2100 YEARS OR TRIBAL INVASION
400BC TO 1700AD
(See maps below how to use and where)

THE GOTHS
The Goths were a German people.  They originated in Scandinavia, but by the 2nd century AD had moved into what is now south Russia.  The Goths adopted fighting on horseback.  This arose from the need to navigate the vast plains of Eastern Europe and southern Russia.  The Goths took quickly to mounted warfare aided by the discovery of the stirrup in Europe.  Goths considered warfare the ultimate experience.  On horseback they could wager war faster and further than in the past.  Like nomads, they were always on the move.

There were two groups of Goths, the Visigoths (western Goths) and the Ostrogoths (the eastern Goths).  They came on the scene in the 3rd century when they swarmed out of south Russia both by land and sea to beset the Roman Empire.  The Goths had been moving because of the attacking pressure of the Huns.  All were looking for resources, food and plunder.  Not too well prepared, The Romans were able to drive them back. In the mid 4th century, these tribes were attacked by even more vicious tribes, the Huns. The Visigoths sought security within the Roman Empire, offering to help defend the Balkans in return for land, but Emperor Valens spurned their offer.  So they invaded and in 378 overwhelmed the Roman army at Adrianople using cavalry in combination with a fortified camp.  Within a century, the Visigoths drifted west to settle in south Gaul (France) and Spain – creating a kingdom of their own.

The Ostrogoths found themselves the wards of the Huns and participated in the Hunnish invasions of Europe during the 1st half of the 5th century fighting under Attila the Hun against their Visigoth cousins and the Romans at the great battle of Chalons (451 AD).  The Huns and their allies lost this battle and thus, began their rapid decline.  The Ostrogoths for time settled in the Balkans, where they were more or less subject to the authority of the Eastern Roman Emperor.  In 493 The Emperor authorized the Ostros to occupy Italy, which was then under control of other Germanic tribes.  Under their able King Theoderic, the Goths did accomplish integration and establish a kingdom of their own.   The end came in the 6th century when the Roman Emperor Justinian decided to regain imperial control over Italy.  The war lasted over 20 years and brought absolute ruination to Italy.  The Ostrogoths kingdom ceased to exist.

The Visigoth kingdom in Spain (The Franks drove them out of most of France in the 6th century) proved to be a vigorous one.  With a stable government and a rich province, their kingdom flourished.  But in 711 AD the Islamic warrior chief Taric led a raid across the Straits of Gibraltar.  Within a few years Visigothic Spain was no more, destroyed by the Islamic tide.   A remnant of the Roman and Visigothic fugitives established them in northern Spain and became the nuclei from which the RECONQUISTA was undertaken.