Flavius Ardabur Aspar ( Greek: Άσπαρ, fl. 400471) was an

Eastern Roman The Byzantine Empire, also referred to as the Eastern Roman Empire or Byzantium, was the continuation of the Roman Empire primarily in its eastern provinces during Late Antiquity and the Middle Ages, when its capital city was Constantinopl ...

patrician and ''

magister militum (Latin for "master of soldiers", plural ) was a top-level military command used in the later Roman Empire, dating from the reign of Constantine the Great. The term referred to the senior military officer (equivalent to a war theatre commander, ...

'' ("master of soldiers") of Alanic-

Gothic Gothic or Gothics may refer to: People and languages *Goths or Gothic people, the ethnonym of a group of East Germanic tribes **Gothic language, an extinct East Germanic language spoken by the Goths **Crimean Gothic, the Gothic language spoken b ...

descent. As the general of a Germanic army in Roman service, Aspar exerted great influence on the Eastern Roman Emperors for half a century, from the 420s to his death in 471, through the reigns of Theodosius II,

Marcian Marcian (; la, Marcianus, link=no; grc-gre, Μαρκιανός, link=no ; 392 – 27 January 457) was Roman emperor of the East from 450 to 457. Very little of his life before becoming emperor is known, other than that he was a (personal as ...

and

Leo I The LEO I (Lyons Electronic Office I) was the first computer used for commercial business applications. The prototype LEO I was modelled closely on the Cambridge EDSAC. Its construction was overseen by Oliver Standingford, Raymond Thompson and D ...

, who, in the end, had him killed. His death led to the ending of the Germanic domination of Eastern Roman policy.

Biography

Aspar was born the son of the magister Ardaburius, and was of Alanic-

descent. The name Aspar (

Avestan Avestan (), or historically Zend, is an umbrella term for two Old Iranian languages: Old Avestan (spoken in the 2nd millennium BCE) and Younger Avestan (spoken in the 1st millennium BCE). They are known only from their conjoined use as the scrip ...

''aspari'') in

Iranian languages The Iranian languages or Iranic languages are a branch of the Indo-Iranian languages in the Indo-European language family that are spoken natively by the Iranian peoples, predominantly in the Iranian Plateau. The Iranian languages are grouped ...

means "Horse-rider". Aspar played a crucial role in his father's expedition in 424 to defeat the Western

usurper A usurper is an illegitimate or controversial claimant to power, often but not always in a monarchy. In other words, one who takes the power of a country, city, or established region for oneself, without any formal or legal right to claim it as ...

Joannes of

Ravenna Ravenna ( , , also ; rgn, Ravèna) is the capital city of the Province of Ravenna, in the Emilia-Romagna region of Northern Italy. It was the capital city of the Western Roman Empire from 408 until its collapse in 476. It then served as the cap ...

and to install

Galla Placidia Galla Placidia (388–89/392–93 – 27 November 450), daughter of the Roman emperor Theodosius I, was a mother, tutor, and advisor to emperor Valentinian III, and a major force in Roman politics for most of her life. She was List of Visigothi ...

and her son, Valentinian III, in his place. He also helped to negotiate a peace treaty with Geiseric after the

Vandal The Vandals were a Germanic people who first inhabited what is now southern Poland. They established Vandal kingdoms on the Iberian Peninsula, Mediterranean islands, and North Africa in the fifth century. The Vandals migrated to the area betw ...

invasion of

Africa Africa is the world's second-largest and second-most populous continent, after Asia in both cases. At about 30.3 million km2 (11.7 million square miles) including adjacent islands, it covers 6% of Earth's total surface area ...

. Aspar attained the

consul Consul (abbrev. ''cos.''; Latin plural ''consules'') was the title of one of the two chief magistrates of the Roman Republic, and subsequently also an important title under the Roman Empire. The title was used in other European city-states throug ...

ship in 434 after campaigning in Africa. However, Aspar could not become

emperor An emperor (from la, imperator, via fro, empereor) is a monarch, and usually the sovereignty, sovereign ruler of an empire or another type of imperial realm. Empress, the female equivalent, may indicate an emperor's wife (empress consort), ...

because of his

Arian Arianism ( grc-x-koine, Ἀρειανισμός, ) is a Christological doctrine first attributed to Arius (), a Christian presbyter from Alexandria, Egypt. Arian theology holds that Jesus Christ is the Son of God, who was begotten by God t ...

religion. Instead, he played the role of kingmaker with his subordinate

, who became emperor by marrying Theodosius II's sister

Pulcheria Aelia Pulcheria (; grc-gre, Πουλχερία; 19 January 398 or 399 – July 453) was an Eastern Roman empress who advised her brother emperor Theodosius II during his minority and then became wife to emperor Marcian from November 450 to he ...

. On 27 January 457 Marcian died, and the political and military establishment figures of the Eastern court took eleven days to choose a successor. Despite the presence of a strong candidate to the purple, the ''magister militum'' and Marcian's son-in-law Anthemius, the choice was quite different. Aspar, who in this occasion was probably offered the throne by the senate but refused, could have chosen his own son Ardabur, but instead selected an obscure tribune of one of his military units,

. In 470, in an episode of the struggle for power between Aspar and the Isaurian general

Zeno Zeno ( grc, Ζήνων) may refer to: People * Zeno (name), including a list of people and characters with the name Philosophers * Zeno of Elea (), philosopher, follower of Parmenides, known for his paradoxes * Zeno of Citium (333 – 264 BC), ...

, Aspar persuaded the emperor to appoint his second son, Patricius, as ''

caesar Gaius Julius Caesar (; ; 12 July 100 BC – 15 March 44 BC), was a Roman people, Roman general and statesman. A member of the First Triumvirate, Caesar led the Roman armies in the Gallic Wars before defeating his political rival Pompey in Caes ...

'' and give him in marriage his daughter

Leontia Leontia ( el, Λεοντία, fl. 610) was an empress of the Eastern Roman Empire as the wife of Phocas. Empress Maurice reigned in the Byzantine Empire from 582 to 602. He led a series of Balkan campaigns and managed to successfully re-estab ...

. However, since the clergy and people of

Constantinople la, Constantinopolis ota, قسطنطينيه , alternate_name = Byzantion (earlier Greek name), Nova Roma ("New Rome"), Miklagard/Miklagarth (Old Norse), Tsargrad ( Slavic), Qustantiniya (Arabic), Basileuousa ("Queen of Cities"), Megalopolis (" ...

did not consider an Arian eligible to become emperor, at the news of the appointment riots broke out in the city hippodrome, led by the head of the Sleepless Monks, Marcellus: Aspar and Leo had to promise to the bishops that Patricius would convert to Orthodoxy before becoming emperor, and only after the conversion would he marry Leontia. In 471 an imperial conspiracy organized by Leo I and the Isaurians caused the death of Aspar and of his elder son Ardabur. It is possible that Patricius died on this occasion, although some sources report that he recovered from his wounds. His death led to the ending of the Germanic domination of Eastern Roman policy. Aspar had another son, Ermanaric, with the sister of Theodoric Strabo and daughter of

Triarius Triarius was a Gothic nobleman and soldier. He was a member of the Amali dynasty. At least by the Battle of Nedao, Triarius had withdrawn his support from Valamir, who was his relative and the king of the Ostrogoths. Triarius joined the Eastern ...

. Herwig Wolfram, p. 32. Aspar's wife was an Ostrogoth, as the Ostrogoth King Theodoric was her nephew.Bunson, 38. A cistern attributed to him still exists today in

Istanbul Istanbul ( , ; tr, İstanbul ), formerly known as Constantinople ( grc-gre, Κωνσταντινούπολις; la, Constantinopolis), is the List of largest cities and towns in Turkey, largest city in Turkey, serving as the country's economic, ...

Notes

References

*Bunson, Matthew (1994). ''Encyclopedia of the Roman Empire''. New York: Facts on File Inc. *Croke, Brian, "Dynasty and Ethnicity: Emperor Leo and the Eclipse of Aspar", ''Chiron'' 35 (2005), 147–203. *McEvoy, Meaghan
"Becoming Roman?: the not-so-curious case of Aspar and the Ardaburii"
''Journal of Late Antiquity'' 9.2 (2016), 483–511. *McEvoy, Meaghan, "Celibacy and survival in court politics in the fifth century AD", in S. Tougher (ed.),
The Emperor in the Byzantine World
' (London, 2019), 115–134. *Williams, Stephen, and Gerard Friell, ''The Rome That Did Not Fall'', Routledge, 1999, . * Wolfram, Herwig, ''History of the Goths'', trans. Thomas J. Dunlap. University of California Press, 1988, .

External links

Profile of Aspar in the Prosopography of the Later Roman Empire
{{DEFAULTSORT:Aspar 400 births 471 deaths Byzantine generals Imperial Roman consuls Gothic warriors Magistri militum Alanic people 5th-century Romans of Gothic descent 5th-century Byzantine people 5th-century Arian Christians 5th-century Roman consuls Year of birth uncertain Assassinated Byzantine people