Audoin

Alduin (Langobardic: Aldwin or Hildwin, Latin: Audoinus;[1] also called Auduin or Audoin) was king of the Lombards from 547 to 560.[2]

For the Frankish bishop, see Audoin (bishop).
Map of Europe at the end of Audoin's reign; his kingdom is marked Royaume Lombard

Life

Aldoin was of the Gausi, a prominent Lombard ruling clan, and according to the Historia Langobardorum, the son of Menia, the Lombard wife of Basinus, king of the Thuringii,[3] and half-brother to King Hermanfrid of Thuringia and Raicunda, the wife of the Lombard king Wacho.

According to the Decem Libri of Gregory of Tours, in 531, Hermanfrid was defeated at the battle of Unstrut and Thuringia was annexed to the Frankish empire. Hermanfrid traveled under safe conduct to meet with Theuderic at Zülpich. While walking along the city walls with Theuderic, Hermanfrid was thrown from the ramparts to his death.[4]

According to Procopius (History of the Wars V, 13), after Hermanfrid's death, his widow Amalaberga fled with her children, Amalafrid and Rodelinda, to her brother Theodahad who was at that time (534-36) King of the Ostrogoths.[5] Around 539, during the Gothic War, they were captured by the Byzantine general Belisarius and sent to Constantinople. Justinian made Amalafrid a general and married off his sister Rodelinda to Audoin. [6]

Around 540 was elected regent for Walthari, the minor son of King Wacho and his third wife Silinga. He led the Lombards to Pannonia, where they were settled by Justinian I and in 541 signed a treaty becoming fœderati of the Byzantines, entrusted with the task of securing the Danube border against the Franks. After Walthari's death around 547, Aldoin became king.

Beginning in 551, Audoin was obliged to send troops to serve Narses in Italy in the Gothic War against the Ostrogoths. The next year (552), he sent over 5,000 men to defeat the Goths on the slopes of Vesuvius. That same year Audoin had been able to inflict a heavy defeat on the Gepids with the help of his brother-in-law Amalafrid:[7] the Gepid king Thurisind lost his eldest son, Turismod, in the Battle of Asfeld during which the prince was killed by Alboin, son of Audoin.

He died in 563 or 565 and was succeeded by his son, Alboin, who brought the Lombards into Italia.

Regnal titles
Preceded by
Waltari		 King of the Lombards
546–560		 Succeeded by
Alboin

Notes
  1. "Uebersetzung der algemeinen Welthistorie, die in Engeland durch eine Geselschaft von Gelehrten ausgefertiget worden". 1758.
  2. Eder, Walter (Berlin), "Audoin', Brill’s New Pauly, Antiquity volumes edited by: Hubert Cancik and , Helmuth Schneider, English Edition by: Christine F. Salazar, Classical Tradition volumes edited by: Manfred Landfester, English Edition by: Francis G. Gentry, 2006 ISBN 9789004122598
  3. Wolfram Brandes, "Das Gold der Menia: Ein Beispiel transkulturellen Wissenstransfers", Millennium 2 (2005): 175–226, esp. 181ff.
  4. Oman, Charles. The Dark Ages, 476-918, Rivingtons, 1908, p.114
  5. Procopius (History of the Wars V, 13)
  6. "Lombard Kings", GermanTribes.org
  7. Wolfram, Herwig. The Roman Empire and Its Germanic Peoples. University of California Press, 1997, p. 283. ISBN 0520085116
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