The New International Encyclopædia/Theodoric the Great

THEODORIC (Lat. Theodoricus), surnamed the Great (c.454–526). The founder of the Ostrogothic Kingdom in Italy. He was born on the banks of the Neusiedler See, in Pannonia. His father, Theudemir, was one of the three brothers who on the death of Attila (A.D. 453) freed their nation from the yoke of the Huns, and being the representatives of the royal line of the Amali, exercised a united sovereignty over it. In his eighth year Theodoric was sent as a hostage to the Eastern Emperor and was trained in all kinds of athletic and martial exercises. He returned to his people about 473 and in 474 succeeded his father as head of the nation. In the previous year the Ostrogoths had obtained parts of Mœsia and Dacia, as settlements, from the Emperor Zeno. For the next thirteen years Theodoric was frequently engaged in strife, sometimes against the Empire, sometimes in its service. In 484 he was made consul; in 478 he ravaged Thrace. The Emperor, to free himself from Theodoric, gave him permission to invade Italy, a suggestion gladly adopted by the warlike monarch, who began his march in 488, and arrived in the summer of 489 on the frontiers of Italy. Odoacer (q.v.), King of Italy, the first of the Germanic rulers of that country, was both forewarned and forearmed; and a desperate battle was fought near Aquileia (August 28, 489), the result of which was decidedly to the advantage of the Ostrogoths. A second and more disastrous defeat was inflicted on Odoacer near Verona (September 27th), after which he took refuge in Ravenna; but having again gathered a large force, he was totally routed a third time on the banks of the Adda (August, 490), and again blockaded in Ravenna, while the whole of Italy was being subdued; and having at last surrendered, was treacherously murdered (March, 493). Theodoric now assumed the title of King of Italy, resisted the claim of suzerainty preferred by the Eastern Emperor, and with the exception of a victorious campaign against the Franks, to compel them to cease their assaults on the Visigothic dominions, the suppression of a rebellion in Spain against the authority of the infant monarch, his own grandson Amalric (during whose minority Theodoric administered also the government of the Visigothic kingdom), and an expedition against the robber hordes of the Bulgarians, the whole of his long reign was devoted to the consolidation and development of his new kingdom. His followers received only one-third of the conquered country; the rest was legally secured to the rightful possessors. He made Ravenna his capital, occasionally, when his northern frontier was threatened, removing to Verona.

Theodoric showed no desire of further conquest; cultivated the friendship and esteem of the surrounding nations; ruled all classes of his subjects with irresistible authority, but with corresponding justice and moderation; zealously promoted agriculture and commerce; and, himself an Arian, exhibited a tolerance of all other sects which was then almost unknown. The one great error of his administration consisted in his wholly neglecting to assimilate his Ostrogothic subjects with the previous inhabitants, either by a common code of laws or by common official preferment. Theodoric left no son; but his daughter, Amalasuntha (q.v.), succeeded him as regent for her son, Athalaric. Theodoric became a hero of many Germanic legends under the name of Dietrich of Bern. Among the men who held office under Theodoric were Boëthius and Cassiodorus. The former, who had incurred the suspicions of the monarch toward the close of his reign, was unjustly put to death. Consult: Hodgkin, Theodoric the Goth (London and New York, 1893); Gibbon, Decline and Fall, vol. iv., ed. by Bury (London and New York, 1898); Hodgkin, Italy and Her Invaders, vol. iii. (Oxford, 1885); Dahn, Die Könige der Germanen, part iii. (Würzburg, 1866).