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'Theodoric the Great' (454 - August 30, 526), known to the Romans as 'Flavius Theodoricus', was king of the Ostrogoths (488-526), ruler of Italy (493-526), and regent of the Visigoths (511-526). He became a hero of Germanic legend as 'Þeodric' in Anglo-Saxon legends, 'Dietrich von Bern' in German legends and as 'Þjóðrekr' and 'Þiðrekr' in Norse mythology.

Contents

Biography

Assessment

Family

Fictional treatments

Notes

References

Further reading

External links

Biography

The man who ruled under the name of Theodoric was born in 454 on the banks of the Neusiedler See near Carnuntum, a year after the Ostrogoths had thrown off nearly a century of domination by the Huns. The son of the King Theodemir, Theodoric went to Constantinople as a young boy, as a hostage to secure the Ostrogoths' compliance with a treaty Theodemir had concluded with the Byzantine Emperor Leo.
He lived at the court of Constantinople for many years and learned a great deal about Roman government and military tactics, which served him well when he became the Goth ruler of a mixed but largely Romanized people. Treated with favor by the Emperors Leo I and Zeno, he became ''magister militum'' (or Master of Soldiers) in 483, and one year later he became consul. He afterwards returned to live among the Ostrogoths when he was 31 years old, and became their king in 488.
At the time, the Ostrogoths were settled in Byzantine territory as ''foederati'' (allies) of the Romans, but were becoming restless and increasingly difficult for Zeno to manage. Not long after Theodoric became king, the two men worked out an arrangement beneficial to both sides. The Ostrogoths needed a place to live, and Zeno was having serious problems with Odoacer, the King of Italy who had overthrown the Western Roman Empire in 476. Ostensibly a viceroy for Zeno, Odoacer was menacing Byzantine territory and not respecting the rights of Roman citizens in Italy. At Zeno's encouragement, Theodoric invaded Odoacer's kingdom.
Theodoric came with his army to Italy in 488, where he won the battles of Isonzo and Verona in 489 and at the Adda in 490. In 493 he took Ravenna. On February 2, 493, Theodoric and Odoacer signed a treaty that assured both parties would rule over Italy. A banquet was organised in order to celebrate this treaty. It was at this banquet that Theodoric, after making a toast, killed Odoacer with his own hands.
Like Odoacer, Theodoric was ostensibly only a viceroy for the emperor in Constantinople. In reality, he was able to avoid imperial supervision, and dealings between the emperor and Theodoric were as equals. However, unlike Odoacer, Theodoric respected the agreement he had made and allowed Roman citizens within his kingdom to be subject to Roman law and the Roman judicial system. The Goths, meanwhile, lived under their own laws and customs.
Theodoric the Great was allied with the Franks by his marriage to Audofleda, sister of Clovis I, and with the Visigoths, Vandals and Burgundian kings. Clovis I's ambitions to also rule over the Goths brought on intermittent warfare between 506 and 523. For much of his reign, Theodoric was the ''de facto'' king of the Visigoths as well, becoming regent for the infant Visigothic king, his grand-son Amalric, around 505. The Franks under Clovis were able to wrest control of Aquitaine from the Visigoths in 507, defeating Alaric II, but otherwise, Theodoric was able to defeat their incursions.
In 515, Theodoric married his daughter Amalasuntha to Eutharic, but Eutharic died shortly after this, so no lasting dynastic connection of Ostrogoths and Visigoths was established.
Theodoric also stopped the Vandals from raiding his territories by threatening the weak Vandal king Thrasamund with invasion. In 519, when a mob had burned down the synagogues of Ravenna, Theodoric ordered the town to rebuild them at its own expense.

Assessment

Theodoric the Goth was neither Frank nor Hun. He had great respect for the Roman culture he saw himself as representing. He had an eye for outstanding talent. In about 520 the philosopher Boethius became his ''magister officiorum,'' (head of all the government and court services). Boethius was a man of science, a dedicated Hellenist bent on translating all the works of Aristotle into Latin and harmonizing them with the works of Plato, not an easy task. Eventually Boethius fell out of favor with Theodoric, perhaps out of a suspicion that he was in sympathy with Justinian, emperor of the East, for Arian Theodoric was always somewhat of an outsider among these Nicaean Christians. Theodoric ordered Boethius executed in 525. In the meantime Cassiodorus had succeeded Boethius as ''magister'' in 523. The pliant historian and courtier could be counted on to provide refined touches to official correspondence. "To the monarch you [Cassiodorus] were a friendly judge and an honored intimate. For when he got free of his official cares he looked to your conversation for the precepts of the sages, that he might make himself a worthy equal to the great men of old. Ever curious, he wanted to hear about the courses of the stars, the tides of the sea, and legendary fountains, that his earnest study of natural science might make him seem to be a veritable philosopher in the purple" (Cassiodorus' letterbook, ''Variae'' 9.24.8). The gulf was widening between the ancient senatorial aristocracy whose center was Rome and the adherents of Gothic rule at Ravenna: other distinguished public figures followed Boethius to the block. Theodoric in his final years was no longer the disengaged Arian patron of religious toleration that he had seemed earlier in his reign. "Indeed, his death cut short what could well have developed into a major persecution of Catholic churches in retaliation for measures taken by Justin in Constantinople against Arians there" O'Donnell 1979, ch. 1.
Theodoric was of Arian faith. At the end of his reign quarrels arose with his Roman subjects and the Byzantine emperor Justin I over the Arianism issue. Relations between the two nations deteriorated, although Theodoric's ability dissuaded the Byzantines from waging war against him. After his death, that reluctance faded quickly.
Theodoric the Great was interred in Ravenna. His mausoleum is one of the finest monuments in Ravenna.

Family

Theodoric was born in 454 as the child of king Theodemir, and Erelieva. He was married twice. It is not known who his first wife was, but he had two children with her: Arevagni and Theodegotho. His second wife was Audofleda with whom he had Amalasuntha.
After his death in Ravenna in 526, Theodoric was succeeded by his grandson Athalaric. Athalaric was at first represented by his mother Amalasuntha, who was a regent queen from 526 until 534. The kingdom of the Ostrogoths, however, began to wane and was conquered by Justinian I starting in 535 and finally ending in 553 with the Battle of Mons Lactarius.

Fictional treatments

Theodoric's afterlife was described in the epic poetry of Dietrich von Bern in the German epic Nibelungenlied, which was based on Theodoric the Great. He is also mentioned on the Rök Stone, carved in Sweden in the 800s, and in the Old English ''Deor'' and ''Widsith'' poems.
Dietrich von Bern is the archetype of the wise and just ruler. The ''Encyclopaedia Britannica'' (1911) noted that "the legendary history of Dietrich differs so widely from the life of Theodoric that it has been suggested that the two were originally unconnected." Anachronisms abound, for example in making Ermanaric (died 376) and Attila (died 453) contemporary with Theodoric (born 454). ''Bern'' is the Middle High German form of Verona, which was one of the historical Theodoric's residences.
The ''"Berner"'' figures in a number of surviving works, and it must be assumed that these draw on long-standing oral tradition. With the exception of the ''Hildebrandslied'' and the ''Nibelungenlied'', in neither of which is Dietrich a central character, all the surviving Dietrich epics were composed or written down after 1250.
The earliest evidence of the legend is provided by the heroic lay, the ''Hildebrandslied'' (''Lay of Hildebrand''), recorded in around 820. In this, Hadubrand recounts the story of his father Hildebrand's flight eastwards in the company of Dietrich, to escape the enmity of Odoacer (this character would later become his uncle Ermanaric). Hildebrand reveals that he has lived in exile for 30 years. Hildebrand has an arm ring given to him by the (unnamed) King of the Huns, and is taken to be an "old Hun" by Hadubrand. The obliqueness of the references to the Dietrich legend, which is just the background to Hildebrand's story, indicates an audience thoroughly familiar with the material. In this work Dietrich's enemy is the historically correct Odoacer (though in fact Theodoric the Great was never exiled by Odoacer), indicating that the figure of Ermaneric belongs to a later development of the legend.
In the heroic epic the ''Nibelungenlied'' (c. 1200), Dietrich is living in exile at the court of Etzel (Attila), the Hunnish King. He fights on Etzel's side against the Burgundians, and his whole retinue apart from Hildebrand is slain. He ends the conflict by capturing Hagen and then Günther in single combat.
The Norse saga deals with Dietrich's return home. The most familiar version is that by an Icelandic or Norwegian author writing in Norway in the 13th century, who compiled a consecutive account of Dietrich, with many additional episodes. This Norse prose version, known as the Þiðrekssaga (Thidrek's saga), incorporates much extraneous matter from the Nibelungen and Weyland legends.
The late Heinz Ritter-Schaumburg reinspected the Old Swedish version of the Thidreks saga for the historical information it contained, and established its topographical accuracy. Further, he concluded that these oldest of the "Dietrich" sources cannot refer to Theodoric the Great of the Goths, whose movements are moderately well known, mainly because of irreconcilable topographical anomalies. Ritter-Schaumburg asserted that their narration relates instead to a contemporary of the famous Goth, who bore the same name, rendered ''Didrik'' in Old Swedish. Moreover, he identified ''Berne'' as Bonn to which was ascribed, in the medieval age, an alternative (latinized) name ''Verona'' of unknown origin. Due to his questionable argument,^[1] Dietrich lived as a Frankish petty king in Bonn.^[2]
Another modern author, Rolf Badenhausen, starts from Ritter-Schaumburg's approach but ends up with a different result. He claims ''Berne'', where Thidrek/Didrik started his rise, to be identical with Varne, south of Aachen, the Roman ''Verona cisalpina'', in the district of the northern Rhine/Eiffel lands. Thidrek/Didrik could be identified with Theuderich son of Clovis I, a royal Frank mentioned with approval by Gregory of Tours and in Fredegar's royal Frankish chronicle.
In the Book of Bern (''Buch von Bern'') written in the late 13th century partly by Henry the Fowler, Dietrich tries to regain his empire with the help of the Huns.
In the collection of the Heldenbuch ("Book of Heroes"), Dietrich's story is related in ''Dietrichs Flucht'' ("Dietrich's Flight"), the ''Rabenschlacht'' ("The Battle of Ravenna") and ''Alpharts Tod'' ("Alphart's Death")
The legendary figure of Dietrich also appears in the 13th-century ''Rosengarten zu Worms'' ("Rosegarden at Worms"), the Epos of Biterolf, of Goldemar, of Ecke, Sigenot and Laurin.
A fictionalized, but impressively researched, version of Theodoric's career is presented in ''Raptor'', a novel by Gary Jennings.
The German historian Felix Dahn wrote a fictional treatment on the end of the Ostrogothic kingdom that was influential in spreading a 'völkische' view on the Early Middle Ages and glorified heroism in the face of certain defeat.

Notes

1. See, for example, the critical review by Henry Kratz, in ''The German Quarterly'' '56'.4 (November 1983), pp. 636-638.
2. Heinz Ritter-Schaumburg: Dietrich von Bern. König zu Bonn. Herbig: Munich / Berlin 1982

References

★ O'Donnell, James J. 1979, ''Cassiodorus''. (University of California Press) [1]

★ ''Encyclopaedia Britannica'' 1911: "Dietrich of Bern"

★ Rolf Badenhausen, "Merovingians by the Svava?": discussion based on the Skokloster ''Svava'', Stockholm catalogued as Skokloster-Codex-I/115&116 quarto, E 9013.

Further reading

★ John Moorhead, 1992. ''Theoderic in Italy'' (Oxford: Oxford University Press) ISBN 0-19-814781-3

External links

★ Theodoric the Great at MiddleAges.net

★ Theodoric the Goth, 1897, by Thomas Hodgkin, from Project Gutenberg

★ Theodoric the Great at the Catholic Encyclopedia