VALENS, East Roman emperor from 364 to 378, owed his elevation in the 36th year of his age to his brother, Valen cinian, who chose him to be his associate in the empire. Valens had been attached to Julian's bodyguard, but he did not inherit the military ability of his father, Gratian of Pannonia. A revolt headed by Procopius in the second year of his reign was quelled by the ability of his generals. In the year 366 Valens at one stroke reduced the taxes of the empire by one-fourth, a very popular measure, though one of questionable policy in the face of the threatening attitude of the Goths on the lower Danube. Before venturing on a campaign against them, Valens received baptism from Eudoxus, the Arian bishop of Constantinople. After some small successes over the Goths, won by his generals (367 369), Valens concluded a peace with them, which lasted six years, on a general understanding that the Danube was to be the bound ary between Goths and Romans. On his return to Constantinople in 369-370 Valens began to persecute his orthodox and Catholic subjects, but he lacked the energy to carry out his edicts.
In the years 3 71 to 3 77 Valens was in Asia Minor, most of the time at the Syrian Antioch. Though anxious to avoid an Eastern war, because of danger nearer home from the Goths, he was com pelled to take the field against Shapur II. Valens crossed the Euphrates in 3 73, and drove back the king of Persia to the farther bank of the Tigris. But the Roman success was by no means decisive, and no definite understanding as to boundaries was come to with Persia. Valens returned to Antioch, where in the winter of 3 74 he instituted a persecution of magicians. Between 3 74 and 3 77 we read of grievous complaints of injustice and extortion perpetrated under legal forms. Although prepara tions were made for following up the war with Persia and secur ing the frontier, a truce was patched up, rather to the disadvantage of the empire, Armenia and the adjacent country being half conquered and arnexed by Shapur. The armies of Rome, in fact,
were wanted in another quarter. The Huns, of whom we now hear for the first time, were beginning in 376 to press the Goths from the north, and the latter asked leave of the emperor to cross the Danube into Roman territory. This they were allowed to do, on the condition that they came unarmed, and their children were transported to Asia as hostages. The conditions, however, were not observed by the imperial generals. Accordingly, the enraged Goths. under their chief Fritigern, streamed across the Balkans into Thrace and the country round Adrianople, plunder ing, burning and slaughtering as they went. They were driven back for a time, but returned in the spring of 378 in greater force, with a contingent of Huns and Alans; and penetrated to the neighbourhood of Adrianople. Valens left Constantinople in May 3 78 with a strong and well-officered army. Without awaiting the arrival of his nephew Gratian, emperor of the West, who had just won a great victory over the Alamanni, Valens attacked the enemy at once. The battle, which was fought on confined ground in a valley, was decided by a cavalry charge of the Alans and Sarmatians, which threw the Roman infantry into confusion and hemmed it in so closely that the men could scarcely draw their swords. The slaughter, which continued till the complete destruc tion of the Roman army, was one of the greatest recorded in antiquity. Valens perished either on the field or, as some said, in a cottage fired by the enemy. From the battle of Adrianople the Goths permanently established themselves south of the Danube.