Atilla the Hun (circa 406-53), king of the Huns (circa 433-53) One of the most feared

and notorious barbarians

of all time, Attila is believed to be ofdistant Mongol stock, he ravaged much of the
European continent during
the 5th century AD. Apparently Attila was as great a menace to the Teutonic
tribespeople as he was to the
Romans.
There is a story that he claimed to own the actual sword of Mars, and that other
Barbarian chiefs could not look
the King of the Huns directly in the eyes without flinching. Attila was a striking
figure, and Edward Gibbon in
The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire offered a
famousdescription of the personality
and appearance of the Hun, based on an ancient account:
His features, according to the observation of a Gothic historian, bore the stamp of
his national origin . . .
a large head, a swarthy complexion, small, deep-seated eyes, a flat nose, a few hairs
in the place of a beard,
broad shoulders, and a short square body, of a nervous strength, though of a
disproportioned form. The
haughty step and demeanour of the king of the Huns expressed the consciousness of
his superiority
above the rest of mankind; and he had a custom of fiercely rolling his eyes, as if he
wished to enjoy the
terror which he inspired....He delighted in war; but, after he had ascended the
throne in a mature age,
his head, rather than his hand, achieved the conquest of the North; and the fame of
an adventurous soldier was
usefully exchanged for that of a prudent and successful general.
In his own day he and his Huns were known as the "Scourge of God," and the
devastation they caused in Gaul
before the great Battle of Chlons in 451 AD became a part of medieval folklore and
tradition.
The rumors of his cannibalistic practices are not unfounded; he is supposed to have
eaten two of his sons.
The circumstances of this act, however, may be more accurately depicted in the
Edda poems where his
revengeful wife serves him the meat of his sons under the guise that it was the meat
of a young animal.
From the year 433 Attila shared the throne with his brother Bleda, but killed him in
445. At the outset of his

reign, Attila demanded more money, and the Eastern Emperor, Theodosius II,
obligingly doubled the annual
subsidy. For various reasons, however, the new king began in the late 440's to look to
the West as the main
area of opportunity for the Huns. For the next decade and a half after his accession
Attila was the most powerful
foreign potentate in the affairs of the Western Roman Empire. His Huns had
become a sedentary nation and
were no longer the horse nomads of the earlier days. The Great Hungarian Plain did
not offer as much room as
the steppes of Asia for grazing horses, and the Huns were forced to develop an
infantry to supplement their now
much smaller cavalry. As one leading authority has recently said, "When the Huns
first appeared on the steppe
north of the Black Sea, they were nomads and most of them may have been mounted
warriors. In Europe, however,
they could graze only a fraction of their former horse power, and their chiefs soon
fielded armies which resembled
the sedentary forces of Rome." By the time of Attila the army of the Huns had
become like that of most Barbarian
nations in Europe. It was, however, very large, as we shall see, and capable of
conducting siege
operations, which most other Barbarian armies could not do effectively.
In any event the Hunnic invasion of Gaul was a huge undertaking. The Huns had a
reputation for cruelty that
was not undeserved. In the 440's one of Attila's attacks against the East in the
Balkans aimed at a city in the
Danubian provinces, Naissus (441-42). It was located about a hundred miles south of
the Danube on the
Nischava River. The Huns so devastated the place that when Roman ambassadors
passed through to meet with
Attila several years later, they had to camp outside the city on the river. The river
banks were covered with human
bones, and the stench of death was so great that no one could enter the city.
Many cities of Gaul would soon suffer the same fate.
After securing a strong position on the Roman side of the Danube the Huns were
checked by the famous
Eastern Roman general, Aspar, as they raided Thrace (442).
By 447 he advanced through Illyria and devastated the whole region between the
Black and the Mediterranean
seas. Those of the conquered who were not destroyed were compelled to serve in his
armies. He defeated the
Byzantine emperor Theodosius II; Constantinople was saved only because the

Hunnish army, primarily a cavalry

force, lacked the technique of besieging a great city. The Huns marched as far as
Thermopylae and
stopped only when the Eastern Emperor, Thodosius II, begged for terms.
Attila accepted payment of all tribute in arrears and a new annual tribute of 2,100
pounds of gold. The Huns
were also given considerable territory south of the Danube. One source says of this
campaign, "There was so
much killing and bloodletting that no one could number the dead. The Huns
pillaged the churches and monasteries,
and slew the monks and virgins . . . They so devastated Thrace that it will never rise
again and be as it was
before." This strong victory in the East left Attila free to plan the attack on the West
that culminated in
the invasion of Gaul.
Theodosius, however, was compelled to cede a portion of territory south of the
Danube River and to pay a tribute
and annual subsidy. Two other considerations proved especially important.One was
the death of the Eastern
Emperor Theodosius II, who fell from his horse and died in 450. His successor,
Marcian (450-7), took a hard line
on Barbarian encroachment in the Balkans and refused to pay Attila the usual
subsidy. The fury of the
Hun was monstrous, but he decided to take out his wrath on the West, because it
was weaker than the East,and
because one of history's most peculiar scandals gave Attila a justification for war
with the Western Emperor.
Honoria, Emperor Valentinian's sister, had been discovered in 449 in an affair with
her steward. The unfortunate
lover was executed, and Honoria, who was probably pregnant, was kept in seclusion.
In a rage she smuggled
a ring and a message to the King of the Huns and asked Attila to become her
champion. He treated this as a
marriage proposal and asked for half of the Western Empire as her dowry. So when
he crossed the Rhine,
he could claim that he merely sought by force what was his by right of betrothal to
Honoria.
After massive preparations Attila invaded the Rhine with a large army of Huns and
allied Barbarian tribes.
In his force was a sizable body of Ostrogoths and other Germanic warriors,
including Burgundians and Alans
who lived on the Barbarian side of the frontier. The Franks were split between proand anti-Roman factions.

As early as April Attila took Metz, and fear swept through Gaul. Ancient accounts
give figures that range
between 300,000 and 700,000 for the army of the Huns.
Whatever the size, it was clearly enormous for the fifth century AD. Some of the
greatest cities of Europe
were sacked and put to the torch: Rheims,Mainz, Strasbourg, Cologne, Worms and
Trier. Paris fortunately
had the advantage of having a saint in the city and was spared because of the
ministrations of St. Genvieve.
Attila died an appropriately barbarian death. He took a new, young, beau- tiful
bride, a damsel named Ildico,
though he already had a coterie of wives. The wedding day was spent in heavy
drinking and partying, and the
King of the Huns took his new bride to bed that night in drunken lust. The next
morning it was dis- covered that
he had died--drowned in his drunkenness in his own nosebleed. The new bride was
found quivering in fear in the
great man's bedquarters. The empire of the Huns dissi- pated nearly as quickly as
its most famous leader. In
454 the Ostrogoths and other Germanic tribes revolted against the Huns, and the
sons of Attila, who had quarreled
among them- selves, could not deal with the crisis.

Selected Thoughts of Atilla the Hun

Written reports have purpose only if read by the king.
A wise chieftan never kills the Hun bearing bad news. Rather, the wise chieftan kills
the Hun
who fails to deliver bad news.
Great chieftains never take themselves too seriously.
A Hun can achieve anything for which he is willing to pay the price.
Every decision involves some risk.
A wise chieftan gives tough assignments to Huns who can rise to the challenge.
When in a political war, a Hun must always keep an eye to the rear.
Huns only make enemies on purpose.

Critical to a Hun's success is a clear understanding of what the King wants.

Never appoint acting chieftans.
Appoint the most capable Hun, give her both responsibility and authority, then hold
her accountable.
A Hun's perception is reality for him.
Huns who appear to be busy are not always working.
Every Hun has value -- even if only to serve as a bad example.
It is best for your friends and foes to speak well of you; however, it is better for them
to speak poorly
of you than not at all.
When nothing can be said of a Hun, she has probably accomplished nothing very
well.
Contrary to what most chieftans think, you are not remembered by what you did in
the past, but by what most
Huns think you did.
Every Hun is responsible for shaping his life circumstances and experiences into
success -no other Hun, and certainly no Roman, can do for a Hun what he neglects to do for
himself.
Some Huns have solutions for which there are no problems.
Suffer long for mediocre but loyal Huns. Suffer not for competent but disloyal Huns.

Attila
King and general of the Huns; died 453. Succeeding in 433 to the kingship of Scythian
hordes disorganized and enfeebled by internal discords, Attila soon made of his subjects a
compact and formidable people, the terror of Europe and Asia. An unsuccessful campaign
in Persia was followed in 441 by an invasion of the Eastern Roman Empire, the success
of which emboldened Attila to invade the West. He passed unhindered through Austria
and Germany, across the Rhine into Gaul, plundering and devastating all in his path with
a ferocity unparalleled in the records of barbarian invasions and compelling those he

overcame to augment his mighty army. In 451 he was met on the Plains of Chalons by the
allied Romans under Actius and the Visigoths under Theodoric and Thorismond, who
overcame the Huns and averted the peril that menaced Western civilization. Turning then
to Italy, Attila, in the spring of 452, laid waste Aquileia and many Lombard cities, and
was approaching Rome, whither Valentinian III had fled before him, when he was met
near Mantua by an embassy -- the most influential member of which was Pope Leo I -which dissuaded Attila from sacking the city.
Attila died shortly after. Catholic interest in Attila centers chiefly in his relations with
those bishops of France and Italy who restrained the Hunnish leader in his devastating
fury. The moral power of these bishops, more particularly of the pope during the
dissolution of the empire, is evidenced as well by the confidence in which the faithful
looked to them for succour against the terrible invader as by the influence they sometimes
exerted in staying that invader's destroying hand. St. Agnan of Orlans sustained the
courage of his people and hastened the reinforcements that saved his apparently doomed
city; at Troyes, St. Lupus prevailed upon Attila to spare the province of Champagne, and
gave himself as a hostage while the Hunnish army remained in Gaul; when Rome seemed
destined to meet the fate of the Lombard cities which Attila had pillaged, it was Pope Leo
the Great who, by his eloquence and commanding personality, overawed the conqueror
and saved the city. The terror which for centuries after clung to the name of Attila, "the
Scourge of God", as he came to be called, and the gratitude of the people to their
deliverers combined in time to encumber medieval hagiography with legends of saints
reputed to have overcome Attila by their imposing presence, or stayed his progress by
their prayers. But these fictions serve to emphasize the import of the facts which inspired
them. They enable us to appreciate how widespread must have been that sentiment
expressed in the recently discovered appeal of Eusebius of Dorylaeum to Pope Leo I:
"Curavit desuper et ab exordio consuevit thronus apostolicus iniqua perferentes defensare
. . . et humi Jacentes erigere, secundum possibilitatem quam habetis [see Harnack,
History of Dogma (Boston, 1903), II, 168]. National pride, too, came in time to invest the
person of Attila with a halo of fiction. Most European countries have their legends of the
Hunnish leader, who is diversely depicted, according as the vanity of nations would
represent Attila as a friend who had contributed to their greatness or as a foe to whose
superhuman strength it had been no discredit to succumb. Of these legends the best
known is the story of Etzel (Attila) in the "Niebelungen-lied".