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praises of Cassiodorus (" vir eruditissimus . . dum laudes regis facundissime recitasset ") are too loudly sung for the words to be those of that writer himself. Still, no one will deny its great value as contributory evidence, and it remains a formidable weapon in the hands of the champions of Boethius's Christianity.

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CHAPTER II.

BOETHIUS AND THEODORIC.

Authorities.—The 'Anonymus Valesii,' described in the text; the writings of our author himself, and especially the 'Consolation'; the ‘Variæ Epistolæ' of Cassiodorus, which Dr Hodgkin has translated en abrégé (London, 1886), supplemented by the 'Anecdoton Holderi'; some of the letters of Ennodius, bishop of Pavia, and the same writer's 'Parænesis Didascalica.' For the general history of the period I have consulted Du Roure's 'Histoire de Théodoric le Grand' (Paris, 1846), Deltuf's 'Théodoric, Roi des Ostrogoths et d'Italie'; and of English historians, Gibbon in his 'Decline and Fall,' Milman in his History of Latin Christianity (1854), and Hodgkin in the second and third volumes of his 'Italy and her Invaders' (Oxford, 1880 and 1885).

THE fall of the western portion of the empire which Constantine had founded dates in reality from the death of Valentinian in 455. That prince, the last of the house of Theodosius, had, by his vacillating policy and extravagant taxation, driven crowds of his subjects into voluntary exile, and cleared the

way for the hordes that hovered over the entry of every road that led to Rome, and that swooped down on the defenceless city like vultures on a wounded tiger. The history of the latter part of the fifth and of the beginning of the sixth century is the history of the rivalry between Huns and Vandals, Visigoths and Ostrogoths, for the prize of Italy.

From the inhabitants themselves, the degenerate descendants of the Fabii and Metelli, there was little resistance to be feared. The old Roman spirit was dead, and the feeble senate was powerless to stem the torrent of barbarian conquest. The successors of Valentinian in the palace of the Cæsars disappear at the rate of one in every two years, and this in itself is sufficient witness to the violence of the changes that shook that proud fabric, and to the rottenness of the political and social life of the age.

It was reserved for Odovacar, the rough young soldier whose high destiny was foretold by Saint Severinus,1 to administer the coup de grâce to the stricken empire. We know nothing certain about his origin beyond the fact that he was the son of one Edecon, identified by Gibbon, but with great improbability, with the Edica who was left on the bloody

1 See the story in Hodgkin, op. cit., vol. ii. p. 527.

field of Bollia, where the power of the Scyri was once and for ever broken.1 After a life of wandering amid the wild tribes of Noricum, the young barbarian found his way to Italy at a time when it was filled with a soldiery envious of the good fortune of their brethren in Spain, in Gaul, and in Africa, and clamouring for their share of the spoil,-for a third part of town and vineyard and field. Orestes the

patrician, who, although he had for sufficient reasons refused the purple in favour of his son Augustulus, was still the real sovereign of the West, resisted such an outrageous demand. This resistance was Odovacar's opportunity. Putting himself at the head of the disaffected troops, he stormed and sacked Pavia, and caused Orestes, who had fled thither at the first alarm, to be put to death. The wretched Augustulus, whom he deemed unworthy of his vengeance, he was content to sentence to a luxurious exile in the Lucullan villa.2 He had now only to stretch out his hand to grasp the imperial sceptre, but experience had taught him that this was a dangerous bauble. He accordingly addressed a letter through the Roman senate to the emperor Zeno at

1 For an exhaustive discussion on the parentage of Odovacar, see Hodgkin, op. cit., vol. ii. pp. 528-530.

2 On the bay of Naples, the famous seat of Lucius Lucullus, the conqueror of Mithridates.

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Constantinople, in which he formally advocated the abolition of the Western empire, and begged to be invested with the title and rank of patrician. The prospect of an undivided rule from Byzantium to Britain flattered Zeno, and he readily gave his assent.

Odovacar kept strictly to the letter of his proposal, and although after seven years he revived the consulship of the West, he never showed any inclination to fill the office in person, but confided it to trustworthy Roman officers. From 476 to 490 he ruled the land with justice and tolerance, protecting it by his arms from the active aggressions of barbarians on the frontier, and by his prudent administration from the still more dangerous oppression of his own turbulent soldiery. But Odovacar's successful course was now to be crossed by one of the most romantic and pathetic figures in all history. This is not the place to dwell at length on the early life of Theodoric the Ostrogoth, but a brief sketch of it is necessary to a right comprehension of the causes that led to the passage of the Isonzo, where Italy once again changed masters. The son of Theudemir the Amal and Erelieva his wife, he was born in 454,

1 She is generally spoken of as his concubine. Dr Hodgkin (op. cit., vol. iii. p. 15) inclines to the view that the union between her and the Amal was sanctioned by the Church, although the woman was of inferior rank to the man.

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