Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers: Series II/Volume II/Socrates/Book VII/Chapter 10
Chapter X.—Rome taken and sacked by Alaric.
About this same time[1]
it happened that Rome was taken by the barbarians; for a certain Alaric, a barbarian who had been an ally of the Romans, and had served as an ally with the emperor Theodosius in the war against the usurper Eugenius, having on that account been honored with Roman dignities, was unable to bear his good fortune. He did not choose to assume imperial authority, but retiring from Constantinople went into the Western parts, and arriving at Illyricum immediately laid waste the whole country. As he marched, however, the Thessalians opposed him at the mouths of the river Peneus, whence there is a pass over Mount Pindus to Nicopolis in Epirus; and coming to an engagement, the Thessalians killed about three thousand of his men. After this the barbarians that were with him destroying everything in their way, at last took Rome itself, which they pillaged, burning the greatest number of the magnificent structures and other admirable works of art it contained. The money and valuable articles they plundered and divided among themselves. Many of the principal senators they put to death on a variety of pretexts. Moreover, Alaric in mockery of the imperial dignity, proclaimed one Attalus[2]
emperor, whom he ordered to be attended with all the insignia of
sovereignty on one day, and to be exhibited in the habit of a slave on
the next. After these achievements he made a precipitate retreat, a
report having reached him that the emperor Theodosius had sent an army
to fight him. Nor was this report a fictitious one; for the imperial
forces were actually on their way; but Alaric, not waiting for the
materialization of the rumor, decamped and escaped. It is said that as
he was advancing towards Rome, a pious monk exhorted him not to delight
in the perpetuation of such atrocities, and no longer to rejoice in
slaughter and blood. To whom Alaric replied, ’I am not going on
in this course of my own will; but there is a something that
irresistibly impels me daily, saying, ‘Proceed to Rome, and
desolate that city.’ Such was the career of this person.