1. On this day in 526, Theoderic the Amal died. Not only did he forge various non-Roman communities and war-bands into the new formation of the Ostrogoths. He also turned Late Roman Italy into the most formidable western regnum of the early sixth century. Thread.
2. Theoderic was born somewhere in Central Europe (Pannonia?) c. 454, at a time this region went through a power-flux. Attila had died in 453. His sons were unable to hold together his realm, resulting in the revolt of various communities against their Hunnic overlords.
3. Theoderic' father was the ruler of one Gothic community that for generations had been living under Hunnic rule. There were all kinds of these (Gepids, Scirians etc) who had been the Huns' main forces. Free to go their own way, several now moved into the Eastern Roman Balkans.
4. Some of them got Imperial permission, others just filled the vacuum in a region tstill had not recovered from Attila's raids in the previous decade. They were just as eager to fight imperial forces as each other in the process. So it came about that his father struck a treaty.
5. Still a child, Theoderic was sent to Constantinople as a hostage (= treaty insurance) to the court of Leo I. He'd spend a decade there, and receive an education in the process. Few non-Roman born leaders ever got the chance to learn as much about Imperial power as Theoderic.
6. Theoderic returned to the Pannonian Goths in the early 470s and eventually became their leader (probably barely 20 years old!). He demonstrated military skill and political acumen against various competitors the following decades, during the volatile reign of Zeno (474-491).
7. At times, Theoderic secured Imperial employment for him and his followers, even aiding Zeno's restoration after the latter lost control over Constantinople. At his peak, Theoderic was a magister militum, became the consul for 484, and received the title of patrician.
8. Yet in all of this Theoderic found a strong rival in a namesake (Theoderic 'Strabo') who led a group of Thracian Goths. Zeno was all to happy to play off both men against each other. When one of them lost imperial favour, they often turned warlord and pillaged the Balkans.
9. In the 480s, however, our Theoderic the Amal (name of his soon-to-be-dynasty) emerged as the sole leader who united these various Goths. Despite the occasional Imperial position and honour, him and Zeno must never had much faith in each other. Yet by 489, they found a solution
10. Go to Italy and replace Odoacer! The sources are divided on who came up to the idea. But for Zeno it meant getting rid of a fierce rival with forces he could not evict from the Balkans himself, while Italy was a much more prosperous prospect for Theoderic and his followers.
11. Odoacer was leader ('rex') of the former western field army in Italy, and had done tremendous work in stabilizing the region after decades of civil war. He'd actually never been hostile to Zeno, but for Zeno he was just collateral damage. So in 489, Theoderic set off West.
12. The war for Italy would last until 493. Not since the second Triumvirate, had the region experienced such an ongoing military conflict. Theoderic defeated Odoacer in a few set-piece battles in 489-90, but found himself under siege by the latter a year later at Pavia.
13. If it were not for the Visigoths who lifted the siege, history might have gone very differently. Even then it took until 493, before Odoacer and Theoderic came to a settlement. A crucial point often forgotten in scholarship: Odoacer never surrendered. It was a compromise.
14. Both men were supposed to divide rule over Italy. IT did not last long, given that Theoderic eventually had Odoacer murdered during a banquet. But it speaks volumes over the fragile position of Theoderic that he had to personally kill him (see also Aetius and Valentinian III)
15. Later propaganda (Ennodius, Cassiodorus) paint Theoderic as a liberator, but we should never forget he came as an Eastern invader while Odoacer had brought 13 years of peace to Italy. Many had not welcomed him with open arms, and Theoderic strongly considered reprisals.
16. In the end, Theoderic used the foundations of Odoacer's regime to turn Italy into the linchpin of a 'western Roman commonwealth'. Even though he was rex of the Ostrogoths, his presentation was very much Imperial. His favourite title in official documents was even 'Princeps'.
17. He also considered himself the arbiter of western politics, first by setting up marriage-alliances between his family and various other reges (most importantly: Burgundians, Franks, Visigoths, and Vandals). Yet that did not mean that simply everybody went along with this.
18. The Franks still went to war with the Visigoths, driving them from most of Gaul. Yet Theoderic intervened, securing the southern Gallic coastline, and imposing his hegemony over the Visigoths in Spain. Ostrogothic military power stretched from the Atlantic to the Danube.
19. Constantinople regarded Theoderic with suspicion through all of this. Zeno had died in 491, before the war with Odoacer was over. His successor Anastasius eventually came to a diplomatic accord with Theoderic, but also supported the Franks by raiding southern Italy in 508.
20. Yet Italy enjoyed a veritable 'Indian Summer'. The Roman Senate eagerly cooperated with the Amal monarch. Through their support, and the fact that Italy was the only post-Imperial region to retain its prefecture, Theoderic had a bureaucratic apparatus unrivaled in the West.
21. Latin literature flourished, as evidenced by the writings of Boethius, Cassiodorus and Ennodius. It's also telling that unlike Clovis, Gundobad or Alaric II, Theoderic never felt the need to come up with his own law code. Because his realm was the most 'Roman' of them all.
22. That's not to say it was all roses and sunshine. That he never managed to have a son (= succession!) was a source for instability. In his final years, Theoderic even condemned high-ranking senators such as Boethius, who wrote his 'Consolation of Philosophy' before execution.
23. Yet even after Theoderic's death in 526, Ostrogothic Italy remained a formidable polity. When Justinian finally went to war with, he needed 25+ years before the last garrisons surrendered. Justinian got Italy at the cost of the destruction of its Roman foundations. Fin.
24. PS: Today I'll submit the MS of an edited volume on 'Late Roman Italy. Imperium to Regnum' for Edinburgh University Press. It should be out next Spring. It will cover the period c. 250-500 CE, and my own chapter will look in detail on the war between Odoacer and Theoderic.
@_Dragases_ Sad day indeed!