife among them for the kingdom.^[27] Later he wanted to forestall the plots of the emperors Leo and Zeno against him. With gifts he moved the Visigothic king Eurich to take Arles and Marseille. He stirred up the Ostrogoths against the eastern empire and the Visigoths against the western, so that he might reign in peace in Africa.^[28]

References

^ Jordanes; Mierow 1915, § 167–169, p. 97–98
^ Jordanes; Mierow 1915, § 168, p. 98
^ Thompson 1948, p. 81, 131
^ a b Maenchen-Helfen 1973, p. 130
^ Jordanes; Mierow 1915, § 167, p. 97–98
^ Mierow 1915, p. 171
^ a b Maenchen-Helfen 1973, p. 108
^ Thompson 1948, p. 78
^ Thompson 1948, p. 79
^ Thompson 1948, p. 81
^ Maenchen-Helfen 1973, p. 111
^ Priscus; Müller 1851, fr. 6, p. 76
^ Priscus; Müller 1851, fr. 15, p. 98
^ Jordanes; Mierow 1915, § 184, p. 103
^ Jordanes; Mierow 1915, § 185–186, p. 103
^ Thompson 1948, p. 131
^ Thompson 1948, p. 132
^ Yavuz 2025, p. 98
^ Bury 1923, p. 291
^ a b Thompson 1948, p. 207
^ a b Jordanes; Mierow 1915, § 235, p. 117
^ Bury 1923, p. 300
^ Mierow 1915, p. 176
^ Priscus; Müller 1851, fr. 24, p. 101–102
^ Priscus; Müller 1851, fr. 29, p. 103–104
^ Priscus; Müller 1851, fr. 30, p. 104
^ Jordanes; Mierow 1915, § 169, p. 98
^ Jordanes; Mierow 1915, § 244, p. 120

Sources

Jordanes (after Priscus and Ammianus Marcellinus)
Priscus

Literature

Charles Christopher Mierow, The Gothic History of Jordanes in English Version, with an Introduction and a Commentary (1915)
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)