In 376 AD the Goths [Germans] had been conquered in their first rebellion by the Roman leader Valens. He was informed that the Huns, an unknown and monstrous race of savages, had interrupted the Goths allowing Rome an easier victory. The Goths now were suppliant and with outstretched arms and pathetic lamentations they acknowledged that their only hope of safety was in the clemency of the Roman government. Valens and his leaders were perplexed and divided; but they soon acquiesced in the flattering sentiment which seemed the most favorable to the pride, the indolence, and the avarice of their sovereign. Consequently, the prayers of the Goths were granted. The only stipulations involved were that the children be separated from their families to be dispersed throughout the provinces of Asia [for military and social reasons] and that the Goths give up their arms.---- The barbarians, who considered their arms as the ensigns of honour and the pledges of safety, were disposed to offer a price which the lust or avarice of the Imperial officers was easily tempted to accept. To preserve their arms, the haughty warriors consented, with some reluctance, to prostitute their wives or their daughters; and the charms of a beauteous maid, or a comely boy, secured the connivance of the inspectors, who sometimes case an eye of covetousness on the fringed carpets and linen garments of their new allies. A different time and a different culture but their decision was wise.---- The avarice and ambition of all the Roman leaders caused discontent in the Gothic camps. Instead of obeying the orders of their sovereign, and satisfying, with decent liberality, the demands of the Goths, they levied an ungenerous and oppressive tax on the wants of the hungry barbarians. The vilest food was sold at an extravagant price... The markets were filled with the flesh of dogs and of unclean animals who had died of disease... A spirit of discontent insensibly arose in the camp of the barbarians, who pleaded, without success, the merit of the patient and dutiful behaviour, and loudly complained of the inhospitable treatment which they had received from their new [benefactors.] They beheld around them the wealth and plenty of a fertile province, in the midst of which they suffered the intolerable hardships of artificial famine. But the means of relief, and even of revenge, were in their hands, since the rapaciousness of their tyrants had left to an injured people the possession and the use of their arms.---- Indeed, the situation rapidly escalated and a leader of the Goths, Fritigern, assumed command for the public welfare of his people. When their humble prayers were rejected with insolence and derision; and as their patience was now exhausted, the townsmen, the soldiers, and the Goths were soon involved in a conflict of passionate altercation and angry reproaches. A blow was imprudently given; a sword was hastily drawn; and the first blood that was spilt in this accidental quarrel became the signal of a long and destructive war... The generals of the Goths were saluted by the fierce and joyful acclamations of the camp; war was instantly resolved, and the resolution was executed without delay... The valour of the Goths was so ably directed by the genius of Fritigern, that they broke, by close and vigorous attack, the ranks of the Roman legions... From that day the Goths, renouncing the precarious condition of strangers and exiles, assumed the character of citizens and masters, claimed an absolute dominion over the possessors of land, and held, in their own right, the northern provinces of the empire... In the course of these [actions] a great number of the children of the Goths, who had been sold into captivity, were restored to the embraces of their afflicted parents... They listened with eager attention to the complaints of their captive children, who had suffered the most cruel indignities from the lustful or angry passions of their masters, and the same cruelties, the same indignities, were severely retaliated on the sons and daughters of the Romans.---- Source: Quoted material from The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire by Edward Gibbon, Knopf, 1993, Vol. 3, pg. 37-43.
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