Flavius Placidius Valentinianus (July 2, 419 – March 16, 455), known in English as Valentinian III, was among the last Western Roman Emperors (425-455).
Family
Born in the western capital of Ravenna, Valentinian was the only son of later Emperor Constantius III and Galla Placidia. He had an older, maternal half-brother by the first marriage of Placidia to Ataulf of the Visigoths. Theodosius, his half-brother, was born in Barcelona by the end of 414. Theodosius died early in the following year, thus eliminating an opportunity for a Romano-Visigothic line.[1][2] Valentinian also had a full sister, Justa Grata Honoria. She was probably born in 417 or 418. The history of Paul the Deacon mentions her first when mentioning the children of the marriage, suggesting she was the eldest. [3]
Placidia was the daughter of Roman Emperor Theodosius I and his second wife Galla.[4] Her older brother Gratian died young. Her mother died in childbirth in 394, giving birth to John, who died with their mother.[5] Placidia was a younger, paternal half-sister of Emperors Arcadius and Honorius. Her older half-sister Pulcheria predeceased her parents as mentioned in the writings of Gregory of Nyssa, placing the death of Pulcheria prior to the death of Aelia Flaccilla, first wife of Theodosius I, in 385.[6] Her paternal grandparents were Count Theodosius and his wife Thermantia, as mentioned in the "Historia Romana" by Paul the Deacon. Her maternal grandparents were Valentinian I and his second wife Justina, as mentioned by Jordanes.[7]
Reign
After the death of his father (421), he followed his mother and his sister (Justa Grata Honoria) to Constantinople, when Galla broke with her half-brother, Emperor Honorius, and went to live at the court of Theodosius II.
In 423, Honorius died, and the usurper Joannes took the power in Rome. To counter this menace, Theodosius nominated Valentinian Caesar of the west (October 23, 424), and betrothed him to his own daughter Licinia Eudoxia (Valentinian would marry her in 437). In 425, after Joannes had been defeated in war, Valentinian was installed Western Emperor in Rome, on October 23, at the age of six.
Given his minority, the new Augustus ruled under the control first of his mother, and then, after 433, of the Magister militum Flavius Aëtius. Valentinian's reign is marked by the dismemberment of the Western Empire; the conquest of the province of Africa by the Vandals in 439; the final abandonment of Britain in 446; the loss of great portions of Spain and Gaul, in which the barbarians had established themselves; and the ravaging of Sicily and of the western coasts of the Mediterranean Sea by the fleets of Geiseric.
As an off-set against these calamities, there was the great victory of Roman general Aëtius over Attila the Hun in 451 near Chalons. Aëtius had also campaigned successfully against the Visigoths in southern Gaul (426, 429, 436), and against various invaders on the Rhine and Danube (428-431).
The burden of taxation became more and more intolerable as the power of Rome decreased, and the loyalty of its remaining provinces was seriously impaired in consequence. Ravenna was Valentinian's usual residence; but he fled to Rome on the approach of Attila, who, after ravaging the north of Italy, died in the following year (453).
In 454 Aëtius, whose son had married a daughter of the emperor, was treacherously murdered by Valentinian. On March 16 of the following year, however, the emperor himself was assassinated in Rome, by two of the barbarian followers of Aëtius. These retainers may have been put up to the act by Petronius Maximus, a wealthy senator who the following day March 17 had himself proclaimed emperor by the remnants of the Western Roman army after the paying of a large donative. He was not as prepared as he thought to take over and restabilize the depleted empire, however; after a reign of eleven weeks, Maximus was murdered by a Roman mob. King Gaiseric and his Vandals captured Rome a few days later and sacked it for two weeks.
Valentinian not only lacked the ability to govern the empire in a time of crisis, but aggravated its dangers by his self-indulgence and vindictiveness.
In literature
Valentinian III was dramatized by John Fletcher in his play Valentinian, c. 1612 (published 1647).
References
Primary sources
Secondary sources
- Oost, Galla Placidia Augusta, University Press, Chicago, 1968.
- Jones, A.H.M., The Later Roman Empire A.D. 284-602, Volume One. Johns Hopkins Unbiversity Press, Baltimore, 1986.
- This article incorporates text from the Encyclopædia Britannica Eleventh Edition, a publication now in the public domain.
External links
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