Vandal Kingdom

The Vandals, under their new king Gaiseric (also known as Genseric or Geiseric), crossed to Africa in 429.[6] Although their numbers are unknown and some historians debate the validity of estimates, based on Procopius's assertion that the Vandals and Alans numbered 80,000 when they moved to North Africa,[7] Peter Heather estimates that they could have fielded an army of around 15,000–20,000.[8] According to Procopius, the Vandals came to Africa at the request of Bonifacius, the military ruler of the region.[9] However, it has been suggested that the Vandals migrated to Africa in search of safety; they had been attacked by a Roman army in 422 and had failed to seal a treaty with them. Advancing eastward along the African coast, the Vandals laid siege to the walled city of Hippo Regius in 430.[6] Inside, Saint Augustine and his priests prayed for relief from the invaders, knowing that the fall of the city would spell conversion or death for many Nicene Christians. On 28 August 430, three months into the siege, the 75-year-old St. Augustine died[10] — perhaps from starvation or stress, as the wheat fields outside the city lay dormant and unharvested. After 14 months, hunger and disease were ravaging both the city's inhabitants and the Vandals outside the walls. The city eventually fell to the Vandals, who made it their first capital.[1]

Peace was made between the Romans and the Vandals in 435 through a treaty between Valentinian III and Gaiseric, giving the Vandals control of coastal Numidia and parts of Mauretania. Gaiseric chose to break the treaty in 439 when he invaded the province of Africa Proconsularis and laid siege to Carthage.[11] The city was captured without a fight; the Vandals entered it while most of the inhabitants were attending the races at the hippodrome. Gaiseric made it his capitol and styled himself the King of the Vandals and Alans, to denote the inclusion of his Alan allies into his realm. Conquering Sicily, Sardinia, Corsica, Malta, and the Balearic Islands, he built his kingdom into a powerful state. Averil Cameron suggests that the new Vandal rule may not have been unwelcome to the population of North Africa, as the previous landowners were generally unpopular.[12]

The impression given by sources such as Victor of Vita, Quodvultdeus, and Fulgentius of Ruspe was that the Vandal takeover of Carthage and North Africa led to widespread destruction. However, recent archaeological investigations have challenged this assertion. Although Carthage's odeon was destroyed, the street grid remained the same, and some public buildings were renovated. The political centre of Carthage was Byrsa Hill. New industrial centres emerged in towns during this period.[13] Historian Andy Merrills uses the large amounts of African red slip ware discovered across the Mediterranean that dates from the Vandal period of North Africa to challenge the assumption that Vandal rule of North Africa was a time of economic instability.[14] When the Vandals raided Sicily in 440, the Western Roman Empire was too preoccupied with war in Gaul to react. Theodosius II, emperor of the Eastern Roman Empire, dispatched an expedition to deal with the Vandals in 441, but it progressed only as far as Sicily. The Western Empire under Valentinian III secured peace with the Vandals in 442.[15] Under the treaty, the Vandals gained Byzacena, Tripolitania, and part of Numidia and confirmed their control of Proconsular Africa.[16]

Historians since Edward Gibbon have seen the capture of North Africa by the Vandals and Alans as the "deathblow"[17] and "the greatest single blow"[18] to the Western Roman Empire in its struggle to survive. Prior to the Vandals, northern Africa was prosperous and peaceful, requiring only a small percentage of the Roman Empire's military forces, and was an important source of taxes for the empire and grain for the city of Rome.[18] The scholar Josephus in the 1st century CE said that North Africa fed Rome for eight months of the year, with the other four months of needed grain coming from Egypt.[19]

The Roman need for grain from North Africa may have declined by the 5th century because the population of the city of Rome had fallen, and the number of Roman soldiers had decreased. Moreover, the 442 treaty between Rome and the Vandals seems to have ensured that grain shipments continued.[20] However, in terms of halting hostilities between Rome and the Vandals, that treaty was honored more in the breach than in the observance, and the Romans placed a high priority on recovering North Africa and regaining their control of grain from the Vandal Kingdom.[18]

The location of Carthage, the Vandal capitol.

Sack of Rome, by Karl Briullov.

The peace treaty of 442 did not halt Vandal raids in the western Mediterranean. Over the next 35 years, Gaiseric used his large naval fleet to loot the coasts of both the Eastern and Western Empires. After Attila the Hun's death in 453, however, the Romans turned their attention back to the Vandals, who were now in control of some of the richest lands formerly ruled by Rome.

In an effort to bring the Vandals into the fold of the Empire, Valentinian III offered the hand of his daughter, Eudocia, in marriage to Gaiseric's son Huneric when both Eudocia and Huneric were children. However, they had not yet wed when in 455, Valentinian III was murdered by accomplices of the usurper Petronius Maximus, who sought control of the Empire. Maximus immediately married Valentinian's widow, the Empress Licinia Eudoxia, and he also canceled Eudocia's betrothal to Huneric and married her instead to his own son, Palladius. Diplomacy between Rome and the Vandal Kingdom broke down. Eudoxia wrote a letter to Gaiseric, begging him to come to her aid. Claiming that the broken betrothal between Huneric and Eudocia invalidated his peace treaty with Valentinian, Gaiseric sacked Rome, rescuing Eudoxia, Eudocia, and Eudoxia's younger daughter Placidia (the latter was married to the future unrecognised emperor Olybrius). Maximus and Palladius were killed by an angry mob while fleeing the city.

The chronicler Prosper of Aquitaine[21] offers the only 5th-century report that on 2 June 455, Pope Leo the Great received Gaiseric and implored him to abstain from murder and destruction by fire, and to be satisfied with pillage. The Vandals departed with countless valuables, including the spoils of the Temple in Jerusalem booty brought to Rome by Titus. Eudoxia and her daughters were taken to Carthage,[16] where Eudocia married Huneric shortly thereafter.

Map of the operations of the Vandalic War.

The Vandal sack of Rome, piracy in the Mediterranean, and the Roman need to recover control of the grain trade made the destruction of the Vandal Kingdom a priority for the Roman Empire. The Western Roman Emperor Majorian began to organize an offensive in the summer of 458. A maritime force staged from Cartagena in Spain would take Mauretania and then march on Carthage, while a simultaneous assault, commanded by Marcellinus, would retake Sicily. The Emperor assembled his fleet in 460, but Gaiseric learned of the impending assault and "put a scorched earth policy into effect in Mauretania - scouring the land and poisoning the wells in advance of the planned imperial offensive." In addition, Gaiseric led his own fleet against Majorian's force and defeated the Romans at Cartagena.[22][18]

In 468, both the Western and Eastern Empires attempted to conquer Africa again with the "most ambitious campaign ever launched against the Vandal state." Primary sources suggest that the fleet numbered 1,113 ships and carried 100,000 men, but this figure has been rejected by modern historiography, with Heather suggesting 30,000 troops and 50,000 soldiers and sailors combined, based on 16,000 Roman soldiers conveyed on 500 ships in 532. Andy Merrills and Richard Miles have asserted that the operation was undoubtedly extensive and "deserves admiration for its logistical brilliance."[23] At a naval battle in Cape Bon, Tunisia, the Vandals destroyed the Western fleet and part of the Eastern fleet through the use of fire ships.[15] Following up the attack, the Vandals tried to invade the Peloponnese but were driven back by the Maniots at Kenipolis with heavy losses.[24] In retaliation, the Vandals took 500 hostages at Zakynthos, hacked them to pieces, and threw the pieces overboard on the way back to Carthage.[24]

In the 470s, the Romans abandoned their policy of war against the Vandals. The Western Germanic general Ricimer reached a treaty with the Vandals,[15] and in 476 Gaiseric was able to conclude a "perpetual peace" with Constantinople. Relations between the two states assumed a veneer of normality.[25] From 477 onward, the Vandals produced their own coinage, although it was restricted to bronze and silver low-denomination coins. Although the low-denomination imperial money was replaced, the high-denomination was not, demonstrating in the words of Merrills "reluctance to usurp the imperial prerogative".[26]

Gaiseric died on 25 January 477, 88 years of age. According to the law of succession which he had promulgated, the oldest male member of the royal house was to succeed. Thus he was succeeded by his son Huneric (477–484), who at first tolerated Nicene Christians, owing to his fear of Constantinople, but after 482 began to persecute Manichaeans and Niceanian.[27]

Gunthamund (484–496), his cousin and successor, sought internal peace with the Niceanians and ceased persecution once more. Externally, Vandal power had been declining since Gaiseric's death; Gunthamund lost large parts of Sicily to Theodoric's Ostrogoths and had to withstand increasing pressure from the native Berbers.

Gunthamund's successor Thrasamund (496–523) was a religious fanatic and hostile to Niceanians, but he contented himself with bloodless persecutions.[27]

Thrasamund's successor Hilderic (523–530) was the Vandal king who was most tolerant of Trinitarian Christians. He granted religious freedom, and consequently Catholic synods were once more held in North Africa. However, he had little interest in war and left it to his nephew Hoamer. When Hoamer suffered a defeat by the Berbers, the Arian faction within the royal family led a revolt, and Hoamer's cousin Gelimer (530–534) became king. Hilderic, Hoamer, and their relatives were thrown into prison. In 533, Hilderic was executed when the Byzantine army approached Carthage.[28]

Byzantine Emperor Justinian I declared war, with the stated intention of restoring Hilderic to the Vandal throne. While an expedition was en route, Gelimer's brother Tzazo led a large part of the Vandal army and navy to Sardinia to deal with a rebellion by the Gothic nobleman Godas. This enabled the armies of the Byzantine Empire, commanded by Belisarius, to land unopposed 10 miles (16 km) from Carthage. Gelimer quickly assembled an army[29] and met Belisarius at the Battle of Ad Decimum, in the Vandals were prevailing until Gelimer's brother Ammatas and nephew Gibamund fell in battle. Gelimer then lost heart and fled. Belisarius quickly took Carthage as the surviving Vandals fought on.[30]

On December 15, 533, Gelimer and Belisarius clashed again at the Battle of Tricamarum, some 20 miles (32 km) from Carthage. Again, the Vandals fought well but broke, this time when Tzazo fell in battle. Belisarius quickly advanced to Hippo, second city of the Vandal Kingdom. In 534 Gelimer, besieged at Mount Pappua by the Herulian General Pharas, surrendered to the Byzantines, ending the Kingdom of the Vandals.

The Vandals' territory in North Africa (which is now northern Tunisia and eastern Algeria) became a Byzantine province. The best Vandal warriors were formed into five cavalry regiments, known as Vandali Iustiniani, and stationed on the Persian frontier. Some entered the private service of Belisarius.[31] Gelimer himself was honourably treated and granted large estates in Galatia, where he lived to be an old man. He was also offered the rank of patrician but refused it because he was not willing to convert from Arianism to Nicene Christianity.[27] Most Vandals remained in North Africa and were absorbed into the native Berber population. In the words of historian Roger Collins: "The remaining Vandals were then shipped back to Constantinople to be absorbed into the imperial army. As a distinct ethnic unit they disappeared."[29]