Gothic War (535–554)
Twenty years of war in which the armies of Justinian destroyed the Ostrogothic kingdom and restored imperial rule over Italy, at the cost of devastating the peninsula.
- Date
- 535–554year known · duration: ≈ 19 years
- Place
- Rometoday: Rome, Italy · Western and Central Europe
- Participants
- Byzantine Empire, Ostrogoths, Justinian I, Belisarius, Narses
- Threads
- Early medieval Europe (500–1000)
- Also known as
- Gothic War; Готские войны; Italian war of Justinian; Battle of Taginae; Битва при Тагинах
In 535 Belisarius took Sicily; in 536 he captured Naples and on 9 December entered Rome, which he then held against the Gothic king Witiges through a year-long siege (537–538). In May 540 he entered Ravenna, the Gothic capital. But the Goths rallied under Totila, who exploited the plague, Justinian’s war with Persia and the quarrels of the imperial generals to reconquer most of Italy; Rome changed hands several times.
The decisive campaign came in 552, when the eunuch general Narses marched an army of imperial troops and barbarian allies around the Adriatic, defeated and killed Totila at Taginae, and then defeated his successor Teia at Mons Lactarius. In 554 Narses destroyed a Frankish and Alamannic invasion, and Justinian’s Pragmatic Sanction regulated the government of Italy; the last Gothic strongholds, Verona and Brescia, fell only in 562. The ruined country could not resist the Lombard invasion of 568.
Connections
Causes and preconditions
- Vandalic WarJune 533 – March 534 · AfricaThe easy conquest of Africa encouraged Justinian to attack Ostrogothic Italy
Related events
- Theodoric takes Ravenna490 – 5 March 493 · Western and Central EuropeThe war destroyed the Ostrogothic kingdom founded by Theodoric in 493
- Plague of Justinian541–549 · Balkans and AnatoliaThe plague of 542 weakened the empire just as Totila began to reconquer Italy
- Jordanes and Procopius describe the Sclaveni and the Antesbetween 550 and 554 · Balkans and AnatoliaProcopius’ account of the Slavs is part of his history of this war, in which Antes served in Italy
- Lombard invasion of Italy2 April 568 – 572 · Western and Central EuropeItaly, ruined by twenty years of war, could not resist the invaders
Same participants
- Construction of Hagia Sophia23 February 532 – 27 December 537 · Balkans and Anatoliavia Byzantine Empire
Same place
- Great Fire of Rome19 July 64 – c. 27 July 64 · Western and Central Europe
- Inauguration of the Colosseum80 · Western and Central Europe
- Antonine Plague165–180 · Western and Central Europe
- Constitutio Antoniniana212 · Western and Central Europe
- Crisis of the Third CenturyMarch 235 – 20 November 284 · Western and Central Europe
- Aurelian Walls271–275 · Western and Central Europe
- Battle of the Milvian Bridge28 October 312 · Western and Central Europe
- Sack of Rome by the Visigoths24–27 August 410 · Western and Central Europe
- Vandal sack of Rome2–16 June 455 · Western and Central Europe
- Coronation of Charlemagne25 December 800 · Western and Central Europe
- Imperial coronation of Otto I2 February 962 · Western and Central Europe
- Fourth Council of the Lateran11–30 November 1215 · Western and Central Europe
- “Summa Theologica” by Thomas Aquinas1265–1274 · Western and Central Europe
- Sack of Rome (1527)6 May 1527 · Western and Central Europe
Meanwhile in the world
Other regions, within a year of this event
Eastern Europe
- Early Slavic cultures: Prague-Korchak, Penkovka and Kolochinc. 450 – c. 700
- Kyi, Shchek and Khoryv: the legendary founding of Kyivbetween 500 and 700
Balkans and Anatolia
- Plague of Justinian541–549
- Jordanes and Procopius describe the Sclaveni and the Antesbetween 550 and 554
- Construction of Hagia Sophia23 February 532 – 27 December 537
- Corpus Juris Civilis7 April 529 – 16 November 534
Africa
- Vandalic WarJune 533 – March 534
The same period
Sources
- Wikipedia (English): Gothic War (535–554)
- Wikipedia (Russian): Готские войны (535—554)
- Прокопий Кесарийский. Война с готами / пер. С. П. Кондратьева. — М.: Изд-во АН СССР, 1950.
- Heather P. Rome Resurgent: War and Empire in the Age of Justinian. — Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2018.
- Wikidata: Q477973