Attila
Attila, frequently called Attila the Hun, was the ruler of the Huns from 434 until his death in early 453. He was also the leader of an empire consisting of Huns, Ostrogoths, Alans, and Gepids, among others, in Central and Eastern Europe.
As nephews to Rugila, Attila and his elder brother Bleda succeeded him to the throne in 435, ruling jointly until the death of Bleda in 445. During his reign, Attila was one of the most feared enemies of the Western and Eastern Roman Empires. He crossed the Danube twice and plundered the Balkans but was unable to take Constantinople. In 441, he led an invasion of the Eastern Roman Empire, the success of which emboldened him to invade the West. He also attempted to conquer Roman Gaul, crossing the Rhine in 451 and marching as far as Aurelianum, before being stopped in the Battle of the Catalaunian Plains.
He subsequently invaded Italy, devastating the northern provinces, but was unable to take Rome. He planned for further campaigns against the Romans but died in 453. After Attila's death, his close adviser, Ardaric of the Gepids, led a Germanic revolt against Hunnic rule, after which the Hunnic Empire quickly collapsed. Attila lived on as a character in Germanic heroic legend.
Etymology
Most scholars have argued that the name Attila derives from East Germanic origin; Attila is formed from the Gothic or Gepidic noun atta, "father", by means of the diminutive suffix -ila, meaning "little father". The Gothic etymology was first proposed by Jacob and Wilhelm Grimm in the early 19th century. Maenchen-Helfen notes that this derivation of the name "offers neither phonetic nor semantic difficulties", and Gerhard Doerfer notes that the name is simply correct Gothic. Alexander Savelyev and Choongwon Jeong similarly state that Attila's name "must have been Gothic in origin." The name has sometimes been interpreted as a Germanization of a name of Hunnic origin.Other scholars have argued for a Turkic origin of the name. Omeljan Pritsak considered Ἀττίλα a composite title-name which derived from Turkic *es, and *til, and the suffix /a/. The stressed back syllabic til assimilated the front member es, so it became *as. It is a nominative, in form of attíl- with the meaning "the oceanic, universal ruler". J. J. Mikkola connected it with Turkic āt. As another Turkic possibility, H. Althof considered it was related to Turkish atli, or Turkish at and dil. Maenchen-Helfen argues that Pritsak's derivation is "ingenious but for many reasons unacceptable", while dismissing Mikkola's as "too farfetched to be taken seriously". M. Snædal similarly notes that none of these proposals has achieved wide acceptance.
Criticizing the proposals of finding Turkic or other etymologies for Attila, Doerfer notes that King George VI of the United Kingdom had a name of Greek origin, and Süleyman the Magnificent had a name of Arabic origin, yet that does not make them Greek or Arab: it is therefore plausible that Attila would have a name not of Hunnic origin. Historian Hyun Jin Kim, however, has argued that the Turkic etymology is "more probable".
M. Snædal, in a paper that rejects the Germanic derivation but notes the problems with the existing proposed Turkic etymologies, argues that Attila's name could have originated from Turkic-Mongolian at, adyy/agta and Turkish atlı, meaning "possessor of geldings, provider of warhorses".
In 2025, Svenja Bonmann and Simon Fries, as part of their hypothesis that the Huns spoke a Yeniseian language, proposed that the name Attila could come from an Old Arin adjective *atɨ-la, meaning "quicker, quite quick, rather quick, quick-ish".
Historiography and sources
The historiography of Attila is faced with a major challenge, in that the only complete sources are written in Greek and Latin by the enemies of the Huns. Attila's contemporaries left many testimonials of his life, but only fragments of these remain. Priscus was a Byzantine diplomat and historian who wrote in Greek, and he was both a witness to and an actor in the story of Attila, as a member of the embassy of Theodosius II at the Hunnic court in 449. He was obviously biased by his political position, but his writing is a major source for information on the life of Attila, and he is the only person known to have recorded a [|physical description] of him. He wrote a history of the late Roman Empire in eight books covering the period from 430 to 476.Only fragments of Priscus' work remain. It was cited extensively by 6th-century historians Procopius and Jordanes, especially in Jordanes' The Origin and Deeds of the Goths, which contains numerous references to Priscus's history, and it is also an important source of information about the Hunnic empire and its neighbors. He describes the legacy of Attila and the Hunnic people for a century after Attila's death. Marcellinus Comes, a chancellor of Justinian during the same era, also describes the relations between the Huns and the Eastern Roman Empire.
Numerous ecclesiastical writings contain useful but scattered information, sometimes difficult to authenticate or distorted by years of hand-copying between the 6th and 17th centuries. The Hungarian writers of the 12th century wished to portray the Huns in a positive light as their glorious ancestors, and so repressed certain historical elements and added their own legends.
The literature and knowledge of the Huns themselves was transmitted orally, by means of epics and chanted poems that were handed down from generation to generation. Indirectly, fragments of this oral history have reached us via the literature of the Scandinavians and Germans, neighbors of the Huns who wrote between the 9th and 13th centuries. Attila is a major character in many Medieval epics, such as the Nibelungenlied, as well as various Eddas and sagas.
Archaeological investigation has uncovered some details about the lifestyle, art, and warfare of the Huns. There are a few traces of battles and sieges, but the tomb of Attila and the location of his capital have not yet been found.
Appearance and character
There is no surviving first-hand account of Attila's appearance, but there is a possible second-hand source provided by Jordanes, who cites a description given by Priscus.Some scholars have suggested that these features are typically East Asian, because in combination they fit the physical type of people from Eastern Asia, so Attila's ancestors may have come from there. Other historians have suggested that the same features may have been typical of some Scythian people.
Early life and background
The Huns were a group of Eurasian nomads, appearing from east of the Volga, who migrated further into Western Europe c. 370 and built up an enormous empire there. Their main military techniques were mounted archery and javelin throwing. They were in the process of developing settlements before their arrival in Western Europe, yet the Huns were a society of pastoral warriors whose primary form of nourishment was meat and milk, products of their herds.The origin and language of the Huns has been the subject of debate for centuries. According to some theories, their leaders at least may have spoken a Turkic language, perhaps closest to the modern Chuvash language. According to the Encyclopedia of European Peoples, "the Huns, especially those who migrated to the west, may have been a combination of central Asian Turkic, Mongolic, and Ugric stocks".
Attila's father Mundzuk was the brother of kings Octar and Ruga, who reigned jointly over the Hunnic empire in the early fifth century. This form of diarchy was recurrent with the Huns, but historians are unsure whether it was institutionalized, merely customary, or an occasional occurrence. His family was from a noble lineage, but it is uncertain whether they constituted a royal dynasty. Attila's birthdate is debated; journalist Éric Deschodt and writer Herman Schreiber have proposed a date of 395. However, historian Iaroslav Lebedynsky and archaeologist Katalin Escher prefer an estimate between the 390s and the first decade of the fifth century. Several historians have proposed 406 as the date.
Attila grew up in a rapidly changing world. His people were nomads who had only recently arrived in Europe. They crossed the Volga river during the 370s and annexed the territory of the Alans, then attacked the Gothic kingdom between the Carpathian Mountains and the Danube. They were a very mobile people, whose mounted archers had acquired a reputation for invincibility, and the Germanic tribes seemed unable to withstand them. Vast populations fleeing the Huns moved from Germania into the Roman Empire in the west and south, and along the banks of the Rhine and Danube. In 376, the Goths crossed the Danube, initially submitting to the Romans but soon rebelling against Emperor Valens, whom they killed in the Battle of Adrianople in 378. Large numbers of Vandals, Alans, Suebi, and Burgundians crossed the Rhine and invaded Roman Gaul on December 31, 406, to escape the Huns. The Roman Empire had been split in half since 395 and was ruled by two distinct governments, one based in Ravenna in the West, and the other in Constantinople in the East. The Roman Emperors, both East and West, were generally from the Theodosian family in Attila's lifetime.
The Huns dominated a vast territory with nebulous borders determined by the will of a constellation of ethnically varied peoples. Some were assimilated to Hunnic nationality, whereas many retained their own identities and rulers but acknowledged the suzerainty of the king of the Huns. The Huns were also the indirect source of many of the Romans' problems, driving various Germanic tribes into Roman territory, yet relations between the two empires were cordial: the Romans used the Huns as mercenaries against the Germans and even in their civil wars. Thus, the usurper Joannes was able to recruit thousands of Huns for his army against Valentinian III in 424. It was Aëtius, later Patrician of the West, who managed this operation. They exchanged ambassadors and hostages, the alliance lasting from 401 to 450 and permitting the Romans numerous military victories. The Huns considered the Romans to be paying them tribute, whereas the Romans preferred to view this as payment for services rendered. The Huns had become a great power by the time that Attila came of age during the reign of his uncle Ruga, to the point that Nestorius, the Patriarch of Constantinople, deplored the situation with these words: "They have become both masters and slaves of the Romans".