Vandals

VANDALS: A people of Teutonic stock, distinguished in secular history for their great migrations from the northeast of Europe to the south and then to the extreme southwest of the Roman world, and in church history for their extreme tenacity to Arianism. In the time of Pliny the elder and Tacitus the Vandals were settled between the Elbe and the Vistula, but by the period of the great Marcomannic war (166-181) they had reached the territory represented by the modern Silesia. A century later Aurelian found it necessary to protect the middle Danube against them; but about 330, hard pressed by their northern neighbors, they received protection from Constantine the Great in Pannonia, though forced to recognize Roman sovereignty. About 407 the Vandals, together with the Caucasian Alans and a Swabian tribe, left Pannonia, and, after ravaging Gaul, sought new homes in Spain, where they settled first in the north, in Galicia (409-423), and then in the south, in Baetiea, the modern Andalusia (423-429). Their Arias Christianity they received from the Emperor Valens.

In 429 Genseric, Vandal lung since 427, landed with some 80,000 followers, of whom 50,000 were warriors, on the coast of northern Africa. The Vandal kingdom properly dates, however, from Oct. 19,

439, when, utterly disregarding the terms of the peace made at Hippo Regius on Feb. 11, 435, Genseric stormed and sacked Carthage, which he made his capital. From 440 until 475 he harried the Mediterranean coasts almost annually, and in June; 455, pillaged Rome itself. He ruled northern Africa from Mauretania to Gyrene, and also Corsica, Sardinia, the Balearic Isles, Iviza, Formentera, and part of Sicily.

The African Vandal kingdom, unprecedentedly isolated in the extreme south of the ancient world, suffered more than any other Teutonic Arias domain on the Mediterranean from a twofold internal antithesis, national and religions. In his new home Genseric found two ruling estates, the ecclesiastical nobility, or bishops, and the secular nobles, or possessores. Both were systematically crushed as main supports of Catholic power, but when, in token of allegiance, the Vandal king demanded Arias rebaptism and disciplined loyal Catholics, the persecution was political rather than religious When, on the other hand, he came into better relation with the two divisions of the Roman Empire, he was lenient toward his orthodox subjects, and at one time the African Bishop Victor of Cartenna could present him with an impassioned refutation of Arianism without ill consequences. On Jan. 25, 477, the aged Vandal king died at peace with all his foes. Except for his religious persecutions, Genaeric was a ruler of a high degree of statesmanship, and his personal integrity and purity were irreproachable. The taint of immorality alleged against him by Sidonius Apollinaris (Panegyricus, v. 327 sqq.) is refuted by the activity of his life, for until about 474 he led almost all his expeditions in person. He was equally ready to recognize nobility in others; while among his acts of toleration to his orthodox subjects may be mentioned his permission, at the request of Yalentinian III., for the Catholics of Carthage to elect Deogratias as their bishop after their community had been desolate for years (Oct. 24, 454).

Genseric was succeeded by his unworthy.son, Huneric (477-484), who at first spared the Catholics out of fear of Byzantium, and even permitted them to choose Eugenius bishop of Carthage in 481, only to persecute the orthodox with ever-increasing barbarity after 482. Guntamund (484-496) spared the Catholics, and his successor, Thrasamund (496-523), contented himself with banishing the most important bishops. Hilderic (523-530), the son of Huneric and the West Roman Princess Eudocia, granted absolute religious ,freedom. Catholic synods were again held on African soil at Junco (523), Sufes (524), and Carthage itself (525). Hilderic's policy, however, allying him with Byzantium, then ruled by Justinian, and estranging him from his natural allies, tie Oatrogoths, led to his fall. His aged cousin, Gelimer (or Geilamir), a fervent Arias, had him dethroned and put to death. In 533-534, Gelimer himself succumbed to Belisarius at Deciruum and Tricameron, and North Africa with the islands became, under the name of the Exarchate of Carthage, a Byzantine province until it fell a prey to Islam in 709. The last Vandal king, a romantic character, received rich estates in Galicia,

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where he was prevented from accepting patrician rank, the highest honor that Byzantium could be stow, only by his refusal to abandon the Arian faith. From the neighboring Moorish tribes Genseric received his so-called testament or law of succes sion, whereby the son did not regularly follow the father, the heir to the throne in each case being the eldest descendant in direct line from Genseric him self. The aim, as in the corresponding rule of the Osmanli Turks, was to prevent degeneration of the ruling stock, but among both .peoples it proved unsuccessful.

(Franz Görres.)

Bibliography: Sources are: Victor of Vita, Hist. persecutionis AJricanm provincie=, ed. M. Petschenig, in CSCE, vol. vii., and in MGH, Auct. ant., iii (1879). 1-58, Germ. transl. by A. Dlally, Vienna, 1884; Procopius, De hello Vandalico, in Opera, ed. J. Haury, i. 307 sqq., Leipsic, 1905, Germ. transl. by D. Costs, ib. 1885; Prosper Tiron, Epiloma chronica, ed. T. Mommsen, in MGM, Auct. ant., ix (1892); Victor Tonnennensis, Chronicon, ed. T. Mommsen, in MGM, Auct. ant., xi (1893). Consult further: F. Papeneordt, Geschichte der vandalischen Herrschaft in AJrika, Berlin, 1837; F. Dahn, Die Könige der Germanen, Vol. i., Munich, 1881; idem, Germanisch-romanische Urgeschichte, i. 147-222, 2d ed., Berlin, 1899; Stadler von Wolffersgriin, Die Vandalen, Bozen, 1883-84; F. Wrede, User die Sprache der Warulalen, Strasburg, 1888; W. PStzsch, Victor von Vita, Dobeln, 1887; L. Schmidt, Aelteste Geschichte der Wandalen, Leipsic, 1888; idem, Geschichte der Warulalen, ib. 1901; A. Ebert, Geschichte der Literatur des Mittelalters, i. 455 sqq., 2d ed., Leipsic,1889; G. Boissier, Etudes d'hist. religieuse, in Revue des deux mondes, is (1890), 145-172; T. Hodgkin, Italy and her Invaders, vols. ii.-iii., Oxford. 1892; A. Schwarze, Enturicklung der afrikanischere Kirche, pp. 153-183, Göttingen, 1892; F. Görres, in ZWT, xxxvi. 1 (1893), 494-511; idem, in HisEorisches Jahrbuch, 1911, ii. 323-332; F. Ferrbre, De Victoria Vitensis Libro, Paris, 1898; F. Martroye, L'OccidenE h Z'Epoque bpzantine. Goths et Vandales, Paris, 1904.