Attila:The Scourge of God

THIRTY-EIGHT

With mingled pride and sadness, Aspar watched his new army file out of Marcianopolis: pride because, starting from a base consisting of the demoralized survivors of the Thracian Chersonesus, he had built a formidable force, trained and equipped to the highest standards; sadness because, in engaging the hordes of Attila, many — perhaps most — would inevitably die. Ratiaria might be in Attila’s hands, but the East’s other workshops had worked night and day to provide his men with the finest weapons and armour that Roman industry and craftmanship could produce. No soldiers of his would face battle in cheap ridge helmets and stiff scale-armour cuirasses, as worn by Western troops. Instead, they would be protected by tough yet flexible coats of chain mail, and by helmets of the superior Attic type — unchanged since Alexander’s day — complete with brow reinforcement and cheek-pieces, and with bowl and neck-guard forged from a single sheet of iron for maximum strength.

The army formed up in marching order on level ground outside the city: heavy cavalry such as the Arubian Catafractarii from the Black Sea province of Scythia; light cavalry like the Augustan Horse and First Theodosians; crack infantry units — the Fifth Macedonian Legion, the Second Thracian Cohort, the Third Diocletians, et cetera; specialist units — archers, slingers, catapult-men, doctors, armourers; the ballistae and onagri; the wagons loaded with arrows and javelins, armour, rations, and spares. Escorted by two famous palatine vexillationes, the Arcadians and Honorians, the three commanders, Arnegliscus, Aspar, and Areobindus, took their places at the head of the column. Arnegliscus raised his arm; all down the line the sonorous booming of the bucinatores’ trumpets sounded, and the army began to move. Swinging along at the regulation pace of three Roman miles per hour, it headed westwards on the Nicopolis road: towards Attila, towards destiny.

‘You’ve chosen well,’ Arnegliscus told Aspar, as the two generals looked down on the imperial dispositions from the wooded slopes on the army’s right.

‘Thank you, sir,’ acknowledged Aspar. ‘Provided our men keep their nerve and hold the line, we should be able to block the Huns’ advance — for a time, at least — and inflict heavy casualties. Realistically, that’s about the most we can hope to achieve. We haven’t the manpower for anything else.’

In the shadowy half-light of the first hour, the recently assembled units resembled black rectangular patches sewn on a grey cloak. The infantry were drawn up eight ranks deep, between high wooded ground guarding their right flank, and the River Utus¹ on their left. Heavy cavalry, mailed clibanarii and catafractarii, forming the wings, were stationed a little in front of the line, behind which were the archers, both horse and foot. Forming a protective screen several hundred yards in front of the main force were the light cavalry, mounted spearmen and scutarii with small round shields and javelins. Their job was not to try to stop the enemy but to slow its advance and cause maximum disruption, before falling back to reinforce the heavy horse. Positioned on the steep terrain on the right, wherever the ground was sufficiently level, catapults had been set up and the trees clear-felled in front of them so as not to impede the shot. Using the energy stored up in twisted hanks of sinew or hair, these formidable machines could discharge heavy bolts or round projectiles with terrific force, lethal up to several hundred yards. As an aid to aiming, painted stones marking various ranges had been sited in what would become neutral ground between the armies.

Scouts had reported that the Huns, bypassing the refortified section of the frontier in Moesia Prima, were approaching eastwards along the corridor of level land between the Danubius to the north, and the Haemus range² to the south. Here, in the neck of the corridor, in the province of Dacia Ripensis, Aspar, with the agreement of the other two generals, had chosen to confront the Huns. As Arnegliscus had implied, it was a strong position, allowing the imperial army to present a broad front to the enemy, thus utilising its manpower effectively, but with sufficient depth to provide stability. The river on the left flank, and the wooded bluffs on the right, ensured that the army could not be outflanked — always the greatest danger with the Huns. While favouring the Romans, the constricted nature of the site also prevented the Huns, who had overwhelming superiority in numbers, from deploying more than a fraction of their forces at one time.

Between the second and third hours, scouts galloped up from the west with the news that the Huns had broken camp and their van would soon be in sight. The bucinatores sounded their trumpets, and the army, which had been allowed to rest, was stood to arms. Two orderlies appeared before the army, carrying between them an improvised tribunal which they placed on the ground. Arnegliscus, the German master-commander, mounted the platform.

‘Soldiers, we shall shortly be in battle with the Huns,’ he began, speaking awkwardly, in clipped, guttural tones. ‘For many of you, it will be your first battle, and you may well be afraid, because of what you have heard about the Huns as fighters. I tell you this: you need not fear the Huns. They are savages, barbarians. A Roman is worth two of them. The only reason they have been successful so far is that there are so many of them compared to us. Well, today their numbers will count for far less. As you can see from our position, they can only bring against us at one time the same numbers with which we will oppose them. Stand firm today, and we will show the world that Attila is not invincible.’

The little speech seemed to go down well, perhaps because, lacking the rhetorical flourishes which a Roman commander would have employed in addressing his troops, it came over as honest and sincere. The soldiers showed their appreciation by beating their shields loudly with their spears.

Soon after Arnegliscus had stepped down from the tribunal, dust-clouds on the western horizon signalled the approach of the Huns. The skirmishers, having done their work, came racing back ahead of the enemy to rejoin the Roman formations. Moments later, the Hun van swept down upon the Roman line. The front held firm; confronted by a hedge of blades, at the last second the enemy riders peeled away to left and right, taking casualties from the volley of darts and javelins that arced up from the Roman ranks.

After the shock and confusion of the initial encounter, both sides settled down to a grim contest of attrition. Time after time, Hun charges against the Roman line stalled, the horses balking in face of the wicked spear-points. Meanwhile, the Roman catapults, from their high ground to the right of the line, wreaked fearful damage on the Huns. The ballistae resembled giant cross-bows, each arm being inserted into a column of sinews clamped in a frame. Cranked back with a lever-and-ratchet mechanism, when released by a trigger the bowstring discharged a heavy bolt along a groove. These projectiles, shooting downhill with tremendous force into the dense masses of Huns, sometimes skewered several bodies together, or turned horses into pain-maddened, uncontrollable liabilities. The other type of catapult, the aptly named onager or ‘kicking ass’, had an arm ending in a sling to hold a heavy ball. Also powered by twisted sinews, when wound down then released it was even more destructive, if less accurate, than the ballista; anyone struck by a lump of iron weighing twenty pounds, and travelling at enormous speed, if he was not killed outright was going to be put out of action — permanently.

The Romans’ choice of terrain denied the Huns their favourite, and winning, tactic: outflanking then encircling their opponents. Being forced to fight on the Romans’ terms on a narrow front put them at a considerable disadvantage; their strengths of speed, mobility, and firepower, were comparatively ineffective against a shield-wall maintained by armoured men, who could be attacked only from the front. And successive charges by the Roman heavy horse, invulnerable in mail, cut bloody swathes through their van, leaving heaps of dead and dying men and horses to impede others trying to attack the Roman front. Roman archers, too, shooting in safety from behind the rear rank, took a steady toll, as did the volleys of darts and javelins which the pedites, constantly supplied by runners bringing replenishments from the wagons, were able to maintain.

But the constant sleet of Hun arrows slowly began to thin the Roman ranks. Perhaps only one arrow in twenty found a mark, but so heavy and unremitting was the barrage that the casualty rate crept up inexorably. As gaps appeared, the file-closers pushed men up from behind to fill them, causing the Roman line to narrow dangerously from eight ranks, to six, to four. . Sensing the situation was becoming critical, Arnegliscus removed his helmet, his long yellow hair allowing him to be instantly recognized, and rode along the Roman front exhorting the soldiers to stand firm. An obvious target, it was not long before his horse was killed beneath him; then he himself fell in the act of mounting a fresh steed, his brain transfixed by a Hun arrow.

Now in overall command, Aspar knew there could only be one conclusion to the battle. Had the sides been evenly matched, the day would have undoubtedly gone to the Romans. But with their huge preponderance in numbers the Huns could sustain enormous losses and still keep putting men into the field. Nevertheless, surveying the endless windrows of Hun dead that made the battlefield resemble a wheatfield after a hailstorm, Aspar felt a grim satisfaction. The Huns might win the battle, but it would be a Pyrrhic victory. It was clear that they had suffered losses on a scale which must leave them severely, perhaps permanently, weakened.

The fighting raged on until dusk. By then the Roman line had narrowed to a ribbon a mere two ranks deep — but still valiantly holding firm. As daylight began to bleed away, the Huns withdrew. Loading as many of the wounded as could be found on to the wagons, the Romans left the field and began to retreat eastwards, in good order. The formations they had maintained throughout the day were exactly delineated on the battlefield by the corpses of the slain, all facing the west. Whole numeri and legions had perished: the Third and Fourth Decimani, the Stobensian Horse, the Dafne Ballistiers, the Saracen Horse, the First and Second Isaurians, and many, many more. Though few had survived, their morale remained unbroken, for they had fought the Huns to a standstill, giving such an account of themselves that Attila must surely hesitate before again taking on a Roman army.

The following day, Attila inspected the field with a heavy heart. He had not taken part in the battle, for such was not his way; his was the mind that planned, not the hand that fought. The scale of the slaughter on the Hun side was immense — far, far worse than that suffered at Tolosa. It would take a generation to make good such losses. With a feeling akin to despair, Attila wondered, for the first time, if he could ever really beat the Romans, at least the Romans of the East. They were perhaps too populous, too organized, their cities too strong, for a barbarian people to defeat permanently. Especially now that they seemed, under strong leadership, to have discovered a new determination and fighting spirit. Or perhaps it was more a case of them having re-discovered the qualities that had made Rome great in the first place.

Had his life, despite all his fame and conquests, been a failure? In his dream of a Greater Scythia he had reached for the stars, but they had proved beyond his grasp. And now, perhaps, his invincibility as a warrior might begin to disappear, as the snows of the Caucasus melted in the spring. The Chinese had a saying: ‘He who rides a tiger cannot dismount, lest it rend him.’ Well, he was riding a tiger, the tiger of his people. He was old now and beginning to tire, but he had no choice except to continue to lead them in the course he had embarked them on, the course of slaughter and rapine. Even should that, in the end, bring about his and their destruction.

‘What now, friend?’ Areobindus asked Aspar, as the two generals, with what was left of the army, came in sight of the rebuilt walls of Constantinople.

‘Now we ride out the storm,’ replied the new Master of Soldiers, with a grim smile. He had no illusions about how terrible would be the vengeance that Attila would wreak on the Eastern Empire, for having the temerity to stand against him and inflict tremendous damage on his forces. The East would raise another army, as Rome had done after Cannae, but that would take time. Meanwhile, they must prepare to endure the whirlwind that the Scourge of God would surely unleash on them.

The battered but proud remnant of the great army that had marched out from Marcianopolis just weeks before, entered the capital by the Hadrianopolis Gate, to be cheered to the echo through the streets by the vast throng that had turned out to give them a heroes’ welcome: news of their stand against Attila had preceded them. Shrewd and tough, the citizens of Constantinople knew the greatness of the debt they owed such men and their leaders. The Emperor might hide from the national crisis in his palace, and his chief minister Chrysaphius scheme only to enrich himself, but with men of the calibre of Aspar, Anatolius, and Constantine to steer the ship of state through the perilous waters that lay ahead, they were confident the empire would be saved.

That night, Aspar had a dream; a solemn funeral procession moved along the Mese, which was lined by the mourning citizens of Constantinople, through the five great fora, past the Hippodrome and the great square of the Augusteum, to the Cathedral of the Holy Wisdom. The pallbearers placed the open coffin on the marble catafalque, which bore the inscription ‘THEODOSIUS’.

He woke feeling disorientated. The vision had been so real, so vivid — it was more like a memory than a dream. He tried to put it out of his mind, but it kept recurring. Was it a portent? A warning? A sudden chill ran through him, as a third possibility presented itself. An admonition? Immediately, he closed his mind against the thought. He was no traitor; all his life he had served the Emperor loyally, and he would continue to do so. But a part of his mind — the Cassius part, he thought ironically — seemed to ask, ‘But if the Emperor is unworthy, should not your loyalty be to the empire?’ And so began a dialogue in his mind between ‘Brutus’ and ‘Cassius’, Cassius urging that the well-being of the state would be served by the removal of its present ruler, Brutus countering with the argument that the curse of the Roman Empire in the past had been ambitious generals wading through blood to seize the throne.

At length, after protracted mental debate, Aspar faced the stark truth. So long as Theodosius lived, the Eastern Empire would continue to pay tribute to the Huns — a disgraceful humiliation which no self-respecting state should endure, especially if that state was the heir to the greatest civilization the world had known, and the tribute extorted by a race of illiterate savages. And Theodosius was not yet fifty; he might live another twenty, even thirty, years. But if Aspar were to contrive the death of Theodosius and himself assume the purple, he would be condemned as yet another murdering usurper, an Arian and barbarian to boot, motivated by selfish ambition; the consequence might well be bloody civil war. No: the successor must be a man of stature, with a career of solid achievement to his credit, acceptable to Senate and Consistory, but a man who could never be accused of acting solely from ambition. A man also of spotless integrity, proven courage, and highest principle. Did such a paragon exist? Yes, Aspar knew just such a one. This very day he would approach him.

Cassius had prevailed over Brutus.

¹ The Vid, in Bulgaria.

² The Balkan Mountains, in Bulgaria.