Gaudentius (c. 440 in Rome – after 455) was the son of Flavius Aetius. F. M. Clover has argued that his mother was Pelagia, a

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 ...

noblewoman and the widow of

Bonifacius Bonifatius (or Bonifacius; also known as Count Boniface; died 432) was a Roman general and governor of the diocese of Africa. He campaigned against the Visigoths in Gaul and the Vandals in North Africa. An ally of Galla Placidia, mother and adv ...

. He was born in Rome, probably in 440, and was baptized before his first birthday. Scholars identify him as the unnamed subject of a poem of Flavius Merobaudes. In 454 his father and emperor Valentinian III arranged a marriage alliance, which included the marriage between Gaudentius and

Placidia Placidia () was a daughter of Valentinian III, Roman emperor of the West from 425 to 455, and from 454/455 the wife of Olybrius, who became western Roman emperor in 472. She was one of the last imperial spouses in the Roman west, during the Fall ...

, but that year his father was killed by Valentinian himself.Stewart I. Oost, ''Galla Placidia Augusta: a biographical essay'' (Chicago: University Press, 1968), p. 287 In 455, the Vandals sacked Rome; Gaudentius was one of the countless thousands made a prisoner and brought back to Africa. Gaiseric claimed that his following attacks to Italy were to recover Gaudentius's legacy.

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