Visigothic Kingdom
The Visigothic Kingdom, Visigothic Spain or Kingdom of the Goths was a barbarian kingdom that occupied what is now southwestern France and the Iberian Peninsula from the 5th to the 8th century. One of the Germanic successor states to the Western Roman Empire, it was originally created by the settlement of the Visigoths under King Wallia in the province of Gallia Aquitania in southwest Gaul by the Roman government and then extended by conquest over all of Hispania. The Kingdom maintained independence from the Eastern Roman or Byzantine Empire, whose attempts to re-establish Roman authority in Hispania were only partially successful and short-lived.
The Visigoths were romanized central Europeans who had moved west from the Danube Valley. They became foederati of Rome, and sought to restore the Roman order against the hordes of Vandals, Alans and Suebi. The Western Roman Empire fell in 476 AD; therefore, the Visigoths believed they had the right to take the territories that Rome had promised in Hispania in exchange for restoring the Roman order. Under King Euric—who eliminated the status of foederati—a triumphal advance of the Visigoths began. Alarmed at Visigoth expansion from Aquitania after victory over the Gallo-Roman and Breton armies at Déols in 469, Western Emperor Anthemius sent a fresh army across the Alps against Euric, who was besieging Arles. The Roman army was crushed at the nearby Battle of Arles, resulting in Euric capturing Arles and secured much of southern Gaul.
Sometimes referred to as the Regnum Tolosae or Kingdom of Toulouse after its capital Toulouse in modern historiography, the Visigothic kingdom lost much of its territory in Gaul to the Franks in the early 6th century, except the narrow coastal strip of Septimania. The kingdom of the 6th and 7th centuries is sometimes called the Regnum Toletanum or Kingdom of Toledo after the new capital of Toledo in Hispania. A civil war starting in 549 resulted in an invitation from the Visigoth Athanagild, who had usurped the kingship, to the Byzantine emperor Justinian I to send soldiers to his assistance. Athanagild won the war, but the Byzantines took over Cartagena and a good deal of southern Hispania, until 624 when Swinthila expelled the last Byzantine garrisons from the peninsula, occupying Orcelis, which the Visigoths called Aurariola, what is today Orihuela in the Province of Alicante. Starting in the 570s Athanagild's brother Liuvigild compensated for this loss by conquering the Kingdom of the Suebi in Gallaecia, which corresponds roughly to present-day Galicia and the northern part of Portugal, and annexing it, and by repeated campaigns against the Basques.
The ethnic distinction between the Hispano-Roman population and the Visigoths had largely disappeared by this time, with the Gothic language losing its last and probably already declining function as a church language when the Visigoths renounced Arianism in 589. This newfound unity found expression in increasingly severe persecution of outsiders, especially the Jews. The Visigothic Code, completed in 654, abolished the old tradition of having different laws for Hispano-Romans and for Visigoths. The 7th century saw many civil wars between factions of the aristocracy. Despite good records left by contemporary bishops, such as Isidore and Leander of Seville, it becomes increasingly difficult to distinguish Goths from Hispano-Romans, as the two became inextricably intertwined. Despite these civil wars, by 625 AD the Visigoths had succeeded in expelling the Byzantines from Hispania and had established a foothold at the port of Ceuta in Africa. Most of the Visigothic Kingdom was conquered by Umayyad troops from North Africa in 711 to 719, with only the northern reaches of Hispania remaining in Christian hands. The medieval Kingdom of Asturias in northern Spain reputedly began when a Visigothic nobleman called Pelagius was elected princeps and became the leader of the Astures and of the Visigoths who had taken refuge in the mountains.
The Visigoths and their early kings followed Arian Christianity. This led to conflict with the Church in Rome. After their conversion to Nicene Christianity, the Church exerted an enormous influence on secular affairs through the Councils of Toledo. The Visigoths also developed the highly influential legal code known in Western Europe as the Visigothic Code, which would become the basis for Spanish law throughout the Middle Ages.
History
Federate kingdom
From 407 to 409 AD, an alliance of Germanic Vandals, Iranian Alans and Germanic Suebi crossed the frozen Rhine and swept across modern France and into the Iberian Peninsula. For their part, the Visigoths under Alaric famously sacked Rome in 410, capturing Galla Placidia, the sister of Western Roman emperor Honorius.Athaulf spent the next few years operating in the Gallic and Hispanic countrysides, diplomatically playing competing factions of Germanic and Roman commanders against one another to skillful effect, and taking over cities such as Narbonne and Toulouse. After he married Placidia, the Emperor Honorius enlisted him to provide Visigothic assistance in regaining nominal Roman control of Hispania from the Vandals, Alans and Suebi.
In 418, Honorius rewarded his Visigothic federates under King Wallia by giving them land in the Garonne valley of Gallia Aquitania on which to settle. This probably took place under the system of hospitalitas. It seems likely that at first the Visigoths were not given a large amount of land estates in the region, but that they acquired the taxes of the region, with the local Gallic aristocrats now paying their taxes to the Visigoths instead of to the Roman government.
File:Theodoric I by Fabrizio Castello 1560 1617.jpg|left|thumb|Theodoric I by Fabrizio Castello
The Visigoths with their capital at Toulouse, remained de facto independent, and soon began expanding into Roman territory at the expense of the feeble Western empire. Under Theodoric I, the Visigoths attacked Arles and Narbonne, but were checked by Litorius using Hunnic mercenaries. This resulted at first in Theodoric's defeat at the Battle of Narbonne in 436, but then in 439 at the Battle of Toulouse the Visigoths defeated the allied forces of Romans and Huns. By 451, the situation had reversed and the Huns had invaded Gaul; now Theodoric fought under Flavius Aetius against Attila the Hun in the Battle of the Catalaunian Plains. Attila was driven back, but Theodoric was killed in the battle.
The Vandals completed the conquest of North Africa when they took Carthage on October 19, 439, and the Suebi had taken most of Hispania. The Roman emperor Avitus now sent the Visigoths into Hispania. Theodoric II invaded and defeated the king of the Suebi, Rechiarius, at the battle on the river Órbigo in 456 near Asturica Augusta and then sacked Bracara Augusta, the Suebi capital. The Goths sacked the cities in Gallaecia, part of the Suebi Kingdom quite brutally: they massacred a portion of the population and even attacked some holy places, probably due to the clergy's support of the Suebi. Theodoric took control over Hispania Baetica, Carthaginiensis and southern Lusitania. In 461, the Goths received the city of Narbonne from the emperor Libius Severus in exchange for their support. This led to a revolt by the army and by Gallo-Romans under Aegidius; as a result, Romans under Severus and the Visigoths fought other Roman troops, and the revolt ended only in 465.
Kingdom of Toulouse
In 466, Euric, who was the youngest son of Theodoric I, came to the Visigothic throne. He is infamous for murdering his elder brother Theodoric II who had himself become king by murdering his elder brother Thorismund. Under Euric, the Visigoths began expanding in Gaul and consolidating their presence in the Iberian peninsula. Euric fought a series of wars with the Suebi, who retained some influence in Lusitania, and brought most of this region under Visigothic power, taking Emerita Augusta in 469. Euric also attacked the Western Roman Empire, capturing Hispania Tarraconensis in 472, the last bastion of Roman rule in Spain. By 476, he had extended his rule to the Rhone and the Loire rivers which comprised most of southern Gaul. He also occupied the key Roman cities of Arles and Marseille. In his campaigns, Euric had counted on a portion of the Gallo-Roman and Hispano-Roman aristocracy who served under him as generals and governors. The Visigothic Kingdom was formally recognized as an independent kingdom in former Roman territory instead of having the status of foederati when the Western emperor Julius Nepos signed in 475 an alliance with Euric, granting him the lands south of the Loire and west of the Rhone in exchange for military service and the lands in Provence. The lands in Hispania remained under de facto Visigothic control. After Odoacer deposed the last Roman emperor in the West, Romulus Augustulus, Euric quickly recaptured Provence, a fact which Odoacer formally accepted in a treaty.By 500, the Visigothic Kingdom, centered at Toulouse, controlled Gallia Aquitania and Gallia Narbonensis and most of Hispania with the exception of the Suebic Kingdom of Galicia in the northwest and small areas controlled by independent Iberian peoples, such as the Basques and the Cantabrians. Euric's son Alaric II issued a new body of laws, the Breviarium Alarici, and held a church council at Agde.
The Visigoths now came into conflict with the Franks under their King Clovis I, who had conquered northern Gaul. Following a brief war with the Franks, Alaric was forced to put down a rebellion in Tarraconensis, probably caused by recent Visigoth immigration to Hispania due to pressure from the Franks. In 507, the Franks attacked again, this time allied with the Burgundians. Alaric II was killed at the Battle of Campus Vogladensis near Poitiers, and Toulouse was sacked. By 508, the Visigoths had lost most of their Gallic holdings save Septimania in the south.