Two Wars, a Wedding, and a Funeral
In the eleventh instalment of ‘The So-Called Dark Ages,’ Herbert Bushman describes the dramatic events preceding the death of Attila the Hun.
The article that follows forms part of The So-Called Dark Ages, a serialised Quillette history of Late Antiquity, adapted from Herbert Bushman’s ongoing Dark Ages podcast. This is the eleventh instalment, and the sixth dedicated to the Huns. To read previous instalments, tracing the history of the Goths, click here.
As discussed in our last instalment, the 451 C.E. Battle of the Catalaunian Plains, fought in what is now the French region of Champagne, was the most decisive engagement of Attila the Hun’s invasion of Gaul. Writers of the period described the result in apocalyptic terms, with the Romans and their Visigothic allies decisively pushing back a barbarian horde set to envelop the whole of western Europe.
But the battle’s significance in the larger geopolitical context is still debated by historians. Attila did retreat east. He’d return less than a year later, however. Insofar as his will was broken by the battle, the Hun leader put himself back together quickly.
Herbert Bushman
In ancient warfare, the greatest carnage often would take place after the losing army was routed, as the victors rushed forward to massacre the retreating soldiers. But the Roman military commander in the Empire’s western half, Flavius Aetius, exhibited little interest in pursuing the retreating Huns eastward following the Battle of the Catalaunian Plains. His strategic situation remained precarious, as he regarded the Goths—who’d become his allies of convenience against Attila—as just as much of a threat to what remained of Roman-held Gaul as the Huns.
Theodoric I, the Visigothic king who’d come to Aetius’ aid, had been killed in the fighting, with command of the Visigothic army falling to his son Thorismund. Aetius discouraged Thorismund from pursuing Attila to avenge his father, and instead counselled him to return home to the Visigothic lands in Aquitaine, in order to ensure that none of his relatives seized the throne in his absence.
Aetius likewise suggested to his Frankish ally Merovech, a prince whom he’d adopted, that he should return to his own lands as well, in order to confront his dynastic rival (who’d allied himself to Attila) on favourable terms. Both allies agreed with Aetius, and the anti-Hunnish coalition army dissolved itself.
(Before proceeding further, a note on Theodoric I. No, this Theodoric was not Theodoric the Great, an even more historically important Gothic leader who wouldn’t be born for another three years. But yes, this was the revered Theodoric who became the inspiration for J.R.R. Tolkien’s Théoden of Rohan, who was crushed by his own horse at the Battle of the Pelennor Fields after the steed recoiled from the Witch-king of Angmar.)
In fact, the outright destruction of the Huns wouldn’t have been to Aetius’ advantage, as the Roman commander calculated things. Attila and Aetius had formerly been allies. And even at this late stage, Aetius still thought he could use Hunnic mercenaries to prop up Rome’s beleaguered Gallic holdings.
Without the threat of the Huns to keep Thorismund in check, Aetius’ logic went, there’d be little to keep the Visigoths (whom the Romans had planted in western France, as their prize for subduing northern Spain) from launching renewed eastward attacks.
It was a delicate balance, but Aetius was still confident that he could return to the (relatively) stable situation of the late 440s. In this, he would be disappointed.
Attila was in a foul mood when he returned to his base in eastern Europe. Marcian, the freshly installed Eastern Emperor in Constantinople, had sent a new ambassador to the Huns, a general named Apollonius. But Attila wouldn’t even grant him an audience, being angry that the diplomat hadn’t brought the extravagant tribute the Hun leader had expected. Instead, he ordered Apollonius to hand over whatever gifts he’d brought and then be gone.
The ambassador, who must be given credit for courage, said he would present his gifts only when received in the manner befitting a Roman diplomat. The Hun could kill him if he wanted—but then the objects would not be gifts, only the rewards of banditry. (Attila let Apollonius live, but still sent him packing to Constantinople.)
In early 452, Attila launched a few incursions into Balkan areas controlled by Marcian, if only to remind the Eastern Emperor who held the whip hand. These attacks were serious enough to prompt a change of venue for a great church council scheduled for Nicaea (which is why the fourth ecumenical council of the Christian Church became known as the Council of Chalcedon, and not the Second Council of Nicaea). But Attila’s attention remained focused on the west. He’d been stung by the way things had gone in Gaul, and was eager for a rematch with Aetius.
More than anything, one imagines, Attila worried that his legend had been tarnished. He decided that punishing Marcian could wait. He readied his forces to return west, this time to fall upon the Roman Empire’s ancient heartland.
The Hun force that moved across the Julian Alps into northern Italy in the spring of 452 was as large as the one that had invaded Gaul the year before. Clearly, the Huns’ ability to raise troops hadn’t been seriously affected by the setback in Champagne.
The first enemy-held city they encountered was Aquileia, at the head of the Adriatic Sea—a great fortress that had never been taken, either by storm or surrender. Attila took no notice of the city’s reputation, and marched his army right up to its walls. The first few assaults were repelled, however, and so the Huns paused to summon siege weapons.
These did the trick. And on 18 July 452, the Huns broke through. Attila’s fury then manifested in the plunder and complete destruction of Aquileia. Even a century later, it would prove difficult for locals to find the original footprint of the great fortress. Some portion of the population fled into the marshes south of the city, where they may have become the seed population of Venice. Aquileia would be refounded, but never again regained its importance as a regional strongpoint.
And where exactly was Aetius during all this? Nowhere close, it turns out. The Roman commander had been so confident that he could open negotiations with Attila and simply re-boot their former 430s-era détente that he hadn’t even posted garrisons in the mountain passes leading into northern Italy. Caught off guard, many Roman subjects in the Huns’ path were captured and led off into slavery. Pavia was taken. And a long list of other cities, including Padua, Vicenza, Verona, Brescia, and Bergamo, were burned to their foundations.
By the time Attila reached Milan (a city he decided to spare for some unknown reason), Aetius had only two real options. The first was to rescue the figurehead Emperor, Valentinian III, and flee south or west from the western Imperial court at Ravenna to (temporary) safety. But the disgrace of leaving Italy to its fate likely would have spelled Aetius’ own doom. And so Aetius instead went with a second option: He sent a delegation to Attila, begging for peace.
The motley group that met with the Hun leader included a fabulously wealthy former consul named Gennadius Avienus who—and here, I’m just going to quote twentieth-century historian E.A. Thompson—“[held] opinions, which he was always painfully ready to advance, [which] were in the judgment of those who knew him, singularly worthless.” Fortunately for the Romans, Avienus was accompanied by the bishop of Rome, the subsequently sainted Pope Leo I, also known to history (in large part because of the events about to unfold) as Leo the Great.
Leo, who’d been bishop of Rome for twelve years by the time he met Attila, was born in Tuscany around 400. While still in young adulthood, he’d developed a reputation as a distinguished and well-connected scholar and lawyer. In time, he’d become a driving force in the centralisation of church hierarchy—including the creation of the papacy as we now understand it.
In fact, it was during Leo’s tenure that the word “pope” began to be applied exclusively to the bishop of Rome, who would henceforth be revered as the heir of Saint Peter. As secular authority in the west crumbled in the mid fifth century, Leo placed himself at the centre of the church’s bureaucracy, which was beginning to supplant the Imperial administration, in part by ensuring the well-being of Roman citizens through charity and public works.
There’s lots more to say about Leo. But for our purposes, the thing to know is that he was a man with a profoundly forceful personality and unshakable self-confidence.
Leo and his colleagues met the Huns on the banks of the river now known as the Mincio, a tributary of the Po that flows through the city of Mantua. There is no surviving eyewitness account of the meeting, and we can’t know exactly what was said. What we do know is that when it was done, the Huns withdrew from Italy.
Prosper of Aquitaine, who served as one of the Pope’s secretaries, wrote that the Hun was impressed by Leo and swayed by the force of his personality. The contemporary historian Priscus of Panium, on the other hand, attributed the Huns’ withdrawal to barbarian superstitions: Attila’s men were nervous about following in the footsteps of the Gothic king Alaric I, who’d succumbed to disease just months after having sacked Rome (a tale recounted back in our fourth instalment).
Herbert Bushman
Later writers, primarily churchmen, layered mystical significance onto the meeting. Gregory of Tours wrote of the appearance of a giant man with a sword whose menacing presence was visible only to Attila. A later, anonymously authored account expanded on this supernatural theme in even more dramatic fashion:
And lo, suddenly there were seen the apostles Peter and Paul, clad like bishops, standing by Leo, one on the right, the other on the left. They held swords stretched out over his head, and threatened Attila with death if he did not obey the Pope’s command. Wherefore he was appeased, as one who had raged mad. He, by Leo’s intercession, straightaway promised a lasting peace and withdrew beyond the Danube.
Naturally, this reverie became a popular muse for artists—from medieval miniaturists to Raphael. But I don’t think I’m going too far out on a limb to express doubt about the literal appearance of Christian saints who acted as Leo’s enforcers.
Ghosts aside, moreover, I doubt that Attila (who, unlike Alaric, was a thoroughgoing pagan) would have had any more respect for Leo than for any other Roman emissary.
In fact, there were other, more banal factors putting pressure on Attila to withdraw from Italy.
First, famine was ravaging the region in early 452 (just as it had in 451, which is one reason why Aetius had enjoyed little success in raising an army to defend Gaul.) The year’s grain harvests hadn’t been collected yet, and Attila was facing the prospect that his soldiers might start succumbing to malnourishment and starvation. (Moreover, disease always follows famine as night follows day—and sickness was already starting to break out among Attila’s soldiers.)
Additionally, Attila was getting worrying messages from the east, where Marcian’s troops had begun successfully raiding Hun territory. If this continued, the Huns’ local Germanic subjects might go rogue, and the state of Attila’s empire could become precarious.
And there is also yet another possible factor: Leo may have been carrying bribes along with him to sweeten the deal.
For whatever reasons, Attila agreed to leave Italy, and now set his mind to reasserting authority in the east. We know this because he sent a message to Constantinople to that effect. This time, he said, there would be no ultimatum, no conditions for Constantinople to satisfy, no tribute to be rendered. This was simply a Hun declaration of war. The inhabitants of the Roman east, Attila promised, would be added to the long list of his slaves.
Before the next year’s campaign season began, however, Attila added to another long list, by taking a new wife. It would prove to be a wedding celebration that changed the course of European history.
We don’t know how many wives Attila had, though it was certainly more than a handful. The bride on this occasion was named Ildico, a woman whom Priscus reports as being quite beautiful. Beyond that, we can say nothing about her, other than that her name implies she was of Germanic origin.
At the feast celebrating the wedding, Attila drank late into the night, as was not unusual for him; but then failed to appear the following day, which was. Eventually, his men became concerned, and forced their way into his dwelling. Inside, they found Ildico crying at the side of Attila’s bed, which was soaked with blood. There was no wound on the man’s body, and the lieutenants concluded that their chief had suffered a nosebleed—apparently, Attila was prone to them—and because he was so drunk, had choked to death on the blood. (Modern interpretations tend to suggest an aneurysm or some other kind of internal haemorrhage.)
It’s oddly difficult to eulogise Attila. Little of his personality survives in the sources, and what does is either filtered through the reporters’ fear at his success or contempt for his barbarousness. He was feared by his compatriots, respected for his victories, and loved for the wealth that flowed from his success. His children held him in terror, which certainly doesn’t speak well of him personally. But I’m not sure that his actual character per se is the most relevant thing to consider. It was the idea of Attila that mattered—his image as an unstoppable warrior who always got what he wanted and made good on his threats. This is why the setback in Champagne was so intolerable to Attila, as it contradicted that myth.
A writer I encountered during my research—I forget who it was, except that he was persuasive—argued that Attila’s most defining characteristic was his ambition. No man in Europe would match it again, one might argue, until Napoleon. The Hun leader was around 47 years old when he died, and had ruled the Huns with iron and gold for 19 years.
Priscus tells us that the Huns who’d discovered Attila’s lifeless body cut off their hair and slashed their faces, so that their great war leader would be mourned with blood and not tears. There are also suggestions here and there that Ildico may have been involved in some kind of conspiracy to murder her new husband. Indeed, later German sagas suggested that Attila was murdered by a woman. But we find no mention of any kind of punishment for Ildico, and it’s hard to imagine that the Huns would have been gentle with the young widow if there’d been even a whisper of suspicion attached to her at the time.
According to surviving historical accounts, Attila’s funeral was elaborate. His body was laid in a silk tent set up on the open plain. And then, according to Priscus, as his account is relayed to us by the sixth-century Roman historian Jordanes:
The best horsemen of the entire tribe rode around him in a circle, in the manner of the circus games, and told of his deeds in a funeral dirge in the following words: The chief of the Huns, King Attila, born of his father Mundzuk, lord of the bravest tribes, sole possessor of the Scythian and German kingdoms… terrified both Empires of the Roman world… He fell not by an enemy’s blow, nor by treachery of his own people, but in the midst of his people at peace, happy in his joy and without sense of pain. Who can rate this as death, when none consider that it calls for vengeance?
A barrow was raised, and Attila’s body was covered over with gold, silver, and, finally, iron, to symbolise the plunder he’d taken and the violent means by which he’d taken it. Supposedly, those who’d laid this treasure out were killed, and buried beside their chief. No trace of Attila’s grave has ever been found.
News of Attila’s passing spread across his lands and into the Roman Empire, where it was greeted with joy. The Eastern Emperor, Marcian, proclaimed that the death had been announced to him on the very night by a divinely inspired dream, which showed him Attila’s broken bow.
Attila’s death wouldn’t be enough to save the western half of the Roman Empire, which would be formally extinguished within a quarter century. But it did have enormous consequences for European geopolitics more generally, as the many tribes trampled by the hooves of Hun horses amid Attila’s great “whirlwind of nations” now began surveying the possibilities that suddenly presented themselves in this new post-Attila world.
