Odotheus
Odotheus (in Zosimus Aedotheus) was a Greuthungi king who in 386 led an incursion into the Roman Empire. He was defeated and killed by the Roman general Promotus.Zosimus, V.36 seems to put this before the death of Gratian in 383, but in IV.39 he tells of Theodosius recruiting the survivors for the coming campaign against Magnus Maximus, and Claudian Cos. Hon IV 633–37 dates the victory over Odotheus by Honorius’ first consulship, i.e. 386 His surviving people settled in Phrygia.
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.Heather (1996), 56 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.{{Cite book|title=The Fall of the Roman Empire: A New History of Rome and the Barbarians|last=Heather|first=Peter|date=2007|publisher=Oxford University Press, USA|isbn=9780195325416|location=New York|pages=154}} An account cited that the Greuthungi were crushed when they tried to cross the Danube.{{Cite book|title=Belief and Religion in Barbarian Europe c. 350-700|last=Dunn|first=Marilyn|date=2013|publisher=Bloomsbury Press|isbn=9781441100238|location=London|pages=42}} It is also said that many of these armed troops perished in an ambush since the Danube crossing was partially successful.{{Cite book|title=The Roman Empire and Its Germanic Peoples|last=Wolfram|first=Herwig|date=1997|publisher=University of California Press|isbn=9780520244900|location=Berkeley|pages=124}} This incident was noted in Claudian's Panegyric, which was delivered to honor Emperor Honorius' fourth consulate.{{Cite book|title=Cassiodorus, Jordanes and the History of the Goths: Studies in a Migration Myth|last=Christensen|first=Arne Søby|author-link=Arne Søby Christensen|date=2002|publisher=Museum Tusculanum Press|isbn=8772897104|location=Copenhagen|pages=214}}
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 Phrygia; some were drafted into the Army and some became agricultural labourers.Heather (1996), n. 10 to p. 138. "Zosimus 4.35, 38-9, Cons. Const. s.a. 386 (= CM 1, 244). captivi: Claudian In Eut. 2.582. coloni: ibid. 205".
Fate of Odotheus' People
In 399, Tribigild, a Gothic commander in Roman service who led a unit of these Phrygian survivors of Odotheus' kingdom,Heather (1996), 144 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.{{harvnb|Kulikowski|2006|p=154}} Gainas, 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.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
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Sources
- {{cite book |title=The Goths |last=Heather |first=Peter |author-link=Peter Heather |year=1996 |publisher=Blackwell Publishers |location=Oxford |isbn=0-631-16536-3}}
- {{cite book |last=Kulikowski |first=Michael |author-link=Michael Kulikowski |date=October 30, 2006 |title=Rome's Gothic Wars: From the Third Century to Alaric |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=QXM9SH4EALgC |publisher=Cambridge University Press |isbn=1139458094 |access-date=January 17, 2015 }}
- Zosimus, Novae Historiae [http://www.tertullian.org/fathers/zosimus04_book4.htm bk 4], [http://www.tertullian.org/fathers/zosimus05_book5.htm bk 5]
Category:Military personnel killed in action
Category:Year of birth unknown
Category:4th-century Gothic people
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