Odotheus (in Zosimus ''Aedotheus'') was a

Greuthungi The Greuthungi (also spelled Greutungi) were a Gothic people who lived on the Pontic steppe between the Dniester and Don rivers in what is now Ukraine, in the 3rd and the 4th centuries. They had close contacts with the Tervingi, another Gothic ...

king who in 386 led an incursion into the

Roman Empire The Roman Empire ( la, Imperium Romanum ; grc-gre, Βασιλεία τῶν Ῥωμαίων, Basileía tôn Rhōmaíōn) was the post-Roman Republic, Republican period of ancient Rome. As a polity, it included large territorial holdings aro ...

. He was defeated and killed by the Roman general

Promotus Flavius Promotus was a Roman general who served under Theodosius I until his death in 391 AD. Career In 386 he had a command in Africa. Later the same year, he was ''magister peditum per Thracias''. The Greuthungi of King Odotheus gathered on t ...

. His surviving people settled in

Phrygia In classical antiquity, Phrygia ( ; grc, Φρυγία, ''Phrygía'' ) was a kingdom in the west central part of Anatolia, in what is now Asian Turkey, centered on the Sangarios River. After its conquest, it became a region of the great empir ...

Invasion of Roman Empire

After the major Gothic entry into the Roman Empire in 376, there still remained substantial numbers of Goths in several kingdoms north and east of the lower

Danube The Danube ( ; ) is a river that was once a long-standing frontier of the Roman Empire and today connects 10 European countries, running through their territories or being a border. Originating in Germany, the Danube flows southeast for , pa ...

. In the year 386 the king Odotheus led his people into the Empire, possibly fleeing Hunnic hegemony, but Heather (1996:103) disputes this. The incursion was described as a heavy assault against the Romans and constituted the second opposition on the Lower Danube frontier, since other Gothic groups also fought the Romans on the same front. An account cited that the Greuthungi were crushed when they tried to cross the Danube. It is also said that many of these armed troops perished in an ambush since the Danube crossing was partially successful. This incident was noted in

Claudian Claudius Claudianus, known in English as Claudian (; c. 370 – c. 404 AD), was a Latin poet associated with the court of the Roman emperor Honorius at Mediolanum (Milan), and particularly with the general Stilicho. His work, written almost e ...

's ''

Panegyric A panegyric ( or ) is a formal public speech or written verse, delivered in high praise of a person or thing. The original panegyrics were speeches delivered at public events in ancient Athens. Etymology The word originated as a compound of gr ...

'', which was delivered to honor

Emperor Honorius Honorius (9 September 384 – 15 August 423) was Roman emperor from 393 to 423. He was the younger son of emperor Theodosius I and his first wife Aelia Flaccilla. After the death of Theodosius, Honorius ruled the western half of the empire whil ...

' fourth consulate. Odotheus was brought to battle and killed by the general Promotus. Zosimus gives two versions (4.35 and 4.38-9), generally thought to be of the same story; the second version calls them ''Grothingi'' and speaks of a betrayal (or entrapment) by Promotus. The survivors of his people were settled in

; some were drafted into the

Army An army (from Old French ''armee'', itself derived from the Latin verb ''armāre'', meaning "to arm", and related to the Latin noun ''arma'', meaning "arms" or "weapons"), ground force or land force is a fighting force that fights primarily on ...

and some became agricultural labourers.

Fate of Odotheus' People

In 399, Tribigild, a Gothic commander in Roman service who led a unit of these Phrygian survivors of Odotheus' kingdom, rose in revolt. Michael Kulikowski suggests the Goths of Tribigild were in fact survivors of the massacres in Asia Minor of 378/9, after the

Battle of Adrianople The Battle of Adrianople (9 August 378), sometimes known as the Battle of Hadrianopolis, was fought between an Eastern Roman army led by the Eastern Roman Emperor Valens and Gothic rebels (largely Thervings as well as Greutungs, non-Gothic A ...

Gainas Gainas ( Greek: Γαϊνάς) was a Gothic leader who served the Eastern Roman Empire as '' magister militum'' during the reigns of Theodosius I and Arcadius. Gainas began his military career as a common foot-soldier, but later commanded the ...

, another Gothic general sent to suppress him, suborned Tribigild's revolt for his own purposes. After some initial successes, Gainas was suppressed and fled north of the Danube, only to be killed by the Hunnic chieftain

Uldin Uldin, also spelled Huldin (died before 412) is the first ruler of the Huns whose historicity is undisputed. Etymology The name is recorded as ''Ουλδης'' (Ouldes) by Sozomen, ''Uldin'' by Orosius, and ''Huldin'' by Marcellinus Comes. On th ...

.Zosimus V.21-22 Thus perished many of Odotheus' remaining people; the fate of the rest in Phrygia is unknown. The Greuthungi's settlement in Phrygia facilitated the so-called Gothicization of the Danubian provinces and, later, Asia Minor.

Notes

Sources

* * * Zosimus, ''Novae Historiae'
bk 4
386 deaths Gothic kings Military personnel killed in action Year of birth unknown 4th-century Gothic people Gothic warriors {{Europe-hist-stub