Visigothic Culture

The Gothic people comprised many different groups, including the Heruli, Rugians, Lemovii, Scirians, Helvecones, Turcilingi, Gepids, Vandals and others. Some of these ended up merging into the whole while others formed their own groups. The Goths, strictly speaking, were divided into the Thervingi (Tervings) and the Greuthungi.

During the 3rd century, both groups - the Ostrogoths and the Visigoths - made incursive attacks on the Roman Empire, the most important of which were in 251 AD (against Moesia and Thrace), 258-259 AD (against the Black Sea coast, the Marmara Sea region, the Aegean Islands, Ephesus, Athens and other parts) and 269 AD (against Crete, Cyprus, Thessaloniki and other parts). In 332 AD they made a treaty with the Romans that lasted for about 35 years. Soon after this, the bishop and Gothic chief Ulfilas (Wulfila) translated the Bible into the Gothic language and encouraged the Goths to convert to Arianism, an eastern branch of Christianity which was declared heretical in the west in 325 AD (at the Council of Nicaea).

A group essentially made up of Visigoths was permitted to settle on the southern banks of the Danube and in the Balkans (in Thrace and Moesia). Many of those who settled in Moesia became farmers and were called Moeso-Goths. The Visigoths under Ataulf left Italy in 412 AD and moved to southern Gaul and northern Spain. Ataulf’s long and complicated struggles to control the south of Gaul continued to 414 AD when Constantius managed to drive Ataulf towards Hispania (which allowed him to retain southern Gaul), and in 415 AD the Visigoths entered Tarraconensis. Ataulf was murdered in Barcelona that same year. His successor, Wallia, tried to settle his people in Africa, but was prevented from doing so by a storm.

In need of provisions, the Visigoths proposed an alliance with the Romans in whose name they would fight the Suevi, Alans, Asding Vandals and Silings who occupied the provinces of Hispania (except Tarraconensis). In return for supplies sent by Emperor Honorius, they would hand back Galla Placidia (Honorius’ paternal half-sister) to the Romans. In due course, the Visigoths put an end to the Siling Vandals of Baetica and the Alans of Lusitania. Honorius later changed his plans and in 418 he re-installed the Visigoths in Gaul.

The height of Visigothic power came during Euric’s reign (466 AD to 484 AD). He brought nearly the whole of Spain under his control (only Gallaecia remaining in Suevi hands, until Liuvigild took it in 586 AD).

In 507 AD, Alaric II was defeated by the Franks under Clovis at the battle of Vouillé and lost all his lands north of the Pyrenees except for Septimania, a part of Gallia Narbonensis inhabited by the Gallo Romans. This province, a vital trading centre of the time, remained a part of the Visigothic kingdom of Hispania to the very end. The cities of Toledo (the capital of Hispania) and Narbona were its key political centres.