Page:A Short History of the World.djvu/239

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The Barbarians Break the Empire
219

Hungary west of the Danube, and their fighting men became nominally legionaries. But these new legionaries remained under their own chiefs. Rome failed

An image should appear at this position in the text.Photo:Sebah & Joailbier
CONSTANTINE'S PILLAR, CONSTANTINOPLE

to digest them.

Constantine died working to reorganize his great realm, and soon the frontiers were ruptured again and the Visigoths came almost to Constantinople. They defeated the Emperor Valens at Adrianople and made a settlement in what is now Bulgaria, similar to the settlement of the Vandals in Pannonia. Nominally they were subjects of the Emperor, practically they were conquerors

From A.D. 379 to 395 reigned the Emperor Theodosius the Great, and while he reigned the empire was still formally intact. Over the armies of Italy and Pannonia presided Stilicho, a Vandal, over the armies in the Balkan peninsula, Aiaric, a Goth. When Theodosius died at the close of the fourth century he left two sons. Aiaric supported one of these, Arcadius, in Constantinople, and Stilicho the other, Honorius, in Italy. In other words Aiaric and Stilicho fought for the empire with the