| Alaric II | |
|---|---|
 A ring depicting Alaric II | |
| King of the Visigoths | |
| Reign | 28 December 484 –c. August 507 |
| Predecessor | Euric |
| Successor | Gesalec |
| Born | c. 458/466 |
| Died | c. August 507 (aged 41/49) |
| Spouse | Unknown Theodegotha |
| Issue | Gesalec Amalaric |
| Father | Euric |
| Mother | Ragnagild |
| Religion | Arian Christianity |
Alaric II (Gothic:𐌰𐌻𐌰𐍂𐌴𐌹𐌺𐍃,Alareiks, 'ruler of all';[1]Latin:Alaricus;c. 458/466 – August 507) was theKing of the Visigoths from 484 until 507. He succeeded his fatherEuric as King of theVisigoths inToulouse on 28 December 484;[2] he was the great-grandson of the more famousAlaric I, who sacked Rome in 410. He established his capital atAire-sur-l'Adour (Vicus Julii) inAquitaine. His dominions included not only the majority ofHispania (excluding its northwestern corner) but alsoGallia Aquitania and the greater part of an as-yet undividedGallia Narbonensis.
Herwig Wolfram opens his chapter on the eighth Visigothic king, "Alaric's reign gets no full treatment in the sources, and the little they do contain is overshadowed by his death in theBattle of Vouillé and the downfall of the Toulosan kingdom."[3] One example isIsidore of Seville's account of Alaric's reign: consisting of a single paragraph, it is primarily about Alaric's death in that battle.[4]
The earliest-documented event in Alaric's reign concerned providing refuge toSyagrius, the former ruler of theDomain of Soissons (in what is now northwesternFrance) who had been defeated byClovis I, King of theFranks. According toGregory of Tours' account, Alaric was intimidated by Clovis into surrendering Syagrius to Clovis; Gregory then adds that "the Goths are a timorous race." The Franks then imprisoned Syagrius, and once his control over Syagrius' former kingdom was secure, Clovis had him beheaded.[5] However, Wolfram points out that at the time "Clovis got no farther than the Seine; only after several more years did the Franks succeed in occupying the rest of the Gallo-Roman buffer state north of theLoire." Any threat of war Clovis could make would only be effective if they were neighbors; "it is nowhere written that Syagrius was handed over in 486 or 487."[3]
Despite Frankish advances in the years that followed, Alaric was not afraid to take the military initiative when it presented itself. In 490, Alaric assisted his fellow Gothic king,Theodoric the Great, in his conquest ofItaly by dispatching an army to raiseOdoacer's siege ofPavia, where Theodoric had been trapped.[6] Then when the Franks attacked theBurgundians in the decade after 500, Alaric assisted the ruling house, and according to Wolfram the victorious Burgundian kingGundobad cededAvignon to Alaric.[7] By 502 Clovis and Alaric met on an island in the Loire nearAmboise for face-to-face talks, which led to a peace treaty.[8]
In 506, theVisigoths captured the city ofDertosa in theEbro valley. There they captured theRoman usurperPeter and had him executed.[9]
After a few years, however, Clovis violated the peace treaty negotiated in 502. Despite the diplomatic intervention ofTheodoric, king of theOstrogoths and father-in-law of Alaric, Clovis led his followers into Visigothic territory. Alaric was forced by his magnates to meet Clovis in theBattle of Vouillé (summer 507) near Poitiers; there the Goths were defeated and Alaric slain, according to Gregory of Tours, by Clovis himself.[10]
The most serious consequence of this battle was not the loss of their possessions inGaul to the Franks; with Ostrogothic help, much of the Gallic territory was recovered, Wolfram notes, perhaps as far asToulouse.[11] Nor was it the loss of the royal treasury at Toulouse, which Gregory of Tours writes Clovis took into his possession.[5] AsPeter Heather notes, the Visigothic kingdom was thrown into disarray "by the death of its king in battle".[12] Alaric's heirs were his eldest son, the illegitimateGesalec, and his younger son, the legitimateAmalaric, who was still a child. Gesalec proved incompetent, and in 511 King Theodoric assumed the throne of the kingdom ostensibly on behalf of Amalaric—Heather uses the word "hijacked" to describe his action. Although Amalaric eventually became king in his own right, the political continuity of the Visigothic kingdom was broken; "Amalaric's succession was the result of new power structures, not old ones," as Heather describes it. With Amalaric's death in 531, the Visigothic kingdom entered an extended period of unrest which lasted untilLeovigild assumed the throne in 569.[13]
In religion Alaric was anArian, like all the early Visigothic nobles, but he greatly mitigated the persecution policy of his father Euric toward theCatholics and authorized them to hold in 506 the council ofAgde.[14] He was on uneasy terms with the Catholic bishops of Arelate (modernArles) as epitomized in the career of the Gallo-RomanCaesarius, bishop of Arles, who was appointed bishop in 503. Caesarius was suspected of conspiring with theBurgundians, whose king had married the sister of Clovis, to assist the Burgundians capture Arles. Alaric exiled him for a year toBordeaux in Aquitania, then allowed him to return unharmed when the crisis had passed.[15]
Alaric displayed similar wisdom in political affairs by appointing a commission headed by thereferendaryAnianus to prepare an abstract of the Roman laws and imperial decrees, which would form the authoritative code for his Roman subjects. This is generally known as theBreviarium Alaricianum orBreviary of Alaric.[14]
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TheMontagne d'Alaric [fr] (Alaric's Mountain), nearCarcassonne, is named after the Visigoth king.[16] Local rumour has it that he left a vast treasure buried in the caves beneath the mountain.[17]
TheCanal d'Alaric [fr] (Alaric'sCanal) in theHautes-Pyrénéesdepartment is named after him.[18]
One or more of the preceding sentences incorporates text from a publication now in thepublic domain: Chisholm, Hugh, ed. (1911). "Alaric II.".Encyclopædia Britannica. Vol. 1 (11th ed.). Cambridge University Press. p. 472.King Alaric II of the Visigoths Died: 507 | ||
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| Preceded by | King of the Visigoths 28 December 484 – August 507 | Succeeded by |
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