168- The Rise of Aetius

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Hello, and welcome to the history of Rome.

Episode 168, The Rise of Aetius.

In 425 AD, a six-year-old Valentinian III became Emperor of the Western Empire.

He shared power with his cousin, the Eastern Emperor Theodosius II, and together they ruled a united Roman Empire that was, territorially speaking, essentially the same empire that had been ruled by Augustus.

At least, that's how it looked on paper.

In reality, this united empire was anything but, as rival power centers with conflicting interests fought to control their little pieces of the pie, and maybe grab some of their neighbor's pie if the opportunity arose.

For the time being, the East was doing a better job holding on to their political integrity than the West, but the ministers of Constantinople knew that any major thrust by the Sassanids in the East or the Huns in the north would bring it all crashing down.

The West, meanwhile, was a mess.

The Franks controlled the northeast of Gaul, the Goths controlled the southwest of Gaul, the Vandals controlled whole swaths of Hispania, Bonifacius ruled North Africa as a quasi-independent warlord, while the new commander-in-chief of Gaul, Flavius Aetius, now controlled tens of thousands of troops, and his loyalty to Ravenna was dubious at best.

A map of the Empire in the fifth century may have looked like a map of the Empire during the age of Augustus, but the first emperor, excuse me, first citizen, would not have recognized the land he once ruled.

Even in the halls of the imperial palaces, the authority of the emperors was only paper thin, as everyone knew that real power lay in the hands of two women, Valentinian's mother, Galla Placidia, in the west, and Theodosius' sister, Elia Pulcheria, in the east.

This was an empire whose reality was clearly divorced from the happy propaganda offered daily to the public.

That, at least, Augustus would have recognized.

Of all these competing power centers, the first of buttheads following the ascension of Valentinian III was Aetius and the Goths.

In 427, Aetius entered Gaul with a force of about 40,000 soldiers and discovered that Theodoric had decided to take advantage of the recent chaos in the west and expand his territory beyond the confines of Aquitaine.

Specifically, the Goths were in the middle of laying siege to the key Gallic city of Arles.

Despite their prolonged intermingling with the Romans, however, the Goths had apparently gotten no better at siege craft, and by the time Aetius arrived they had not yet managed to take the city.

Aetius' veteran forces were fresh and easily drove the Goths back into Aquitaine.

Aetius made no move to pursue them or even punish them for their siege.

Just a few years removed from the settlement with Constantius, and already the question of the Gothic right to Aquitaine was not at issue.

Their only crime was straying beyond the border of their territory.

After putting the Goths back to bed, Aetius turned his attention north.

Since the barbarian invasion of 406, the power of the Franks had waned a bit after they had been first overrun by their eastern neighbors and then sided with successive losers in the Gallic usurpation wars fought between Constantine III, Garantius, Jovinus, Atolf, and Constantius III.

But now that things had settled down, the Franks were beginning to reassert their preeminence in northeastern Gaul, which Aetius and the Romans were fine with.

Apart from its failure to stop the combined barbarian invasion of 406, the Frankish bulwark along the Rhine had served the Empire's interest well.

But as we've noted previously, it was imperative that this reassertion of preeminence come under the auspices of the imperial government.

It may have been just a veneer of authority, but the veneer was all the Romans had left, and they were willing to fight to protect it.

So Aetius marched his forces north, and conducted a campaign in four hundred twenty eight, during which he defeated a combined Frankish army in battle, and secured from them the acknowledgment that yes, Rome is still number one, and we just live here.

Aetius also coaxed an agreement from the Goths to provide troops to the Romans if necessary, and of course, by Romans, Aetius meant me, Aetius, you will provide me with troops, should I find it necessary.

And he would very shortly find it necessary.

After all, Brutus says that Aetius was ambitious, and Brutus is an honorable man.

In recognition for his achievements in Gaul over the past two years, and to placate a general whose loyalties, as I just mentioned, were a bit suspect, Aetius was elevated to the rank of magister militum, making him one of the most senior officers in the Western Empire.

I say one of, rather than the most senior officer, because he was still outranked by the senior magister militum, Flavius Felix, who had earned his position by way of his friendship with Gallipolacidia.

But Aetius was a savvy operator, and so, rather than attack a rival who was close at hand and able able to defend himself, Aetius attacked a rival who was far away and unable to defend himself.

Leveraging his newfound influence, he managed to convince Galloplacidia that Bonifacius was guilty of conspiring against the imperial family.

Then, according to Procopius, the Byzantine historian who rode with Belisarius, the sneaky snake Aetius wrote letters to Bonifacius, warning him that Ravenna, for some reason, had decided he was guilty of treason.

I don't know where they got that idea from, Aetius wrote, but if Placidia summons you back to court, don't come, because it's a trap.

So, of course, when Placidia wrote to Bonifacius asking him to please come to Ravenna and explain himself, Bonifacius froze.

It was all unfolding exactly as Aetius had told him it would.

And of course it was, because Aetius was working both sides as deviously as a malicious fifteen-year-old girl with unlimited text messaging.

Now, I am not aware of any smoking gun piece of evidence that supports the theory that is usually floated around about what happens next.

But the coincidence of events is so strong that it is often simply taken for granted that Bonifacius is the one who invited the Vandals into North Africa.

Because in 428, right at the moment when Bonifacius is falling from favor and finding himself isolated politically and militarily, the Vandals suddenly decided to pick up and migrate en masse from Spain to North Africa, and Bonifacius did not lift a finger to stop them.

Hence, the assumed theory that the general, desperate for allies and arms, made contact with the new Vandal king Genseric, who had just months before succeeded his late brother Gundric and offered him land and title in North Africa in exchange for Vandal support in a possible civil war.

Now, in the midst of his dark knight of the soul, Bonifacius might have thought that inviting the Vandals in was a necessary, even reasonable step to take.

But when the dawn came, pick your metaphor, you can't put the genie back in the bottle, or the toothpaste back in the tube, or the vandals back in Spain.

But this theory has been challenged recently, for not really making much sense.

Bonifacius had been nothing but loyal to the imperial family, and they had in turn been nothing but loyal to him.

Why would a couple of letters from Aetius, who, you'll recall, had been on the opposite side from Placidia and Bonifacius in the last civil war, suddenly induce him to panic and invite a horde of unpacified vandals into his territory?

The answer is that, well, it probably wouldn't have, And the coincidence of the Vandal migration really was just that, a coincidence.

With a new king having just ascended to power, it's not like it would have been far fetched for the Vandals to choose this particular moment to move on.

So, in this less dramatic version, Gundarik dies, and upon taking control of the tribe, Genseric decides to lead them out of Hispania down into North Africa, where the pastures might be greener and easier to harvest.

And given that the Romans were about to recognize a vandal kingdom in North Africa, it's not like Genseric was wrong to try his luck there.

This far less fun theory is backed up by what happened next.

As I just noted, Bonifacius was a favorite of Galloplacidius.

He had refused to recognize Joannis and done everything in his power to help get Valentinian III onto the throne.

So after Aetius made his accusations, the Augusta was left to wonder why Bonifacius would suddenly go rogue now after showing so much loyalty in the past.

And the answer she soon arrived at was that Bonifacius had never gone rogue.

The charges had rung hollow because they were hollow.

So almost as quickly as Bonifacius had fallen from favor, he flew right back up into it.

Not only does the rapidity of this turnaround point to an underlying trust between Placidia and Bonifacius that could not be so easily shaken, but it also leaves very little time for Bonifacius to make his alleged invitation to the Vandals.

Whether he did or did not invite them to come down to North Africa, however, one thing is very clear.

In the late 420s, the Vandals came down to North Africa.

When Bonifacius heard they were making the crossing from Hispania, he ordered them to turn around at once, but Genseric simply ignored him.

The Vandals were in the process of migrating en masse, giving up their land and strategic positions in Spain in the process.

They had no intention of going back.

So now Bonifacius had himself a little problem.

What do you do when 80,000 vandals say that we're here to stay?

And what are you going to do about it?

While Bonifacius was figuring out what to do about it, Aetius returned to Gaul, where he was once again forced to confront an expansionist-minded Theodoric.

Around 430, a second battle was fought near the city of Arl, whose outcome was the same as the first time around.

The Goths were driven back into Aquitaine.

This time, however, Aetius forced Theodoric to sign a formal peace deal, reinforcing the terms the Goths and Romans had previously agreed on.

The original original deal had been struck by Atolf and Constantius, neither of whom were still alive.

So now the deal was restruck between Theodoric and Aetius, and maybe that would keep the Goths where the Goths belonged.

And maybe, since he was being so lenient, Aetius would be able to count on the loyalty of Theodoric and the might of Gothic arms should the need arise.

Having come to terms once again with the Goths, Aetius turned his attention to a more pressing matter.

It appeared that Gallipolacidia had gotten wise to his double dealings over Bonifacius.

The details of all this are muddled, but it appears likely that Placidia, hip to Aetius' shenanigans, ordered the senior magister militum, Flavius Felix, to take care of his two-faced colleague.

Aetius was then probably warned that he was under some kind of secret death sentence, because guys like Aetius always have spies everywhere, and so he decided to strike first.

When Felix travelled to Gaul in May of four hundred thirty, Aetius sprung trumped up treason charges on his senior colleague.

Refusing to let the no good traitor Felix time to wriggle away from the righteous hand of justice, and by that I mean contact Placidia and calmly explain the situation, Aetius had the senior general executed immediately.

Galloplacidia was now in a bind.

It was clear that Aetius was conniving and backstabbing his way up the chain of command, but there was very little that she could do about it.

As charismatic as he was methodical, Aetius had secured the loyalty of practically every soldier under arms from Spain to Gaul, barbarian auxiliary, regular legionary, whichever.

So the Augusta couldn't just move against him without risking him taking that final step and invading Italy.

Her only hope lay in Bonifacius, but unfortunately he was busy grappling with the Vandals.

Having crossed over the Strait of Gibraltar, Genseric had led his people on a steady march east until by early 430 they were on the border of Numidia, knocking on the door of the heart of Roman North Africa.

Bonifacius led an army out to meet them, but the Roman forces proved insufficient.

Even though the Vandals only had something like fifteen to twenty thousand fighting men, that was still more than anything Bonifacius could muster.

After the Roman army was scattered, the Vandals kept moving, and by the spring of 430, they were besieging the city of Hippo, trapping the elderly bishop Augustine inside.

Facing the destruction of his city by barbarian vandals, who, to add insult to injury, had all converted to the heretical sect of Arianism, Augustine entered into terminal decline, and in August of 430 died before the siege could be lifted.

But the siege would eventually be lifted, though it was only a temporary reprieve.

Hippo eventually did fall to the vandals.

But in the subsequent sacking, the heretic Genseric was careful to protect Augustine's library and his church.

Such was the reputation of the great doctor, even after his death.

With his rival general under siege in North Africa, Aetius was in no rush to force a confrontation with Placidia for control of the west.

Instead, he spent almost all of four hundred thirty one travelling first to the Rhine frontier and then up through Noricum to the Danube frontier.

At every stop along the way, he secured agreements from local Roman officers and local barbarian chieftains to support him personally in case of emergency.

By 432, he was back along the lower Rhine, conducting a second campaign against the Franks, again, not to defeat them in any meaningful way, but just to kick them around enough to make them pledge to supply troops should Aetius call for them.

By 432, the situation in North Africa was still grim, but it appears that grim had become the new normal.

Most of the key Roman cities were able, for now, to resist Vandal siege, and the Vandals were not so numerous they could just flood the countryside and envelop the whole continent all at once.

In any case, nothing was happening in North Africa in 432 that was so pressing that it stopped Galla Placidia from recalling Bonifacius to Ravenna.

Apparently, realizing that time was playing into Aetius' hands far more than hers, Placidia decided that she needed to act now or risk losing her status without Aetius ever needing to pull his sword.

When Bonifacius arrived in Ravenna, the imperial court made a great show of welcoming him, and it was shortly announced that he had been elevated to the rank of senior Magister Militum.

So,

question for the Augusta?

What does that mean for Aetius, the current senior magister militum?

Oh, he's been fired.

Oh,

I see.

Well, good luck with that.

I think I'm going to go take cover now.

Aetius, as you can well imagine, did not take his sacking lying down.

Indeed, as soon as he got the news, he mobilized his forces and marched them into Italy.

But a funny thing happened on Aetius' irresistible march to the pinnacle of power and prestige.

Confronted along the road between Ravenna and Remini by hastily mustered Italian forces under the command of Bonifacius, Aetius lost the battle.

Stone Cold lost the battle.

Stripped of his command, Aetius was now little more than a fugitive, and so he did what fugitives so often do he ran for it.

And he didn't stop running until he knew he was some place where the long arm of the imperial court could not reach him.

In this case, that some place was the territory of the Huns, north of the Danube.

Having lived with them for years, and fought alongside them ever since, Aetius was free to walk among the Huns as almost no other high ranking Roman was able to do.

Among them he was safe, and among them he could plot his revenge.

In this plotting, Aetius had an ally in the Hunnic king Rua, or Rugila, depending on which book you're reading.

Since about 420, Rua had co-ruled a major faction of the Huns with his brother Oktar, but since his brother's death, Rua had been the sole king of what was fast becoming a united Hun Confederacy.

The friendly ties between Aetius and Rua were longstanding, as it appears that Aetius' years as a hostage had been spent in the same Hun group that Rua had been a rising noble in.

Once before, Aetius had shown up on his doorstep asking for a Hun army to back him in a Roman civil war, and that time around no blood had been shed, and the Huns had been paid well for doing nothing more than walking to Italy and then walking back.

This time around the situation was clearly more dire for Aetius personally, and real fighting might be required.

But Rua was still happy to provide his old friend with the troops he needed.

The possible upside was too tantalizing to pass up.

If Aetius won, he would be the master of the Western Empire, and who doesn't like being close personal friends with the master of the Western Empire?

Meanwhile, back in Italy, it became clear that Bonifacius' victory had not come without a price.

The general himself had been wounded in the fighting, and after lingering for a few months, Bonifacius succumbed to his injuries in the autumn of 432.

He was succeeded by his son Sebastianus, whose first assignment was to ensure that Aetius stayed exiled.

In this, he was entirely unsuccessful.

It is unclear to me whether Aetius returned to Italy in late 432 or early 433,

but whichever it was, when he did come back, he came at the head of a powerful Hun army.

This new army easily swept aside the Italian forces, and Aetius forced his way into Ravenna, where he humbly asked to be reinstated to his old position.

And how could Placidius say no, what What with how nicely Aetius was asking and all?

Aetius completed his takeover of the West by taking title of all the lands that had been owned by Bonifacius, and then, kind of creepily, marrying his late rival's widow, which, I can't imagine, was any fun for her at all.

So now Aetius was the most powerful soldier and statesman in the West.

He was, just as Rua had hoped, the master of the Western Empire.

And Flavius Aetius would not relinquish this title for a good twenty years, making him easily one of the most important men of the fifth century, and when you get right down to it, one of the most important men in the whole of Roman history.

He would manage the West through its final phase of semi-stability, and then successfully see it through one last great crisis before he died.

That crisis, of course, has a name and a face, and they will be shown to us for the first time next week.

Because as happy as Rua must have been to see his old friend Aetius attain such great heights, he did not live to enjoy the fruits of his friendship.

Dying in 434, Rua would be succeeded by his two nephews, an elder brother, known as Bleda, or Buddha, whose name incidentally is where scholars think the Buddha in Budapest is derived from,

and a younger brother, whose name is synonymous with all that is great and terrible, Attila the Hun.

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