Born into Hunnic aristocracy early in the fifth century, Attila and his elder brother Bleda were nephews of King Rugila. The Huns were a nomadic, pastoralist society who, from the fourth century AD, had been migrating west towards the Roman Empire. Growing up, Bleda and Attila would have learnt to ride almost as soon as they could walk. They would also have been trained as archers, for the Huns were renowned for being able to dispatch arrows with great accuracy from horseback in battle. He was certainly known to have had many wives, polygamy helping to bind the Hunnic clans together.
When King Rugila died in 434, he was succeeded by his nephews. We don’t know how Bleda and Attila got on, but they seem to have at least tolerated each other, successfully co-ruling for over a decade. In 445, however, Bleda was dead. Some hinted at Attila’s involvement and, whilst there is no direct evidence, dispatching his brother in a bid for power would certainly fit what we later know of his character.
In reality, however, this immense ‘empire’ was no more than a loose coalition of tribes, bound together by the genius and military prowess of Attila, says Miles Russell. Priscus, an envoy sent from Constantinople to Attila’s court, came face to face with the King, and observed that “he was a very wise counsellor, merciful to those who sought it and loyal to those he had accepted as friends”. In fact, so generous could he be to his supporters that, Priscus noted, many considered life with the Huns to be better than in the Roman Empire; corruption, injustice and taxation all being unknown. While Attila lived, his empire was a successful business operation.
From the few facts that can be established one thing is clear – we are dealing with an astonishing personality who grips the imagination, says John Man. Driven by overweening ambition and an addiction to booty, Attila attempted far more than he could ever achieve. Set on ruling as much of the world as he could grab, his ambition drove him to risk everything against overwhelming odds. In 447, he was at the towering and utterly impenetrable walls of Constantinople, perhaps hoping to take advantage of damage caused by a recent earthquake. Too late: by the time he got there across the Balkans, the walls had been repaired.
The evidence suggests that Attila’s ambition was not simply personal. It was a political necessity. To keep his restless chieftains happy, he needed loot. At first that meant raids; then war; and finally, as his empire grew, large-scale conquest.
The affair was discovered, Eugenius executed, and Honoria betrothed to a rich consul. In his Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, Gibbon portrays Honoria as a dizzy teenager. In fact she was a scheming thirty-something. Seething with rage, she determined to exact vengeance on her brother and take power for herself. Knowing that Attila had plans to invade Gaul, she sent off a loyal eunuch, Hyacinthus, to Attila, asking him to rescue her from a loathsome marriage, promising cash. Hyacinthus carried her ring as a pledge of good faith, with the implication that she was willing to become Attila’s wife. Honoria’s actions were discovered. On his return, Hyacinthus was beheaded.
Rome’s predominantly Christian society viewed the Huns with a mixture of horror and fascination. The Roman historian Jordanes described them as “little, foul, emaciated creatures possessing only the shadow of speech; monsters with faces made of shapeless collops of flesh” whilst Ammianus Marcellinus noted that they were always untrustworthy and unpredictable. Living their entire life on horseback, Ammianus observed that they possessed only rudimentary cooking skills, eating either roots or animal flesh “which they warm by placing it between their own thighs and the backs of their horses”.
One evident truth Ammianus records was that the Huns were “immoderately covetous of gold”. Positioned at the northern fringe of the Roman world, they were a near and present danger, able to extort a large amount of the precious metal from their Mediterranean neighbours.
In the spring of AD 451, Attila crossed the river Rhine at the head of a vast army. The reasons for this sudden change of strategy, from extortion to military intervention, are unclear. It may be that, in order to stay in power, he required a major demonstration of strength. Alternatively, it may be that he felt the Western Roman Empire simply hadn’t paid him enough respect (or gold). History tells us that the catalyst was the letter from Honoria (detailed above). Whatever the true reason, the Huns were now inside the Empire, burning, looting and killing large numbers of civilians.
On the morning of 20 June 451, both sides clashed on the Catalaunian Plains, near Troyes, northeast France. More than 160,000 died on either side, the Roman historian Jordanes noting the fields were “piled high with bodies” and the rivers “swollen with blood”. It was close, but the Huns were beaten.
Whatever the reason, allowing Attila to go free would ultimately prove to be a costly mistake. Attila could not be content with this stroke of luck, because he was out of cash with which to keep his troops happy. The following year, Attila returned with an even larger army, this time striking deep into northern Italy, aiming at Rome itself. In the event, having taken a dozen cities in the Po valley, the Huns were stopped by disease and famine, not by military defeat, and returned to Hungary for the last time.
Hungary was founded by Árpád, who led his Magyar people over the Carpathians in 896. Yet there is, deep in the Hungarian psyche, the shrewd suspicion that Árpád was only reclaiming land staked out 450 years before by Attila. That is the story related in the 13th-century chronicle, Gesta Hungarorum. By the 15th century, Attila had become a sort of Hungarian Charlemagne, the forefather not only of the Arpads but of Hungary’s greatest king, Matthias Corvinus, praised by his courtiers as the second Attila.
Until recently, Hungarian histories often reproduced a pseudo-biblical family tree, in which Attila begat four generations of descendants, who at last begat Árpád, (although each of them would have produced his heir at the age of 100). To Hungarians, he was a Hungarian at heart, and they honour him. Attila is a common boy’s name and many towns have streets named after him.)
Attila’s death deprived the Huns of a great and charismatic leader. Within a few years, their empire had disintegrated. It may have been no more than a violent, short-lived robber state, but the impact of the Hunnic Empire upon the political, religious and cultural institutions of Europe was profound. The meeting between Leo and Attila proved a turning point for the Western Empire, demonstrating that it was the Bishop of Rome who wielded ultimate power. Arguably, it was this that cemented the status of the papacy and ended the secular supremacy of the emperors.
Attila’s burial is the subject of further mystery. The sources mention that the Huns did something with three metals, gold, silver and iron, which eventually inspired a legend that he was buried inside a triple coffin. (This became popular currency, especially after a novel, Geza Gardonyi’s The Invisible Man (1902), brought the legend vividly to life, yet almost certainly, the coffin was of wood, containing at most a few personal relics, with small symbolic clasps of the three metals.)
And then came the burial itself, in secret and carried out “in the earth”, not in a tumulus, with the pall-bearers supposedly being slain to keep the site a secret. This part may be true, for slaves could have acted as grave-diggers and then been despatched, leaving only a few leaders to guard the secret.
Dr Miles Russell is a senior lecturer in prehistoric and Roman archaeology at Bournemouth University and the author of 15 books.
This article amalgamates two features, published in the Christmas 2016 issue of BBC History Revealed magazine and the March 2005 issue of BBC History Magazine, written respectively by Miles Russell and John Man