Attila (HUN and Western emperors)

Collier's New Encyclopedia (1921)

THE HUN and Western emperors. The Vandals, the Ostrogoths, the Gepidæ, and a part of the Franks united under his banners, and he speedily formed a pretext for leading them against the Empire of the East. He laid waste all the countries from the Black to the Adriatic Sea, and in three encounters defeated the Emperor Theodosius, but could not take Constantinople. Thrace, Macedonia, and Greece all submitted to the invader, who destroyed 70 flourishing cities; and Theodosius was obliged to purchase a peace, Turning to the W., the "scourge of God," as the universal terror termed him, crossed with an immense army the Rhine, the Moselle, and the Seine, went to the Loire, and laid siege to Orleans. The inhabitants of this city repelled the first attack, and the united forces of the Romans under Aetius, and of the Visigoths under their King Theodoric, compelled Attila to raise the siege. He retreated to Champagne, and waited for the enemy in the plains of Chalons. When the victory of Attila seemed assured the Gothic prince, Thorismond, the son of Theodoric, poured down from the neighboring height upon the Huns, who were defeated with great slaughter. In the following year Attila tried to seize upon Italy, and demanded Honoria, the sister of Valentinian III., in marriage, with half the kingdom as a dowry. When General. this demand was refused he conquered and destroyed Aquileia, Padua, Vicenza, Verona, and Bergamo, laid waste the plains of Lombardy, and was marching on Rome when Pope Leo I. went with the Roman ambassadors to his camp and succeeded in obtaining a peace. Attila went back to Hungary, and died on the night of his marriage with Hilda or Ildico (453), either from the bursting of a blood vessel or by her hand.